At this year's ADC Talent Award 2025, students from the Department of Design at the Niederrhein University of Applied Sciences were once again recognised for their outstanding design work.
The student team received two silver nails for their work on the collaborative project "Tabletop & Textile" - a transdisciplinary university project realised jointly by lecturers and students from the Departments of Design and Textile and Clothing Technology.
The project was realised in the winter semester 2024/25 by Prof. Lisa Freyschmidt and Prof. Nora Gummert-Hauser (Department of Design) and Dipl. Des. Anna Koch (Faculty of Textile and Clothing Technology) initiated and supervised the project. The conceptual and visual communication of the project was in the hands of the communication design students under the direction of Prof Gummert-Hauser.
With a concise, typographically sound corporate design, the students succeeded in translating the synergy between textile and porcelain design into a strong visual identity. The highlight of the project was the presentation at the Ambiente 2025 trade fair in Frankfurt am Main, where it was unveiled to an international audience of experts.
The jury of the Art Directors Club (ADC) honoured the work in the categories "Concept > Brand Identity/Design" and "Craft > Graphic Design/Typography" with a silver nail each. In their statement, the jurors emphasised the "simply captivating cleverness of the overall concept" and the convincing visualisation of the transdisciplinary collaboration. The strong typographic design, which is consistently used in print media, on the website, in social media and at the trade fair stand, was particularly emphasised.
The award-winning students: Johanna Alofs, Charlotte Finzel, Samuel Heinbach, Lena Bothe, Katharina Schladebach, Tessa Forck, Emily Kaufhold, Louisa Skowron and Jan Kersten.
In addition to the "Tabletop & Textile" project, two other works from the Department of Design were recognised in the renowned young talent competition, which set a new record this year with 532 submissions from 70 universities in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Julia Frolov's final thesis "The Featherprint Project" - supervised by Prof. Richard Jung and Prof. Thorsten Kraus - was awarded bronze and honoured three times over. The term paper "Kölsche Kaffee" by Hannes Delissen, Julius Lohmar, David Spielmanns and Jule Mehlmann, also supervised by Prof Richard Jung, also received an award.
The ADC Talent Award is regarded as one of the most important indicators of the quality of design training in the German-speaking world. "The successes once again emphasise the creative and conceptual level of training at the Department of Design," explains Nora Gummert-Hauser, graduate designer and Professor of Typography and Editorial Design at the Department of Design.
Further information and insights into all the award-winning projects can be found at: https: //www.adc.de/wettbewerb/adc-gallery/talents/year/2025
