maarten baas awarded designer of the year for design miami 09

‘the man in a clock’, by marteen baas, video still photo by designboom

design miami has announced dutch designer maarten baas as winner of the designer of the year award 2009. new work, commissioned for the award, along with a retrospective of baas’s work, will be presented at the december edition of design miami 09.

each december, the prestigious award is presented to a designer who has made a significant contribution to the progression of design. the designer of the year must demonstrate a long history of consistent work, as well as outstanding work created within the last twelve months. now in its fifth year, the award has gone to an impressive list of esteemed designers, including zaha hadid, marc newson, tokujin yoshioka and the campana brothers.

‘he has allowed more people to accept and respect young design. but he is also a truly phenomenal talent who has all the qualities of a great designer and whose work is consistently strong and varied. he has a great sense of imagination and trusts himself to explore his ideas to the maximum, constantly evolving while anchoring his work in a craft-oriented approach. he has kept the design community gripped, like a good movie where you can’t take your eyes off the screen, where each project is like one excellent scene after another.’ – design miami/ director ambra medda 

ambra medda & maarten baas photo by: james harris

‘sweeper clock’ street cleaners perform an analog clock, they were filmed to create a 24 hours movie photo by designboom

the passing of the time within this clock is given by multitudes of people brushing – shot and screened in a true interval of 12 or 24 hours