UAE's First One Day Design Challenge Attracts 294 Participants from Across 22 Universities and 81 Companies

Participants of competition hosted by Roca challenged to create innovative concepts related to the bathroom space in less than eight hours

Roca, global leader in creating bathroom spaces, has announced the winners of the first-ever UAE edition of its signature One Day Design Challenge. After five successful instalments in Spain, and an international edition in Hong Kong last year, the competition made its regional debut as part of the Dubai Design Week, and garnered heavy interest from the nation's design students and young professionals: the challenge drew in 294 participants from over 22 universities and 81 companies spread across the UAE.

“The participants were tasked with creating innovative concepts related to the vanity area in a bathroom – this brief was handed to them on the morning of the challenge, and had to be executed within the day,” explains Xavier Torras, Brand Communication Director at Roca. “Affordable products within this category do not differ from each other except in terms of aesthetic appearance and finish. The performance and functionality of the area remain the same. We wanted our participants to tackle this lack of innovation.”

The three sets of winners walked away with a first, second and third prize of AED 6,000, AED 4,000, and AED 2,000 respectively. The first place went to Priyanka Soni and Rima Chalma from the American University of Sharjah for a vanity space comprising a tilted mirror equipped with a motion sensor to trigger defogging, and a retractable sink and cabinet space housed in the bottom half; the second went to freelance designers Serena Terzian and Jessica Khouzami for designing a sink with a self-cleaning system; and the third to Nisa Punjabi, a student of the Northeastern University, for a peg board-mounted, flexible vanity area.

Commenting on the winning entries, Torras notes: “Our judges felt the three concepts were out of the box, and a refreshing blend of practical, tech-augmented design. The solutions were flexible, functional and, above all, original.”

A jury comprising globally renowned design and architecture professionals, including Isabel Pintado, Xavier Torras, Khalid Shafar, Pallavi Dean and Ignacio Gomez, assessed the final concepts.