Hiroshima rules at design awards
Hiroshima designers took three of the top four prizes at the lighting company
Daiko's annual Akari hyakunin hyaku touten design contest. The top prize was awarded to
a graduate of the local Anabuki Design School, and two teachers from the school also took prizes.
Winner of one of the "Product Awards" was freelance creator Mendel Jonkers with his
"Space Nouveau" lamp.
Mendel says, "It was funny because at the award ceremony in Tokyo we all spoke in Hiroshima-ben."
After receiving their awards, "there was a lecture
about lighting and the woman next to me just fell a sleep and nobody
pretended to notice because it was embarrassing, I just thought it was
hilarious and nearly burst out in laughter."
|
The real prize is that the lamp will be out into production and Mendel will
receive a percentage of each one sold. Mendel says that this was what he had been
silently hoping for, but confesses that, "after seeing the other Hiroshima entries, my
hope dropped a little because I felt that their level was quite high and
thought "Well, if Hiroshima is all ready this good then from all over the
country it must be much better." This turned out not to be the case,
luckily." |
Mendel's winning lamp
|
"The lamp itself is made of
sakura/cherry wood and stainless steel also it has some acryl cut lenses
to create the beams of light it emits to make an interesting
pattern on the floor or table. I used many special and traditional
techniques and tools to make it but it has a very modern design. I was
wondering if people could appreciate that or not and if it it is good for
product design and mass production. I think I just got my answer to that."
The lamp is now on a nationwide tour, being exhibited everywhere from Hokkaido to Kyushu until next spring.
It took all
of Mendel's skills of persussion to get Daiko let him have it in Hiroshima for the
opening of his up coming exhibition.
|
Mendel is looking for investment to sett up his own furniture brand. "I'd do the design and probably making the prototypes and molds
etc and then the products would be produced in China and reimported to Japan. The aim would then to be market the products
across Japan, and then all over the world."
|
Mendel
|
It can be frustrating. It looked as though a Hiroshima company was all set to invest the huge amount of monet to do just that, but
just when seemed that all Mendel's hard work and networking over the past few years was about to pay off, the
deal fell through.
"I had a long meeting the other day and showed them about 50 designs I had been working on
for some time, but they reckoned that it wouldn't make the minimum target monthly income
for it to be profitable... Among other reasons. So, I guess I'm back to where I was."
Mendel is not one to put off by such set backs, and he is always looking to the future, and more
imporatntly always doing the work he loves.
"I got an interview the other day with Elle Deco interior
magazine to be published in the January or March edition. It's a national and worldwide magazine
and am looking
forward to seeing how that goes. Perhaps I'll start getting some orders
from other parts of the country, who knows."
Mendel's next exhibition is in Funairi Dec 11 - 17. The award-winning lampo will
be on display Saturday Dec 11 and Sunday Dec 12. Go say "hi" to Mendel at the opening party 5-7pm
on Saturday.
Click here for more details.
Links
December 2004
|
Similar Articles
