As noise pollution continues to impact the lives of city-dwellers worldwide, one of the most compelling new design solutions comes from a group of five Chilean university students. 

Known as The Chilensis, this collective has earned global recognition for their new product through this year’s Wege Prize, a design competition focused on sustainability. The group’s winning idea? Repurposing discarded palm leaves, a major waste problem in Chile, into sound-quieting panels that benefit both people and the environment. 

Calling the panels Aislate — “isolate yourself” in Spanish — The Chilensis touts the acoustical benefits of palm leaves for improved privacy and quality of life in any urban environment. For denizens of dense cities like Santiago in Chile, where nearly half of all households face overcrowding, these cost-effective, biodegradable, and highly functional palm panels have the potential to be truly transformational.

And as a winner of the Wege Prize competition, The Chilensis is now working to develop Aislate further and expand production, with a target retail price of just $20 per panel. 

The continued development of actionable student proposals is a major goal of Wege Prize, which is hosted annually by the Wege Foundation and Kendall College of Art and Design in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The international program, which has just announced a five-year expansion and a doubling of its prize money, seeks to promote ideas that contribute to a regenerative and circular economy rather than one that takes, makes, and wastes. Past winners have gone on to receive venture funding or join major incubators.

With their innovative approach and strong growth trajectory, The Chilensis stands as a powerful example of how young designers can create products that serve real community need, and how nonprofits and institutes of higher education can support this process.