Pepe Gimeno and LZF, National Design Awards 2020

The Ministry of Science and Innovation has granted the National Design Award 2020 to designer Pepe Gimeno in the ‘professionals’ category and to the lighting firm LZF Lamps in ‘companies’. Both have been great representatives of Valencian design for decades. Two awards, sought after for years, which reaffirm such an exceptional Valencian track record within the field of graphic and product design.

In addition, the National Innovation Award 2020 has also been granted to a Valencian company: Seipasa, specialised in the development and formulation of bioinsecticide, biofungicide and biostimulant products, has been rewarded in the small and medium sized enterprise category.

Pepe Gimeno (1951, Valencia) is a reference of Valencian and Spanish graphic design, whose track record of more than 35 years has enabled him to develop a very extensive range of design types with efficiency, quality and creativity, through typographic design to publishing and corporate, packaging, exhibitions and signage.

“This award represents great personal and professional satisfaction, especially owing to the demonstrations of support and respect that I have received during the whole process. And because it represents a pinnacle and, at the same time, a stimulus to continue working with the same enthusiasm and dedication,” assures the designer.

Among other projects, he created the corporate image of projects such as the Spanish Presidency of the European Union in 2002, of companies such as Roca and Banco de Valencia and institutions including the Corts Valencianes,

MetroValencia and the Agència Valenciana de Turisme. Some of these designs are a reference that identifies the Valencian Community beyond its geographic borders.

Among other prizes, he has obtained the Communication Award of the Type Directors Club of New York and the Gold Medal in the ADCV Awards of the Association of Designers of the Valencian Community.

As well as being a designer, Pepe Gimeno has other facets. That of mentor, conference speaker, feature writer and experimental artist. His personal experimental work made him one of the first designers to exhibit individually in an art museum. This was the Institut Valencià d’Art Modern (IVAM) in 2004 with the work Hushed Writing, which has also been exhibited in Miami, Chicago and New York.

His recent design work includes the brand identity of València Turisme and that of the city of Santander. Within his personal projects, soon to be shown is Metatrón, a graphical musical work, which brings together mathematics, music and plastic arts and which is supported by Valencia World Design Capital 2022.

Pepe Gimeno is the second Valencian graphic designer to be recognised in the last two years, after Marisa Gallén, who won a National Design Award in 2019.
The Ministry of Science and Innovation has also granted the National Design Award 2020 to LZF in the “Companies” category. This reward distinguishes companies that, like this manufacturer of lamps handcrafted from wood, incorporate design in their business strategy and thus contribute to improving society and people’s quality of life.

This reward recognises and reinforces a track record that has been distinguished by a strong commitment to design culture, their creative spirit and their carefully crafted processes. In the words of Mariví Calvo and Sandro Tothil, founders of LZF, “it is an enormous satisfaction to receive the good news that our work has been recognised with the most highly desired design award in our country. Today we feel that design and craftsmanship walk hand in hand and that is something very great.”

From the outset, LZF has used wood veneer, its raw material, as a tool to express its values. Through this, they show their commitment to ecology, sustainability and innovation. As its founders point out, they use wood “because it is an ancestral element, which is related to nature and fire.”

The award could not have come at a better time. After a track record of 25 years and more than 35 national and international awards in the design sector, LZF maintains the spirit with which it was founded in 1994. From that modest beginning, the small workshop grew until in 2008 the company moved to a renovated former winery in Chiva (Valencia), where a skilled and creative team works.

Their lamps can be found today in such emblematic locations as the Little Spain market, the Mi Casa, Jaleo and Fish restaurants, by the chef José Andrés and designed by Juli Capella in New York, Puerto Rico, Washington, Disney Springs Orlando, Maryland and the Bahamas. They can also be seen at the Californian headquarters of Youtube, Microsoft and Amazon, at the Netherlands defence headquarters, in the offices of Coca-Cola in Atlanta and Madrid, and in the Los Gatos library of the University of Nevada, among other well-known places.