We announced the 2024 Metropolitan Design Challenge winners last night at the Interior Design Show (IDS) Opening Night Party in Toronto, Canada, and the design industry, media, and Metropolitan team were all in attendance to congratulate them.

Congratulations to Gigi Lombardo-Dybalski, Natalie Guberney and Jenny Bae Huggon of Sheridan College for their award-winning and interactive design Origins: Crafted with Conscience!

This year's design challenge took inspiration from Metropolitan's Clean Floors program, a forest-to-floor quality assurance and environmental compliance program. The challenge's theme, coined "Crafted with Conscience", tasked participants to design an installation that gives meaning and life to the phrase and incorporates Kentwood's latest flooring designs.

The challenge offers Ontario students enrolled in a post-secondary interior design program the chance to win fifteen hundred dollars and have their design constructed and showcased at the Metropolitan Floors booth (#710) during IDS.

Joe Cosentino, Metropolitan Builder Commercial Business Manager for Eastern Canada, with award winners Gigi Lombardo-Dybalski, Natalie Guberney and Jenny Bae Huggon of Sheridan College.
Joe Cosentino, Metropolitan Builder Commercial Business Manager for Eastern Canada, with award winners Gigi Lombardo-Dybalski, Natalie Guberney  and Jenny Bae Huggon of Sheridan College.

The students used three distinct flooring products from Metropolitan's Kentwood Collection of engineered hardwood flooring to create layers of depth, guiding the audience toward the central point of the installation. Each panel is vertically mounted in multiple tiers to form a gentle arch over the world map. The overlapping lines in this design narrate the intricate connections we share with our planet and communities, emphasizing the bond we share with the environment. The warm backlight adds clarity and represents the certainty of our collective existence with each other and the Earth. 

Origins: Crafted by Conscience, on display at IDS Toronto at the Metropolitan booth (#710).
Origins: Crafted by Conscience, on display at IDS Toronto at the Metropolitan booth (#710).

IDS attendees are invited to place a pin on the map to show us where they come from. The goal is to craft an interactive experience that presents a captivating visual statement, paying conscious tribute to our origins and the deep connection to our environment. 
We thank all the interior design students who participated in the Design Challenge. Your entries were spectacular, and your talent and creativity are impressive! 

To view the installation, visit IDS Toronto from January 18-21.