Red Dot Award: Brands & Communication Design 2021 – jurors select best-in-class brands and communication projects
The jury for the Red Dot Award: Brands & Communication Design 2021 has made its decision. In the course of an evaluation process lasting several days, the experts reached agreement on the year’s best brands and communication projects. The winners in the Communication Design section include large and small studios as well as agencies from all over the globe, ranging from Serviceplan, 3st kommunikation and why do birds from Germany, Heimat Wien from Austria and Resoluut from the Netherlands to Gabor Palotai Design from Sweden and Klim Type Foundry from New Zealand. Furthermore, brands such as Gira, Minna Bank, My Clair and Pruvia succeeded in winning over the jurors.
Today more than ever, digital solutions, branding and social responsibility are hugely significant for a company’s success. The special design quality demonstrated by the award-winning works in these areas is further proof of their relevance.
Novel design approaches to digital solutions
The digital projects put forward by this year’s award winners reflected the fact that, especially now, companies are thinking outside the box and using periods of transition to develop new design approaches. Thus, several works in the new category, “Digital Solutions”, won a Red Dot: Best of the Best.
#VictoryPages was published to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany. The social media campaign by ANO TV-Novosti and RT Creative Lab from Russia uses visual art, interactive formats and 3D animations to build engaging narratives – some told from first-hand experience. The jury was equally impressed by #NEXTGen 2020 – Reset the Mindset, a digital event by BMW and Elastique. Together the German companies designed a studio with an LED stage and reached a global audience, hosting three world premières, organising talks and presenting a Netflix-style series. Serviceplan won an award for its staging of the first digital party congress of the German CDU political party. Online voting and XR productions brought the 1,001 delegates and more than 11 million live audience members together to create a new sense of togetherness.
Increasing prevalence of strong brands
It’s a real challenge to create a consistent and contemporary brand that allows customers to identify with the brand and distinguish it from others. A number of participants rose to the challenge. Minna Bank won the top distinction in the Brands section “Red Dot: Brand of the Year”. The Japanese company convinced the jurors with consistent brand management that is reflected in all of its communication elements. The jury also awarded distinctions to the brand identity of Zibra, developed by TWID Creative Studio in Ukraine, and the brand design for the café “Millions” by hongdesign from Seoul.
Winners taking responsibility
Many of the award-winning communication works tackle the challenges of our time, encouraging people around the globe to change their way of thinking. For example, the film “Girls like me” by Schaeffler Technologies and Stereoscreen from Germany won a Red Dot: Best of the Best. The film tells the story of Sophia Floersch, a young racing driver battling prejudice and inspiring other women to be different. Another example is the font “The Polite Type” by TietoEVRY, Melvas Type Design and TBWA\Helsinki from Finland, which the jury named as a winner. The font automatically recognises and rewrites online hate speech.
Last but not least, US-based environmental sensor company “METER” along with Serviceplan won a Red Dot: Best of the Best for the posters and the digital campaign “Meltdown Flags”. The initiative visualises glacier retreat by reducing the amount of white in country flags analogous to the respective glacier retreat. Those interested can offset their carbon footprint and download the flags online.
Award-winning brands and works online from 12 November
On 12 November 2021, all of the award-winning brands and works in the Red Dot Award: Brands & Communication Design will be published online at www.red-dot.org. The winners of the Red Dot: Grand Prix, the highest distinction in the Communication Design section, will be announced on the same date. Furthermore, the emerging designer to win the Red Dot: Junior Prize along with prize money of 10,000 euros will also be named on the day.