“It is important for us to ensure the values of a designer are not just to design and throwing old spaces. With all the things happening in the age of climate change, there is even a bigger need of consciousness and awareness from the students to be a good designer and be equipped with the good values that community can benefit,” Nippon Paint Group General Manager Gladys Goh said in a recent interview with the BusinessMirror on the sidelines of this year’s launching of the Asia Young Designer Award (Ayda) held in Makati City.
Goh said the search is now on for architecture and interior-design students from the Philippines who will compete in the regional finals in Malaysia early next year. This is the fourth year that the country has been participating in Ayda, and it will be the first time that the local search will feature foreign guest judges.
Since its launching in 2008, Ayda has become one of the most sought-after and highly anticipated industry award programs that encompass 14 more countries throughout the region, namely: Bangladesh, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, India, Japan, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam. This year marks Ayda’s landmark 10th anniversary.
Ayda is also Nippon Paint’s signature corporate social responsibility program that provides a much-needed platform to expose today’s young professionals to design trends, to provide them with mentoring and coaching from renowned architects and interior designers, and to allow them to interact and network cross-culturally with fellow young specifiers from theAseanregion.
Every year, interior-design and architecture students are challenged on a particular theme to come up with innovative ideas in changing the way that people live, as influenced by design. This year’s theme is entitled “You For Tomorrow: Future Living, As Envisioned Today”.
“It is important for us to keep in mind the rapid development of our world. Even as we speak, we face numerous challenges in terms of adapting to our environment and attaining quality of life for all,” Goh said.
“With this year’s Ayda competition, we ask our youth to start becoming responsible and responsive toward the challenge of aesthetics combined with sustainability and environmental sensitivity,” she added.
Since joining Ayda in 2014, the Philippines has been making a huge positive impact on the growing interest and passion of young Filipinos in the areas of interior design and architecture.
Last year a total of over 1,200 Filipino students in both architecture and interior-design categories participated in the competition, coming from 27 schools all over the country. “We look forward to even stronger support and participation from our young Filipino students, especially in this year’s momentous 10th anniversary of Ayda,” Nippon Paint (Coatings) Philippines General Manager Michael Francisco said.
For this year’s Philippine leg of the competition, a panel of respected judges from the interior-design and architecture industries both locally and abroad have been assembled in order to select the deserving Filipino representatives to the regional AYDA competition.
The panel of judges in the architecture category is headed by architect Consuelo Buencamino, along with fellow architects Nina Bailon Arce, Maria Benita Regala, Jose Ramon Carunungan, William Ti Jr., Veronica Villanueva, and an international judge, architect Boon Che Wee. Architect ChonaElvas-Ponce,will serve as the competition’s academic advisor.
Wee is based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and is the president of the Malaysian Institute of Architects. He has also served on the Board of Architects Malaysia, as well as the Board of Town Planner Malaysia. He was the accreditation panel chairman of the Green Building Index, the certification body for green buildings and sustainable townships in Malaysia.
The panel of judges in the interior-design category was headed by interior designer Wilfrid Magcase together with other fellow interior designers Michael Pizarro, Belen Morey, Cynthia Almario, Ivy Almario, Cara Marie Marcelo, Rachelle Medina, and an international judge, David Tay. Imelda Reyes serves as the competition’s business advisor.
Tay is the principal of his own interior- design firm, ETHOSpace, based in Singapore. He has worked on projects not just within Asia but in the Middle East and Europe, as well.
Source: Business Mirror | 27 September 2017
