Have you heard of the LIT Lighting Design Awards? LIT Lighting Design Awards is an annual international lighting design competition and, this year, I am very honored to be invited as a board member of the LIT Awards Jury.
Archifos had the great pleasure to speak with the founder of the LIT Design Awards Hossein Farmani and discover more about the international lighting design competition.
When and Why were the LIT Lighting Design Awards created?
I’ve always been fascinated by the power of light. We developed the LIT awards in 2017 as sister efforts of our successful International Design Awards, IDA. We wanted to create an award the recognize the efforts of talented international lighting product designers and lighting implementers.
Farmani Group, established in 1985 has been responsible for many successful awards around the globe. Farmani Group organizes the International Design Awards (IDA), Architecture Masterprize, DNA Paris Design Awards, London International Creative Awards, Prix de la Photographie in Paris, and the Annual Lucie Awards for Photography, which has emerged as one of the world’s most prestigious awards.
We have 3 offices, Farmani Group Head Office is in Los Angeles, while our support teams are in Budapest and Bangkok.
How are the LIT Lighting Design Awards differentiated from other awards in the lighting design industry?
The Lighting industry is vibrant! I am always glad to see new projects, associations, and platforms dedicated to lighting products or designers.
One of the key differences, is the total independence of LIT Design Awards, while many other competitions belong to Media Groups or Associations, LIT Design Awards is totally independent of any organization. One of LIT’s strengths is the diversity and the level of expertise of our Jury panel. This year we have 36 exceptional judges – they are the heart & the light of LIT.
Which are the LIT Lighting Design Awards winning titles?
LIT winners are selected by our esteemed jury of designers, leaders in the lighting, interior design, and architectural fields. We have 4 main winning titles every year:
- Lighting Product Design of the Year (professional)
- Lighting Design of the Year (professional)
- Emerging Lighting Product Design of the Year (student)
- Emerging Lighting Designer of the Year (student)
In 2018, we introduced the “Lifetime Achievement” prize, given to one person for their outstanding contribution to the Lighting Industry: In 2018, the LIT Lifetime Achievement Award went to Mr. Kevan Shaw. In 2019, the recipient was Mr. Alfred R. Borden.
Where have the previous LIT Design Awards ceremonies been conducted?
LIT Winners have been celebrated on four continents since its launch in 2017!
We have brought LIT to Tokyo (Japan) for the first winners’ exhibition, followed by Philadelphia (US), Sao Paulo (Brazil) as part of our partnerships with LED Forum. The LIT 2018 winners event took place in Budapest (Hungary). Unfortunately, the LIT 2019 Winners event had to be canceled a couple of weeks before the celebration in Frankfurt due to Covid-19.
Is there anything else you would like to add that one cannot find on your website?
We are working very hard to make LIT a barometer for excellence in Lighting Product design and Designing with light. Our goal is to inspire many young designers to enter the industry and revolutionize the way we see.
It has been very important to us that our Jury panel be more diverse, we have 36 Jury members this year with more countries represented and we were very conscious of gender parity.
We are also working on a new scholarship program in partnership with universities. LIT is giving a cash prize to the emerging winners to support them for their prototype or to start a new project. We would like to put more young designers in the “Spotlight”; they are the future of this great industry.
After all, without light, we are all blind.
Hossein Farmani
If you have any questions regarding the LIT Lighting Design Award, feel free to contact the team > team@litawards.com.
As for me, I can’t wait to join the other members of the jury to review this year’s submissions and vote for the best.
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