In 2020, we had the exciting opportunity to launch the first edition of Diseño Responde, Desafío Latinoamericano Index Award + UDD. The competition invites Latin American youth to design solutions that address coronavirus-related challenges and the "new normal".
With an array of brilliant partners, including the Inter-American Development Bank, The Impact, Agora, the Chilean Ministry of Culture, Arts & Heritage and the Embassy of Denmark in Chile, the call was heard ALL over the continent and yielded an inspiring and innovative result.
The nominees
As the nomination platform closed on December 31st, the competition received an incredible 399 designs within just a few months. The solutions address a broad range of issues, such as protection for healthcare workers, remote-education tools for children, sustainable food shortage solutions and much, much more. Some notable examples include:
Nos Están Matando explores the severe problem of violence against women and femicides in Peru; a problem exacerbated in many areas by stay-at-home orders. The book/exhibition enables viewers to see and 'experience' gender-based violence, prompting society to confront these frequent atrocities that are ignored far too often.
worME addresses the current malnutrition rates in Latin America and the projected food shortages caused by the pandemic. The food production tool is designed to encourage people to integrate worms and insects into their diets, as a sustainable and nutritious alternative to meat, by enabling users to grow them at home.
Discancha offers a creative solution to keeping children safe at school as communities begin to reopen. The design proposes how to adapt indoor and outdoor spaces to allow for enough physical distance between children as they learn and play. The modular designs can be drawn on any hard surface with temporary inks, like chalk or paint.
Overall, we received projects from 13 Latin American countries, with Chile in the lead with 165, closely followed by Mexico with 102 and then Colombia with 32 projects. Check out all the nominees (in Spanish) here.
The next steps
Next, the jury, comprising an all-star line-up of Latin American thought-leaders in design and innovation, will review the solutions to select finalists. Of the 399 designs, we anticipate approximately 40 finalists to be chosen and announced in February.
From the finalists, the jury will then choose five winners, one per Index Award category; body, work, home play & learning and community, and announce them in March with an online ceremony (Spanish) in April. The winning projects will also be placed in the running for Index Award 2021, celebrated in Copenhagen in September.
Our partnership
Latin America has been hit particularly hard during the coronavirus pandemic, where almost 31% of the population lives in poverty. COVID-19 hasn't only impacted the community's health but also dealt a severe blow to the economy and employment rates.
Since 2018, Faculty of Design at Universidad del Desarrollo (UDD) has been an instrumental partner in Latin America to extend the philosophy and teachings of 'design to improve life'. With UDD, Diseño Responde aims to stimulate Latin American youth's creativity to "project themselves as agents of change" and is the first of many large-scale initiatives we hope to hold in the region.
The competition has not only birthed a diverse range of local solutions to the pandemic but helped ensure more Latin American representation within the global Index Award 2021 pool.
