On April 8th, The German IF Design Award, an authoritative global industrial design award, announced the winner list of the 2016 IF Student Design Award.  Zhan Bei, Lu Bin and Hu Yipeng, 3 students from our School of Industry Design, formed a design group to take part in the competition.  Under the guidance of their tutor, teacher Deng Weibin, the team submitted their work “Free Cup”, which stood out from more than 11,000 pieces of works and won the 2016 IF Student Design Award. 

The design concept of “Free Cup” is combining coffee packaging with a coffee cup.  People can easily satisfy their need for coffee by carrying this coffee packet with them when going out.  At present, the demand for coffee is increasing.  And instant coffee is popular because of its convenience—its ready-to-drink.  The design work is oriented to the group of people who demand coffee, and have a rapid pace of life.  It lets people enjoy the pleasant taste of coffee, anytime and anywhere.  The design was also highly praised by both domestic and foreign experts for simplifying the instant coffee making process - customers could drink coffee just by opening the packing bags, squeezing the bags on both sides to make them look like cups, and pouring hot water into them.

German IF Design Award enjoys equal popularity with Red Dot Design Award, which is one of the internationally recognized top awards for global industrial design.  It also enjoys the title of “Oscar” in industrial design. Each year, only the top 100 promising young designers are able to be granted this honor after struggling against more than 10 thousand competitors.  After some teachers and students from our School of Industry Design won awards in Red Dot Concept Award last year, some other teachers and students from our School of Industry Design again received recognition from international design authorities and won awards in IF Design Award.