Dezeen promotion: Tokyo Designers Week is calling for design professionals, young creators and design schools to enter the Asia Awards, which will be presented during this year's event from 26 October to 4 November.

The inaugural awards program will honour projects in categories ranging from architecture and product design to fashion and photography, under the themes Hello Future and Festival.

The awards will include presentations by finalists and critique sessions from the selection committee, plus a conference and party for exhibitors and students from different countries.

Entries for the awards will be accepted before 31 July. For more details about how to register, entry formats, fees and prizes visit the sites for the professional exhibition, young creators exhibition and school exhibition.

For students and designers within the school and young creators exhibitions, a grand prize of 1 million Japanese Yen (£6532) and semi-grand prize of 300,000 Yen (£1959.60) will be awarded to winning entries.

Tokyo Designers Week has also issued a call for designers to show at the Tent exhibition and promoters or brands to exhibit at the Container exhibition.

The event takes place from 26 October to 4 November 2013 - click here for more details.

Photographs of last year's event are by Luke Hayes. Asia Awards logo and Tokyo Designers Week 2013 key visual and art direction by Airside Nippon.

Here is some more information from the organisers:

Asia Awards 2013

Asia Awards will be held to foster young talented designers, the future of the creative industries. We are now looking for professionals, young creators and school exhibitors.

Design Association NPO (Venue: Minami Aoyama Minato-City, Tokyo President Kenji Kawasaki) will be holding a Design & Art Event, Tokyo Designers Week 2013, at Meiji-Jingu Gaien (In front of Meiji-Jingu Memorial Picture Gallery, Tokyo).

One of the two main contents of the event represented by the "School Exhibition" & the "Young Creators Exhibition” have showcased a large number of students and young designers from both inside and outside Japan.

This year, a comprehensive Asian creative award called the "Asia Awards" has been established to gather the creative power from all over the world in the center of Tokyo, thus trying to discover young talents that will lead the next generation and become a platform for students and young designers to make their strides to the global stage.

We are implementing the "Professional Exhibition” for top creators and designers, the "Young Creators Exhibition” for young designers and artists under the age of 30, and the "School Exhibition” for Design & Art schools, colleges, universities and graduate schools.

The representatives of Design Association NPO, Architect Toyo Ito and Art Director Katsumi Asaba will be distributing several awards (Grand Prix 1,000,000JPY, Semi Grand Prix 300,000JPY, etc) for the creators of the Asia Awards.

We expect to nurture the future designers/artists and help them develop capabilities to excel on global stage through interacting with students across different countries and fields. We are now looking for professionals, young creators, and schools to join us in Tokyo Designers Week 2013.

Asia Awards - objective

Objectives: strengthen the competitiveness in creativity - become a platform for young creators to make their strides to the global stage, cultural exchange - build friendship between Japan and other countries through cultural exchanges in design and art.

Category: the Asia Awards will provide the opportunity for students and young designers/artists to exhibit along with top professional designers and to hold a wide range of creative presentations.

Exhibition by Top Creators within the Professional Exhibition, Exhibition by Designers under the age of 30 within the Young Creators Exhibition and Exhibition by Schools within the School Exhibition.

Choose from the following two themes: Hello Future, FES (Festival)

Date: 26 Oct (Sat) - 4 Nov (Mon - National Holiday)

Asia Awards - exhibiting details

Professional Exhibition Outline
Chairman: Motomi Kawakami Design Room Kawakami / Designer

Exhibition format: W1800mm×L1800mm, H300mm, 600mm, 900mm (please choose)
Exhibition fee: 150,000 JPN (without tax) *fee to be paid only by applicants who passed the initial screening
Exhibition contents: display of recent, past, representative works, prototypes etc.
Entry deadline: 31 July (Wed)
More details here.

Young Creators Exhibition Outline

First screening : concept sheet review (organiser)
Designers who have passed the first screening will be able to exhibit as below:
Exhibition format: three dimensional works - plain/flat space W900mm×L900mm (Height: choose from H300mm, 600mm, 900mm), two dimensional works - wall surface W900mm×H1800mm
*Designers who failed to pass the 1st screening will have their work displayed within a panel. (panel exhibition, A2 size W420mm X 594mm)

Second screening: work review, within the Tokyo Designers Week 2013, Oct.26th – Nov.4th (Mon.) * (only works that passed the 1st screening will be reviewed)

Final screening: presentation review by a special jury
Finalists will hold presentation for the special jury members, in either English or Japanese. Internet live broadcast from the venue.

Exhibition fee: free of charge
Target: designers under 30 years of age (professionals, amateurs, students)
Entry deadline: 31 July
More details here.

School Exhibition Outline
Chairman: Satoshi Tabuchi Professor, Tama Art University / Architect

Exhibition format: Outdoor Space 20-metre-squares (5m×4m), Indoor Space 8-metre-squared (W4×D2×H2.4)
Number of works allowed: 10 works or less
Exhibition fee: This year, the exhibiting fees for overseas universities and colleges are FREE, however, membership fee still applies ( Membership Fee 100,000JPY tax free per unit)
Entry deadline: 31 July (Wed)
More details here.

Asia Awards - special events

Competition presentations by young creators / students
Date: During the Session (scheduled to be held within the latter half of the event)
Venue: TDW-DOME Stage
Note: Only exhibitors within School Exhibition / Young Creator Exhibition may join
Contents: A competition where students from all exhibiting schools present the concept of their exhibiting work. An opportunity to bring out the students/young creators’ presentation skills.

Critique Sessions
Date: During the Exhibition period (scheduled to be held within the latter half of the event)
Venue: TDW-DOME Stage
Note: Live broadcast from the venue through our YouTube Official channel.
Broadcast within "TOKYO DESIGNERS WEEK.tv" at a later date
Contents: Members of the Design Association’s selection committee will critique the works they have reviewed.

Asia Awards International Exchange Party
Date: Pending dates (scheduled to be held within the first half of the event)
Venue: TDW-DOME
Contents: Create an opportunity for students, young and professional designers from different countries and fields to meet and exchange ideas.

Asia Awards Conference
Date: During the Exhibition period (scheduled to be held within the first half of the event)
Special conferences for students and young designers held by Japanese and overseas professional creators.

Award
Only young Creators and School Exhibitions are included in the (Grand Prix, Semi Grand Prix, Corporate Awards, Prize, Nominee) awards categories.
*Professional Exhibitions are not included in the awards categories.

Genres
Architecture/Interior/Product/Fashion/Textile/Photography/WEB/Image/Marketing/Graphics/Illustration/Art/Media Arts/Crafts/Space Design/Animation/Music
Ex: Architecture, graphic design groups can participate within either design or art category.
The exhibition will be distributing a Grand Prix, Semi Grand Prix, Corporate Awards, Prizes, and Nominee within both Design and Art categories.

Tokyo Designers Week 2013

Tokyo Designers Week started systematically as Designers’ Saturday in 1986 and was renamed as Tokyo Designers Week in the year 1997, setting its venue continuously every fall for 28 years in the city of Tokyo. It is an international design event that gathers the excellent design and art from all over the world in areas close to our every-day lives, such as architecture, interior, product design, graphic design and art. Since 2005, the event has been provided the central venue of Meiji Jingu Gaien Mae (In front of Meiji-Jingu Memorial Picture Gallery) and developed into an event that attracting in 2012 a record number of over 100,000 people with highly sensitive opinions in the creative field. The event has allowed companies, organizations, embassies, schools, designers to become highly recognized by providing a place to announce their latest design and art through PR, product promotion, marketing and testing for branding purposes.

Date: 26 October (Sat) - 4 November (Mon National Holiday), scheduled for 10 days
Time: 11:00–22:00 (18:00 on the last day)
Venue: 2-3 Kasumigaoka, Tokyo 
Meiji-Jingu Gaien Mae (Central Venue), Shops around the Metropolitan Area
Expected Visitors: 120,000 people (estimate)

Tent Exhibition - Tokyo Designers Week's main content is the 'TENT exhibition'. It gathering more than 120,000 people with high sensitivity opinions in the creative field, thus creating a forum for the promotion of various companies and products. Visitors include manufactures, buyers, various media, people in the design industry who can become incubators.

More details for companies about the Tent exhibition here and the Pavilion exhibition here. Additional details for designers here.

Container exhibition - an original content produced by Tokyo Designers Week using reusable cargo containers. An independent space ideal for promotions and branding. Visitors are fascinated by the unique exhibitions, including interactive art and space installations, but also media arts and projection mapping. More details here.

About Design Association NPO - Design can change the world

Design Association NPO is the maneuvering vehicle that contributes to society with the design in life beyond genres and across borders by connecting the related companies, designers, schools, embassies and media. Through our art and design event Tokyo Designers Week  and our tv program TokyoDesignersWeek.tv - Ken Mogi's Seeds of Inspiration IMAGINE – we believe that design has the power to change the country.

www.tdwa.com