The Museum of Ethnography in Budapest has earned international recognition at the Red Dot Award: Brands & Communication Design competition, receiving three distinctions this year. The award celebrates the museum’s permanent collection exhibition, the innovative multimedia elements incorporated into it, and the catalogue of the ZOOM exhibition.
According to the institution, several Hungarian museum projects have received Red Dot Awards in the past, but this marks the first time a museum exhibition in Hungary has earned such praise from the competition’s jury.
Opened in October last year, the permanent collection exhibition is the largest in the museum’s history, spanning 3,000 square metres and presenting 3,600 objects. Divided into eight thematic sections, it offers visitors the chance to explore the uniqueness of each artefact and its story through detailed and creative solutions, many of which were developed by the Art1st Design Studio. The Red Dot Award acknowledged both the exhibition’s design and the use of multimedia tools, underlining their international appeal.
The ZOOM exhibition catalogue, which accompanies the permanent display and presents the collection as an explosive ‘big bang’, also received a Red Dot Award. Designed by Zoltán Berta, the catalogue takes an unconventional approach to showcasing selected objects from the museum’s collection. Its unique structure allows readers to explore the content in various ways, making it an award-winning guide to the exhibition.
The Red Dot Design Award has been recognizing excellence in design since 1955, maintaining its mission of ‘seeking good design’ over the decades.
This year’s successes add to a growing list of accolades for the Museum of Ethnography, including nominations for the Luigi Micheletti Award and the CIMAM Award for Outstanding Museum Practices, as well as the IF Design Award for the permanent collection exhibition. The ZOOM catalog has also won the A’ Design Award and the Indigo Award, while other projects—such as ‘Spend the Night at the Museum!’—have been recognized internationally. The museum has also received national honours, including prizes at the Beautiful Hungarian Book competition.
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