It is with much gratitude and admiration that we celebrate the jury alumni members of the Core77 Design Awards.
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Jury Alumni
Joey Zeledón
Designer, Joey Zeledón Studio
2024 Furniture & Lighting Jury Captain
Joey Zeledón (they/she) is a designer who helps objects find their purpose in life. They do this by creating aspirational narrative identities – sticky stories that drive meaning – for object archetypes. Is it just a printer? or could it be furniture that prints? Is it just a coffee maker? or could it be a barista in your kitchen? Is it just a clothes hanger? Or could it be a closet you can sit on? In 2022, they founded a design studio based on this approach, creating purposeful objects for people and market differentiation for clients. Prior to starting their own studio, Joey brought dozens of products to market from shoes and furniture to housewares, consumer electronics and consumer packaged goods during their 15-year career working for Clarks, Continuum, Smart Design, Steelcase and HP. Their designs have won 40+ awards and have been featured in leading publications. Joey is a proud RIT alum.
Yuka Hiyoshi
Designer, MillerKnoll
2024 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member
Yuka is a Japanese industrial designer based in Michigan. She has over fifteen years of experience designing and consulting for companies in Europe, Asia, and the Americas. She is lead designer at MillerKnoll’s Tailored Studio.
Fernando Ramirez
Co-founder and Designer, Common Object
2024 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member
Fernando Ramirez is a designer dedicated to exploring the intersection of sustainability and community and how it drives value in design. Specializing in industrial design, furniture design, and environmental design, he has left his imprint on diverse projects, collaborating with both major corporations and innovative startups. His deep commitment to sustainability propels him beyond conventional boundaries, driving him to explore pathways that lead into the realm of regenerative thinking.
As a co-founder of Common Object, a design studio aligned with his values for people and the planet, Fernando has forged a path guided by these principles. At the core of his studio's philosophy is a "planet- centered" design approach, empowering companies to take steps toward sustainability while fostering more inclusive connections with people. Their versatile portfolio spans industrial, furniture, medical, and interiors. A notable aspect of their work involves community projects, actively participating in co-design workshops specifically crafted to empower and uplift communities.
Common Object's experience in sustainability has led to the studio's regenerative design experiment, Okaterra—a project that focuses on creating regional supply chains that collaborate with farmers to create materials for furniture. Since its release, Fernando and his design partner, Justin Beitzel, have seamlessly integrated workshops and talks into their studio flow. They are diligently working to share this thinking and posing the question, “Can the future of product design be regenerative?”
Ayako Takase
co-founder / principal, Observatory
2024 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member
Ayako Takase (she/they) is the co-founder/principal of Observatory, an award-winning, multi-disciplinary design studio founded in 2001. Observatory balances innovation and simplicity to foster meaningful connections with people, culture, and audiences. With work spanning creative fields, Observatory relies foremost on an intuitive process that allows a natural interplay of form and function to take place in their designs. The studio has worked for leading companies such as Herman Miller, Google, and Procter & Gamble. Ayako is also an Associate Professor at the Rhode Island School of Design and a director of the graduate program in the Industrial Design Department. They teach hands-on studios focusing on audience-centric, emotive, and iterative design. Ayako lives in Cranston, Rhode Island, with her partner and too many creatures.
Sunshine Thacker
Founder, Sunshine Thacker Studio
2024 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member
After studying Architecture and Land Development at Texas A&M University, Sunshine spent 15 years navigating lawyers, liars and leeches before returning to her first love - clay. Sunshine's background in architecture informs her always curious - artistic and design practice. Sunshine believes in taking risks, in pushing boundaries. She’s always asking, “why?” Or more often, “why not?” Her work has been featured in Architectural Digest, Dwell, Surface, Wallpaper and Elle Decor among others.
Jaye Buchbinder
Director of Product, Emeco
2023 Furniture & Lighting Jury Captain
Born and raised in Long Beach, California, Jaye studied Sustainable Engineering at Stanford and currently works at Emeco in Product Development and Sustainability, where she chairs out of recycled materials. She lives and surfs in Venice Beach, California.
Inigo Hernandez-Ysasi
Co-Founder, Casa Ysasi
2023 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member
Iñigo Ysasi is a co-founder at Casa Ysasi; a Los Angeles-based creative studio with an emphasis on light.
Iñigo self-taught designer constantly experimenting with new mediums from wood to neon all the way to concrete. He is driven by curiosity and the combination of nontraditional materials in new formats. He moved to LA back in 2016 to join a large technology company while simultaneously pursuing a creative profession in his free time. He worked for a furniture company before co-founding Casa Ysasi with his brother Patricio Ysasi in 2020.
Patricio Hernandez-Ysasi
Co-Founder, Casa Ysasi
2023 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member
Patricio “Pato” Ysasi is a co-founder at Casa Ysasi; a Los Angeles-based creative studio with an emphasis on light. Patricio is a Los Angeles-based art director and filmmaker whose work explores the intersection of photography, film, and text. Since graduating from Cornell University, Patricio has worked in collaboration with Farm League, MACRO, and Tortoise.
Daniel Stromborg
Product Development Design Director, Gensler
2023 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member
As Product Development Design Director for Gensler, Daniel applies his insights and industry experience to inspire design teams to translate Gensler’s voice and vision into tangible products for workplace and lifestyle environments. Partnering with manufacturers, his team creates touchpoints that expand the experience for which clients rely upon Gensler. He previously led design teams on projects with Arper, Andreu World, Devon&Devon, Elizabeth Arden, Emser, Estel, Fantoni, Gandia Blasco, Knoll, Muraflex, OXO, Targetti, Zumtobel, and many others.
Daniel’s career began with digital imaging pioneer April Greiman, focusing on brand-based design and conceptual work. From there, he worked with legendary product designers Richard Holbrook and Don Chadwick until eventually striking out on his own. Daniel joined Gensler in 2014.
Ian Yang
Founder & CEO, Gantri
2022 Furniture & Lighting Jury Captain
Ian founded Gantri in 2016 to reimagine how design is developed, made and sold. After joining the San Francisco TechShop, he became fascinated with the potential of 3D printing and sought to build a new way for creators to bring original designs directly to consumers that’s simpler, more accessible and more sustainable.
Prior to founding Gantri, Ian led product and growth at Lovely, a design-forward apartment rental marketplace that exited in 2014. He was also a business strategy consultant at OC&C, advising Fortune 500 technology and consumer goods companies.
Ian graduated from the London School of Economics with honors in 2010. He was awarded Apartment Therapy’s Design Changemaker and House Beautiful’s 2020 Visionary.
Estelle Bailey-Babenzien
Business Founder, Creative Director and Interior Designer, Dream Awake Studio
2022 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member
Estelle Bailey-Babenzien is of British and Ghanaian descent and was born and raised in the UK. She graduated from Central Saint Martins in London, with an honors degree in Fashion- communication and promotion, and moved straight to New York City. Since then, she has built her career as a creative director in the fields of music, fashion, and interior architecture and design. In 2015, she cofounded the men's/unisex clothing brand Noah with her husband, designer Brendon Babenzien. Noah has two stores in the United States, two stores in Japan, and shop-in-shops in three Dover Street Market stores globally. Simultaneously, Estelle continues to grow her design studio, Dream Awake Design, which focuses on experiential and interior design, and creative direction for commercial and residential projects and brands. She lives in Brooklyn, NY, with her husband and their six year-old daughter, Sailor.
Jeremy Cai
CEO, Italic
2022 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member
Jeremy Cai was born and raised in Illinois where his entrepreneurial streak began while operating a lending business at his middle school lunch table. Jeremy studied at Babson College before dropping out as an early member of the Thiel Fellowship to pursue a career in technology. Since then, Jeremy has brought many successful companies to life, including Fountain, a leading software platform that businesses such as Uber and Amazon use to hire millions of people each year, Not Pot, a cult-favorite wellness brand, and Tonari , a Japanese anime
studio.
In his current role as CEO of Italic, Jeremy oversees global strategy and culture.
Bryan Jay Calvero
Founder, Period Correct
2022 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member
Eny Lee Parker
Founder, Eny Lee Parker
2022 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member
Eny Lee Parker is a spatial designer based in New York, emphasizing in objects, furniture and lighting, using clay as her main medium. Parker reclaims the essence of making used in traditional craft from our past – the slowness, the intention, the respect for natural resources, creating contemporary objects that brings awareness to our presence as well as to non-living things.
Tariq Dixon
Co-founder, TRNK NYC
2021 Furniture & Lighting Jury Captain
Tariq Dixon founded TRNK in 2013 as a destination for fellow design enthusiasts seeking rarefied products in a more approachable setting. A creative strategist and product designer, he’s motivated by the role designed environments play in shaping our interactions, memories, and experiences. His work has been featured in NY Times, The Wall Street Journal, and New York Magazine, to name a few. Tariq is originally from Baltimore, a graduate of Harvard College, and has called New York City home for more than ten years.
Jillian Choi
Director of Global Exhibitions, Design Miami
2021 Furniture & Lighting Jury Member