Mercedes-Benz GLK: The results

Back in April Mercedes-Benz and Wallpaper* invited design talent from six universities to take inspiration from the Mercedes-Benz GLK.
Read more about Mercedes-Benz GLK: The contest
Students from six top European designs schools, led by a team mentor, were encouraged to explore the GLK’s design vocabulary, mixing disciplines to examine how future objects could embody the same levels of design, desire and excitement. The resulting designs were judged by a jury chaired by Professor Peter Pfeiffer, Mercedes-Benz’s former chief designer. Judges included designers Fiona Swarovski-Grasser and Werner Baldessarini, A&W editor in chief Barbara Friedrich and Wallpaper’s own editorial director, Richard Cook.
The institutions taking part included Paris’s 250-year-old Ecole Nationale Supérieure des
Arts Décoratifs (ENSAD), Istituto Europeo di Design (IED) in Barcelona, the Istituto Marangoni in Milan, Hamburg’s Hochschule für Angewandte Wissenschaften (HAW), Ecole Cantonale d’Art
de Lausanne (ECAL) in Switzerland, and MOME, the Moholy-Nagy University for Art and Design,
in Budapest.
Receive our daily digest of inspiration, escapism and design stories from around the world direct to your inbox.
See the stars of tomorrow show off their creative drive
The prize for the best design concept was awarded to the team of Istituto Marangoni, overseen by Davide Montagna, art director for special projects. Under Montagna’s tutelage, the product design, fashion styling and fashion design students put together a fashion-focused spread of four design items, each extrapolated from the visual elements of the GLK.
Each item embodied ‘four moments of the GLK life’, such as well-being, spare time, relaxation and beauty. Barcelona’s IED, represented by the I+ED multidisciplinary department, attained the prize for best design exhibit for a unique architectural installation: its SOUL project. Paris’s ENSAD was acknowledged with an honourable ‘empathy award’ for its project – the creation of a cinema-style world that had the GLK at its heart.
‘The design:project’ celebrated the GLK, a 4x4 that neatly dovetails the need for compact functionality with expressive design and a strong sense of the typical design features of Mercedes-Benz cars. It’s also proved the perfect springboard for creative experimentation.
Jonathan Bell has written for Wallpaper* magazine since 1999, covering everything from architecture and transport design to books, tech and graphic design. He is now the magazine’s Transport and Technology Editor. Jonathan has written and edited 15 books, including Concept Car Design, 21st Century House, and The New Modern House. He is also the host of Wallpaper’s first podcast.
-
Remembering X-girl’s notorious 1994 fashion show, which starred a pre-fame Chloë Sevigny
A new book by Angela Hill, ‘X-girl Show’ – featuring an introduction by Chloë Sevigny – documents the cult label’s renegade 1990s fashion show, which took place in New York and captured a changing underground look
-
How to spot a fake Lamborghini: inside the sports car manufacturer’s Polo Storico division
Fake or fortune? We talk to the team of Lamborghini experts who can spot a priceless classic from a phoney
-
Meet The Good Plastic Company, rethinking the way we use plastic
This creatively responsible brand supplied, and recycled, the plastic plinths used in Wallpaper’s Milan Design Week exhibition. Here’s how it is reimagining the use and reuse of the contentious material
-
A mighty concept coupé from Mercedes-AMG rewrites the electric performance car rulebook
The Mercedes-AMG Concept AMG GT XX is a four-door coupé that explores new approaches to battery tech, brake cooling and aerodynamics. As a sign of things to come, it can’t be ignored
-
The Mercedes-Maybach SL 680 Monogram Series is an eyeful as well as a mouthful
Mercedes-Maybach’s first-ever sports car is comprehensively ‘wallpapered’ in the brand’s double-M design. We sampled this monogrammed machine on the coast of Ibiza
-
Mercedes-Benz previews its next-gen people mover with an ultra-luxury EV concept
The Mercedes-Benz Vision V Concept is an art deco picture palace on wheels, designed to immerse passengers in parallel worlds as they travel
-
The new Smart #5 takes the brand's essential character upmarket and offroad
Kai Sieber, head of design Smart at Mercedes-Benz Design, discusses the evolution and style of the new Smart #5
-
In celebration of Bruno Sacco, the man who brought order and elegance to Mercedes design
The car designer Bruno Sacco has died. Sacco shaped Mercedes-Benz design for nearly a quarter of a century. We look back on his impressive legacy
-
Does the Mercedes-Maybach SL 680 Monogram Series epitomise Pebble Beach culture?
Mercedes-Maybach launched its new SL 680 Monogram Series at Monterey Car Week 2024. How does Maybach's 21st-century take on upper-class motoring square with America's most upscale auto show?
-
Mercedes electrifies the G-Wagen, transforming its brutish off-roading icon
The Mercedes G-Class began life as a utility vehicle, before evolving into a dubious urban status symbol that could win approval from LA to London. How does the first all-electric version fare?
-
An all-electric 1960s Mercedes-Benz SL, perfect for swift, silent classic cruising
Electrification specialist Everatti unveils its sympathetic upgrade to a 1960s icon, the elegant Mercedes-Benz SL W113