Congratulations TACSI - Australian International Design Award in Service Design 2012!

The Australian International Design Award 2012 took place in Sydney at the City Recital Hall Angel Place. It was a pretty fancy event (black tie), dominated (as usual) by product/industrial design submissions. You know like, cars, chairs, electronic equipment etc. (including the Deepsea Challenger Research Submersible by James Cameron's team, who won the most prestigious design award). So it was great to see service design recognized as a separate category for the first time this year. "About time!", we cry, though it might take more time for Lee Lin Chin (Masters of ceremonies - she wore a fantastic combo of a bomber jacket and white skirt layered with lace, sans crazy specs tho) to recognise that 'good' design isn't just about 'men and women in sheds tinkering away on gadgets'! Premier Barry O'Farrell made a good speech (he must have a good advisor) that 'politics needs good design', so could we take this as an invitation to help state govt with their appalling services..? Fmmm.

The highlight was of course when TACSI (The Australian Centre for Social Innovation) was announced as the  Best in Category for their Family by Family project. Speaking with some of the judges in the Service Design category later at the Ivy Ballroom (shmancy!), they said about how impressed they were with the way TACSI had presented their process of designing. There's lots we could learn from TACSI in this regard - not only in the informal and articulate way they present their work, but also how they have made their approach open-sourced, ie, shared through a Creative Commons license. 

Chris Vanstone (Co-lead of Radical Redesign team at TACSI) had briefly mentioned that he might be coming over to Melbourne in September. Will confirm when this will be to organise some activity/event around that. So stay tuned!