Introducing the nominees for the 2025 DAE Awards
At the end of the year, exceptional student projects are nominated for the Gijs Bakker, Rene Smeets and Melkweg Awards. After a review of both the Master and Bachelor graduation projects during the final examinations, back in June 2025. The juries nominate the students individually for the awards and the winners of the three awards are to be announced during the graduation show during Dutch Design Week. Each winner will receive a sum of € 2,000 and a trophy by Olga Flor in collaboration with EE Labels.
GIJS BAKKER AWARD
The Gijs Bakker Award recognises a Master graduate whose research and design project embodies the core aspirations of initiator of the MA Programme Gijs Bakker: combining quality with relevance to open up new roles for the discipline of design. Each Master department nominates up to two final exam projects from their department, and an external jury from a range of backgrounds decides on a winner.
GIJS BAKKER AWARD NOMINEES 2025
- Gil Lima Monteverde (ID)
- Floor Berkhout (ID)
- Ze Qiu (CIL)
- Valdís Steinarsdóttir (SD)
- Sara Ballout (SD)
- Célestin Zion (GEO)
- Aleksandra Nazarova (GEO)
- Derrick Crichlow (CD)
- Kai-Hsiang Wen (CD)
The Jury for the Gijs Bakker Award 2025 was comprised of Clara Balaguer, cultural worker & educator at WdKA and Piet Zwart; Hicham Khalidi, director Jan van Eyck & curator; Milou van Rossum, chief NRC Magazine; and Miriam van der Lubbe, Creative Head DDW, designer at Van Eijk & Van der Lubbe.
“This cohort demonstrated a strong case for the role of designers as collectors and amplifiers of stories from below. The jury was impressed by the depth of research and engagement with the research contexts, grounded in urgent and heartfelt subjects. Unlike journalistic or academic researchers, these graduates work with materiality, both to explore sensorial ways to enter a research subject and to create works that resonate affectively. At the same time, the jury was struck by a general tendency towards academic language and including many elements in the presentations, which did not always help to access the projects. To live up to the potential of amplifying relevant counterstories, the jury was curious how this role may translate in deliberate choices of audiences and consequently, formats and aesthetics.”
- Jury of the Gijs Bakker Award
JURY MELKWEG & RENE SMEETS AWARDS
The Jury for both the Melkweg and Rene Smeets awards was made up of Grace Turtle (designer, artist, researcher TU Delft, educator), José Maase (Head of Design Royal Mosa), Rawad Baaklini (Curator ArtEra and educator), and Roger Gerards (Head of Print Design Vlisco).
MELKWEG AWARD
The Melkweg Award recognises a Bachelor graduation project that demonstrates an original and radical view in a provocative presentation that has the potential to activate and stimulate debate.
This year’s cohort demonstrated a compelling engagement with design as a social and discursive practice, capable of holding complexity while remaining grounded in specific contexts. The jury was deeply impressed by the overall quality and integrity of the presentations. While the projects hold distinct trajectories and modes of engagement, they collectively signal a shift in design practice: one that moves from expressing a decided statement toward the relational, the situated, and the structurally entangled. Across different registers, the personal was not framed as self-expression, but rather as a deliberate and critical entry point into broader political, cultural, and material questions.
MELKWEG AWARD NOMINEES 2025
RENE SMEETS AWARD
The René Smeets award recognises a Bachelor graduate with a high level of empathy whose project has grounding outside the academy and demonstrates a (potential) big impact on and in collaboration with society.
The jury were impressed by the level of determination across this year’s projects, many of which moved from concept to outcome with clarity and intention. The students demonstrated strong communicative abilities and reflective storytelling, presenting their processes with confidence and precision. The individuality of each proposal, shaped by distinct cultural perspectives without defaulting to claims of globalism, did not restrict them to a particular locality. The return to interlocal concerns gave the projects grounded, situated qualities, often oriented around conviviality in form, method, or ambition. The jury also observed a refreshing absence of default reliance on digital tools or AI, pointing instead to a hands-on, process-driven ethos that felt especially relevant within today’s design landscape and its possibilities of collaboration. Together, these graduates presented themselves as well-prepared, thoughtful professionals ready to engage with complexity across contexts.
RENE SMEETS AWARD NOMINEES 2025
