Inaugural Design Museum - Beazley Designs

The 2016 edition of Beazley Designs of the Year at the Design Museum was one of the inaugural exhibitions presented in the museum’s new Kensington home. Open from November 2016 to February 2017, the exhibition showcased more than seventy innovative projects selected from around the world across six categories: Architecture, Digital, Fashion, Graphics, Product, and Transport. The exhibition highlighted the growing role of design in addressing social, environmental, and humanitarian challenges, featuring projects ranging from refugee housing and sustainable products to digital health services and experimental fashion. A standout winner was Better Shelter, a flat-pack emergency housing solution developed in partnership with the IKEA Foundation and UNHCR, which received both the Architecture Award and the overall Beazley Design of the Year prize. Other notable winners included David Bowie’s Blackstar album artwork by Jonathan Barnbrook for Graphic Design, the Space Cup developed for astronauts in microgravity for Product Design, and the Lumos bicycle helmet for Transport Design. Together, the nominated projects demonstrated how contemporary design extends beyond aesthetics to solve real-world problems, making the 2016 exhibition a compelling snapshot of design’s cultural and social impact.