Design finalists think outside the bar

The finalists, who went up against the likes of Nicola Mansfield-Scaddan, Gavin Rajah and Lucas Adams, are Yolandi Kotze; an interior design student at Cape Peninsular University of Technology, Ryan Roberts; founder and managing director of RobertsCreative, and Peet van Straaten; creative director of Raw Studios.

Opened to established professionals, emerging designers, and "wild cards", entrants were tasked to "think outside the bar" and design and build a modular mobile bar that serves neat and cocktailed brandy. Submissions were to inspire stylish living and change the perception that brandy is old-fashioned.

Going beyond product

After a unique sushi and brandy pairing, the top 10 entrants and media guests were treated to an online presentation by OBE-recipient Jay Osgerby of Barber Osgerby. The acclaimed interior and industrial designer captured the room with a step-by-step slideshow on the production of the London 2012 Olympic torch. Also in attendance was founder and managing director of Design Indaba, Ravi Naidoo.

"In some respects, I think that brandy in this country trades at a discount to its net asset value," said Naidoo. "It's so celebrated abroad; it's won a raft of international awards. I don't think we value it enough as a produce of this country, locally."

Naidoo went on to say that he looked forward to seeing how the designers went beyond product: "I think, all too often, we objectify design as product, but what you bring in is the other element of experience; how do you interact with the product. Getting you to think about designing a bar, a pop-up bar, and taking it out to the public is a very interesting dimension, because design is beyond the object, it is actually designing the experience... I believe the judges had a vexing time, but I believe at the end of the day they settled on three great propositions."

Yolandi Kotze

Ryan Roberts

Peet van Straaten

Top three

Finalist Peet van Straaten is a Pretoria-based furniture designer who established Raw Studios in 2005 where his client-driven designs are influenced by user needs, production processes, and modular expansion.

Van Straaten's team are currently working with spaces in the work environment, trying to make it a lot more fun and interactive. His focus is on making a difference on project scale: "If you have a good system, if you can create a good system, it's going to do a lot more good than just beautiful objects," says Van Straaten.

Ryan Roberts, a winner of the eLuxius iWatch modern mobile phone watch competition, and his company, RobertsCreative, are focused on conceptualisation, interactive / experiential design and 3D visualisations. If he wins, he plans on reinvesting the prize-money into his business: "I picture my business being well-established and well-known internationally, and self-sustaining," said Roberts. He also aims to make a difference in the design community in Cape Town and the rest of the world.

Yolandi Kotze won first prize in a Crazy Store competition for the Best Signage Solution. Currently in her final year at CPUT, Kotze's ambition is to find anything and everything that inspires her, and to create something out of the ordinary.

"It's amazing! I never expected to get this far when I entered the competition to start off with. I thought ok, this is just a basic college design project that I did, and now I'm sending it in to see what happens, and ja, I'm top three now!" said a very excited Kotze, who plans on paying off her studies, and travelling overseas should she win.

www.finebrandy.co.za