BE OPEN BLOG

An online vote has defined the winner of the Public Vote Award in the “Second Life of Things in Design” competition organized by BE OPEN and Cumulus. The public voting did not only bring another young talent a prize, but helped thousands of people see the remarkable creativity, awareness and responsibility of the younger generation.

In 2019, BE OPEN and Cumulus joined forces to hold an international competition to support the UN’s SDG programme. Students of arts, design and architecture-related courses submitted works that demonstrate a design-oriented take on the problems of sustainability, wiser production and consumption called for in one of the SDGs. The project accumulated a total of 683 submissions from 44 countries.

The competition offered 5 prizes overall; the three main winners were selected in May by the international jury and awarded the prizes of €10,000, €6,000, €4,000 jointly by BE OPEN and Cumulus.

Out of the 50 honorable mentions, the public have selected the winner of the Public Vote Award, who will now receive a €2,000 prize and a paid trip to the awards ceremony, where all the winners will have a chance to present their ideas to a wide panel of academics, design professionals, sustainability experts, etc.

BE OPEN and Cumulus are happy to announce that the award goes to Fernanda Ordorica Bechelany, a student of National School of Architecture, Art and Design at Tecnologico de Monterrey, Mexico, for her Agave Bioplastic project, “a thin but resistant bioplastic made from the agave plant fiber, the main waste of the Tequila producing industry.”

Fernanda comments on her victory: “I’m really honored to be part of this amazing initiative by BE OPEN and Cumulus that supports the so important fight against climate change, and for that I couldn’t be more grateful. I didn’t expect my project to win the Public Vote against so many incredible entries, but I’m happy and motivated now to perfect Agave Bioplastic thanks to this. My hope is to invest the prize into further research to eventually create the material that could efficiently be used worldwide. I also hope that my example will inspire others to do the same: investigate your countries’ economies, identify an issue and try to fix it with design and creativity.”

“I’m really honored to be part of this amazing initiative by BE OPEN and Cumulus that supports the ever so important fight against climate change, and for that I couldn’t be more grateful. I didn’t expect my project to win the Public Vote against so many incredible projects, but I’m happy and motivated now to perfect Agave Bioplastic thanks to this. My hope is to invest the prize into further research to eventually create the material that could be used worldwide. I also hope that my example will inspire others to do the same. Investigate your countries’ economies, identify an issue and try to fix it with design and creativity.”

“I entered the competition with this specific project, because I know it has a lot of potential in my home country Mexico. I’ve always hoped that one day we as a nation will realize the potential of the agave plant waste as a new sustainable material that may become useful for many other countries and cultures as well. In my opinion, if each country had its own local research about food waste, we could create new materials with less environmental impact and fight the climate change as a united world. Thanks to this contest, I will be able to play my part.”

Fernanda Ordorica was born in Mexico City in 1998. Currently, she is studying Industrial Design at the National School of Architecture, Art and Design at Tecnologico de Monterrey. From an early age, she attended a German School in Mexico City, growing up with a bicultural perspective of the world. With her favorite subjects having been the arts, history and social studies Fernanda considered design as a career early on. She has lived in Germany and Italy for short periods of times and speaks four languages. Fernanda believes that Internationalism, Sustainability and Climate Action are the base of a great design, so as early as 21 years old and in her 4th semester she designed a bioplastic made from agave fiber, the waste of the plant used to make Tequila, with hopes are that one day we will develop a fully circular economy, which her invention is aimed.

The winner of the Founder’s Choice Award will shortly be announced by Elena Baturina, the Founder of BE OPEN.