Impressive achievement: Automist Smartscan receives highest distinction in the Red Dot Award: Product Design 2016!

Automist Smartscan by Plumis is one of this year’s outstanding products: The Red Dot jury was enthused, and awarded Automist Smartscan a Red Dot: Best of the Best. In 2016, this highest single distinction in the international competition goes to only 1.5% of all entries. Manufacturers and designers from 57 nations had registered about 5,200 products and sent them to the Ruhr area in Germany – Automist Smartscan impressed with highest design quality and makes Plumis one of the leaders in an international comparison.

Automist Smartscan relocates the traditional spray heads from the ceiling to a wall mounted nozzle, and uses a rotating head that directly targets fires with a powerful jet of water mist. It has been proven to achieve the same performance as residential sprinkler systems and uses 90% less water, minimising water damage to the living space.

Automist Smartscan has risen in popularity among architects and builders for being super easy to retrofit—without requiring a tank or network of pipes. It offers more than a reliable safety device for fighting fires; it’s an intelligent modern design feature offering greater flexibility for projects with challenging building regulations, from loft conversions to more open-plan homes and flats.

With 41 experts from all around the world, who are chosen according to strict rules, the Red Dot Award: Product Design guarantees a very high judging competence: Only freelance designers, design professors and specialised journalists – but not designers employed at companies potentially participating – are appointed to the jury.

The independent expert panel assesses each entry strictly and fairly, live and on site, according to criteria such as degree of innovation, formal quality, functionality and ecological compatibility. The jury awards the highest single distinction “Red Dot: Best of the Best” for ground-breaking design. Only the best entries in a category receive this award.

Professor Dr. Peter Zec, founder and president of the Red Dot Award: “With their extraordinary feel for creativity and keen eye for unmatched precision, the Red Dot: Best of the Best laureates deserve this highest recognition. We will honour them at the formal presentation of the Red Dot Trophy on stage at the Aalto-Theater in Essen.”

4 July 2016 marks the culmination of the Red Dot Award: Product Design 2016. During the glamorous awards ceremony, the Red Dot: Best of the Best laureates will accept their trophies in front of around 1,200 guests. At the subsequent after-show party “Designers’ Night”, the winners will celebrate until the early hours in the Red Dot Design Museum Essen in the midst of prize-winning products. All award-winning products will be presented in the special exhibition “Design on Stage” for four weeks before becoming part of the permanent exhibition.

With about 2,000 exhibits from 45 nations, the Red Dot Design Museum Essen displays the complete range of current product design. In the former boiler house of the UNESCO World Heritage Site Zollverein coal mine, it presents products that have won the Red Dot on five floors and approximately 4,000 square metres. Every year, the world’s largest exhibition of contemporary design informs around 150,000 visitors about current trends and top achievements.

About the Red Dot Design Award:

In order to appraise the wide scope of design in a professional manner, the Red Dot Design Award is broken down into the three distinct disciplines: the Red Dot Award: Product Design, Red Dot Award: Communication Design and Red Dot Award: Design Concept. The Red Dot Award is organised by the Design Zentrum Nordrhein Westfalen in Essen, Germany. With more than 17,000 entries in 2015 alone, it is one of the largest competitions in the world. It was in 1955 that a jury convened for the first time to assess the best designs of the day. The name and brand of the award were developed in the 1990s by Red Dot CEO, Professor Dr. Peter Zec. Since then the sought-after “Red Dot” is the revered international seal of outstanding design quality. Further information: www.red-dot.org.