BraunPrizeBlog

The other day e.sens.e (the media agency facilitating the digital media tricks and tweaks of the BraunPrize behind the scenes) informed me that the videos from the finalists presentations are online now. This year they’ve assembled a great Flash-Site which provides a coherent video and text overview of the BraunPrize 2007 finale as well as a virtual BraunPrize exhibition. Give it a look!

However beside the information contained over at the official BraunPrize website I’d thought that sharing the videos parallel here on this platform together with some personal observations might interest you as well ;-)

So first in line will be German designers Lena Billmeier and David Baur with their “Vision Energy” project, a dynamic and futuristic ecological sculpture designed as an artistic barometer for resource efficiency.

I’m heading to Kronberg later today for the welcome dinner with the BraunPrize team as well as the 5 finalists!

So far I neither know their names nor their submissions or nationalities and you can trust me that I’m quite excited to meet them … OK, if I think carefully I have one submission in mind which I’ve spotted right from the start earlier in March 2007. Let’s see if the ‘gadget’ makes its way to the finale ;-)

What is different this year from previous BraunPrize forums is that I will be hosting a part of the ceremony. I actually feel quite honored by this as there will be some 200 design experts present from across the globe! My task will be to moderate the time slot where the 5 finalists will present their BraunPrize entries to the public. More on this ‘experience’ when the mission is fulfilled ;-)

Accordingly my schedule for the next two days will be quite tight and we’ll meet tonight at 19:00 hrs. for a briefing dinner with Peter Schneider, Gerlinde Kress, the jury members and the rest of the crowd.

I will spend tomorrow morning together with the finalists and we will discuss the strategies of their 10 minutes presentation. For sure we will do some fine tuning as well as a rehearsal on stage.

Around 15:00 hrs. most of the BraunPrize forum members will arrive and the ceremony starts around 15:30 hrs. with a keynote by Peter Schneider. Some more information is to be found here at the BraunPrize website.

Finally around 18:00 hrs. I think the winner of the BraunPrize 2007 will be announced and afterwards Braun/Gillette will host a great dinner at the Braun/Gillette Headquarter with lots of food, wine, beer and the likes ;-)

My plan is to conduct some short audio interviews with some interesting guests. More on this later on this week. For those of you who can not join us there will be the opportunity to follow parts of the event via the well known webcam to be found at the entry page of the BraunPrize.

Time up to the final BraunPrize forum to be held on September 12th is getting closer. Only some 3 weeks to go :-)

In the light of my previous posting I’m happy to share some information released by Core77 today. As you might know Braun in conjunction with Core77 has organized a small quiz where you’ve been asked to answer a short set of questions around the BraunPrize and its history.

So the lucky winner is Italian native Giuseppe Furcolo now living in Brooklyn, NYC. Giuseppe has won a sponsored 3 day trip to attend the BraunPrize ceremony here in Germany. I’m already looking forward to meeting him and maybe some of you the readers of this blog in a couple of weeks here in Germany!

Hopefully we can do a short audio interview to be released here on the blog afterwards. So, stay tuned!

Hey, don’t we all do some self referential Google searches from time to time ;-) So did I for the BraunPrize 2007 and here’s a quick selection of what I found:

• British Design Innovation provides a concise summary of my earlier Video Podcasts with the three external BraunPrize Jury members.
• FX The Business of Design provides a similar wrap-up
• Designeast from Czech Republic is providing a good overview about design competitions across central and eastern Europe mentioning BraunPrize as well

I’ve just talked with Gerlinde Kress of the BraunPrize Team and she informed me that the BraunPrize Jury Session Webcam is online now :-) Up to Thursday this week from 10:00–18:00 hrs. you will be able to watch what the Jury is currently busy with.

As one camera seems to be not enough they’ve even installed a set of two webcams as well as a photo diary! I will also post selected photos on a random basis to our recently opened Flickr! Account: http://www.flickr.com/photos/braunprizeblog/

Hey, just an add-on: While checking links to the technorati tag “BraunPrize” I’ve somehow landed on a Flickr!-profile page titled “kophmann” since it contains the Flickr! tag “braunprize”.

And … if I’m not completely wrong this must be BraunPrize Winner 2005 Jens Andersson’s profile since a reasonable set of pictures is tagged with “braunprize” and contains even snapshots from “behind the scenes” … So if you’re interested in how it ‘looks’ like being a member of the group of BraunPrize finalists surf by at his Flickr! site.