JANUS et Cie Honors Young Design Talent with Second Global Student Design Competition

JANUS et Cie announces its second global student design competition, celebrating budding talent in the design industry. Collaborating with international design collective RIOS to develop the brief and foundational platform, the goal of the 2024 competition is to create versatile products centered around placemaking, with particular emphasis on the dynamic relationship between pieces—how they cluster, group, and fit together to establish a place for dialogue and community. 

Carolina Zhang, VP of Product Design & Development for JANUS et Cie, describes this year’s competition, stating, “Every great design begins with an idea, and every idea has the potential to shape the world. We are partnering with RIOS to celebrate the creative minds and visionaries from diverse backgrounds who dare to dream and push the boundaries of design.”

The competition is open to US and internationally based junior- and senior-level design students or those in their final two years of a design program. Five finalists will be announced in spring 2024 and the grand prize will be awarded at NeoCon in Chicago that June, with cash prizes for the students and a matching amount awarded to their schools’ design programs. The founding jury for the competition includes Carolina Zhang, Sebastian Salvadó, Creative Director and Partner at RIOS, and Adam Stover, Senior Principal at Populous.

In its second year, JANUS et Cie designates Christopher Locke as competition Champion. As co-founder of Designing in Color, Locke aims to diversify the way architecture is taught and practiced, with projects informed by the principles of social and spatial justice and design equity. He uses filmmaking as a key means of communication and storytelling in his work.

"RIOS believes in supporting and nurturing young talent, which is why we enthusiastically decided to participate in this competition," states Sebastian Salvadó. "Throughout this collaboration, alongside Design Champion Christopher Locke, we aim to empower the next generation, champion diverse points of view, and showcase the profound impact of design on our public realm and daily lives."

More information, including submission requirements, deadlines, and complete details about the competition can be found at www.janusetcieglobalstudentdesign.com.

About JANUS et Cie: The Definitive Source for Site, Garden, and Casual Furnishings®

For more than 40 years, JANUS et Cie has been an industry leader in design-driven furnishings for the outdoors. The luxury furniture brand, part of Lifestyle Design family with Cappellini, Cassina, Ceccotti Collezioni, INTERNI, Luminaire, Karakter, Poltrona Frau, and Luxury Living Group serves commercial, hospitality and residential clients with a dedicated focus on outstanding quality, superior craftsmanship and unparalleled service. In the years since the company's founding in 1978, JANUS et Cie has transformed from a single showroom in the Los Angeles Pacific Design Center to a comprehensive global design resource with 19 flagship showrooms, as well as field offices and select dealers throughout the world.

The company's namesake—the Roman god JANUS, whose two faces look both forward and back—is the foundation of a unified mission rooted in tradition, heritage and craft, yet equally dedicated to innovative materials and progressive engineering. This inspired long-term view is realized through the lens of a unique corporate culture that encourages curiosity, creativity and collaboration in the pursuit of excellence.

JANUS et Cie offers a diverse catalog of over 6,000 pieces—each design remarkably distinguished in concept and form—and in addition to furniture, includes a growing commitment to decorative accessories and performance textiles. Acclaimed by the most discriminating designers, architects and juried competitions, this powerful body of work has inspired for decades a demand for beautifully imagined furnishings to be used both indoors and out, and has influenced an entire industry in the process.

About RIOS:

RIOS is an international design collective working beyond boundaries to inventively combine disciplines and amplify the impact of design. Combined, our talents comprise a wide range of professional skills including architecture, landscape, urban planning, interior design, video, graphics and signage, and experiential and product design. Our work is irreversibly connected to the narrative of place and the complex order of human culture, creating solutions that are joyful, authentic, and unexpected. Our projects are diverse, including commercial, civic, hospitality, institutional, and residential. Recent projects by RIOS include ocViBE, 1 Hotel West Hollywood, Atlanta’s Echo Street West, Lynn Wyatt Square for the Performing Arts in Houston, and Spotify’s L.A. Content Campus. For more information visit www.rios.com and www.rioshome.com.

About Christopher Locke:

Raised by a hardworking and loving Jamaican family, Christopher challenges the established practices of architecture as a black designer, spatial advocate, and filmmaker to create spaces for equitable and liberated change. He is the Co-founder of Designing in Color (DCo), an award-winning collective of architects and designers of culture. Designing in Color's mission aims to diversify the way architecture is taught and practiced to amplify marginalized communities who’ve been historically silenced and erased throughout the design process. Working throughout the country, DCo facilitates educational programming, creates workshops, designs socially responsible projects, and distributes digital initiatives, each meant to dismantle the systemic racism built into the practice of architecture.

Full-time, he is also currently a job captain at Steinberg Hart in LA. As a designer, he has experience working on affordable housing, workplace offices, and educational services all uniquely created to its spaces equitable for its users.

In 2017, Christopher co-founded small talks:LA, a community-based project created to assemble a network of people and construct safe spaces to unify the disparate voices of Los Angeles. With the creation of Designing in Color and small talks: LA, he uses filmmaking as a method to study the current housing crisis across the city as a means of telling stories for narratives unknown.

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