Hiroki Tanahashi
Loftwork Inc. Innovation Maker
After graduating from Shibaura Institute of Technology, Hiroki Tanahashi worked as a marketing researcher and became involved in web production around 1999. From 2004, he was engaged in web strategy planning and the provision of consulting services based on human-centered design at Mitsue-Links Co., Ltd.
From 2008, he shifted the focus of his work from web to products/services and was engaged in the consulting services for user research and interaction design at IID, Inc. In 2009, he was involved in supporting the development of new products/services and providing education programs to develop internal innovators for client companies at CoPro System Corporation.
cIn 2013, he joined Loftwork Inc. He is in charge of providing support to clients in realizing innovations in their business activities, with emphasis in the area of service design. He has written “Design thinking-based approaches” and “After you’ve made a persona, what’s next?,” and co-written “Marketing 2.0.” His personal blog “DESIGN IT! w/LOVE” has been active since 2005.
Judge’s selections
The Tokowaka Prize
The circular architectural project "Regenerative Forest -JINEN'' by JINOWA Consortium for restoration of earth
株式会社GEN Japan
I appreciate that this project highlights soil, a resource that is so important for food production and human health, but that also has low potential for regeneration. The JINOWA consortium brings together several companies that are working to emphasize the value of soil as a resource, and it’s interesting that they should choose to focus on issues faced by the Venice Biennale arts festival. Yet it all somehow makes sense. Seemingly contradictory approaches – innovative global collaboration versus traditional local approaches, environmental activism versus art – point to something entirely new being born.
Agriculture-as-Commons Prize
CIRCUULAR ECONOMY CSA
鴨志田農園（屋号）
The EU has made "Farm to Fork" a core strategy in its 2019 European Green Deal. However, circularity rejects the concept of the “end consumer” and requires citizens to instead think of themselves as part of a cycle in which nature and society are as one. This project takes the idea of Community-Supported Agriculture (CSA) a step further by asking consumers to support farmers by supplying them with compost. The project has the added benefit of supporting small-scale farmers who might otherwise struggle to compete against larger producers.
The Novices of Sais Prize
Beyond the circular economy. Mana Earthly Paradise with a social circular design
Earth Company
The Novices of Sais is an unfinished novel by the 18th Century German Romantic writer Novalis. Sais is an ancient Egyptian town where Osiris, the god of fertility and agriculture, is said to have been dismembered and buried by his brother Set. In the novel, Novalis attempts to define nature thus: "As the colors of the spirit merge into one, the individual natural objects and phenomena all merge more and more into one, taking on more and more perfect, more and more human forms, and flowing into these colors." This is the ideal state in which humans are at one with nature, just as Osiris was before he was torn apart by Set. I dream that my stay at the ethical hotel Mana Earthly Paradise will be similar to what Novalis wrote next: “To the people of days gone by, all things must have seemed human, familiar and intimate, and their eyes must have seen those things at their most vivid.”
Oikeios Prize for Environmental Design
Combing manure treatment and sustainable farming as integrated circular agriculture system
Agriforward Co., Ltd.
This is a great example of circular design that solves the issue of manure treatment at small-scale pig farms. Rather than install costly new infrastructure, Agriforward’s solution is to redesign the treatment process in a way that not only purifies water, but also leads to a reduction in the use of pesticides and herbicides in orchards. The design is also notable for deploying new technologies from biotechnology and IoT, such as photo-synthetic bacteria (PSB) and valve controllers to control pumps and other equipment.
The Web of Life Prize
Collaborative Galician Creation Space
Individual
This is an interesting fusion of ideas in which a new technology for producing biomaterials is used to reverse the decline of the traditional craft of basket-weaving in Galicia, Spain. The message is that rather than abandoning traditional cultural practices, we can use that wisdom to solve challenges in our natural environment. To see people as diverse as basket-weavers, designers and scientists come together in support of the fishing industry, and combine solutions both old and new, provides us with one way to think about circular design.