It is with much gratitude and admiration that we celebrate the jury alumni members of the Core77 Design Awards.
Lalita Abhyankar is a family medicine physician based in Brooklyn, New York and provides full spectrum patient-centered primary care for all ages. She currently consults for a federally qualified health center improving care of older adults through collaborative research and design methods, targeting electronic health record chart review and interdisciplinary workflows for end of life conversations. She also serves as the Chair of Advocacy for the New York State Academy of Family Physicians and is a regular contributing author to the American Academy of Family Physicians Fresh Perspectives blog.
Sarah Fathallah is an independent designer, researcher, and educator, who specializes in applying participatory research and design to the social sector, with impact-driven clients like the International Domestic Workers Federation, the International Rescue Committee, and Open Society Foundations, to name a few. Sarah co-founded Design Gigs for Good, a free community-driven resource to help more people use the tools of design to create positive social change. Sarah is a graduate of Sciences Po Paris, where she studied International Business and Middle Eastern and Mediterranean Affairs. She also studied design innovation at the Paris Est d.school, User Experience design at General Assembly, and participatory design at MIT.
Morgan Hutchinson, MD is the Assistant Medical Director of the Thomas Jefferson University Hospital Emergency Department, Assistant Professor of Emergency Medicine and Director of Education for the Jefferson Health Design Lab where she directs the first curricular design thinking program in a US medical school. She is a creator, educator, international speaker, clinical leader and advisor working at the intersection of human-centered design, medical education and clinical quality improvement. Her work has been highlighted by the New York Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Business Journal, Pennsylvania Medical Society and others.
Morgan is passionate about applying human-centered design to reimagining healthcare. Morgan’s created Jefferson’s COVID-19 Mobile Unit to increase access to testing and vaccines in Philadelphia’s vulnerable communities, and has advised on multiple mobile health programs focusing on primary care, women's health and cancer prevention. She has led multiple initiatives to expand clinical spaces to boost surge capacity; leverage 3D-print technology to meet supply chain shortages, and reimagine healthcare services. She has advised and partnered with diverse teams across industries to find creative, collaborative solutions to challenges in service design, health equity and medical education.
Julianna Schneider is the lead Usability & Human Factors Engineer for the Bausch + Lomb Surgical product lines. She is an innovative engineer who is committed to developing intuitive, useful products for users. Having the ability to resonate with users, she prioritizes simplistic and meaningful designs. She leverages human centered design elements partnered with a risk based approach to ensure interfaces are optimized for users’ applications, and ultimately safe and effective for use. Harnessing her previous experience as a mechanical engineer, she frequently assesses design-related and use-related failures prior to product launch and creates solutions to mitigate these failures. Similarly, she understands the value input from multiple functionalities has and works cross functionally to ensure input is captured and incorporated into designs. She enjoys learning new things, meeting new people, and embracing challenges because they all bring growth - both personally and professionally.
Christina Harrington (she/her) is a designer and qualitative researcher who works at the intersection of interaction design and health and racial equity. She combines her background in electrical engineering and industrial design to focus on inclusive approaches to support historically excluded groups such as Black communities, older adults, and individuals with differing abilities in areas of health, wellness, and community building. She looks to methods such as design justice and community collectivism to broaden and amplify participation in design as a universal language of communication and knowledge. Dr. Harrington is the Director of the Equity and Health Innovations Design Research Lab at Carnegie Mellon University.
Rachel Smith is a Latinx Designer & Founder of Design to Combat COVID-19, a virtual community of creatives over 2,000 strong—who during the pandemic volunteered their skills and time to support underrepresented communities. By day, Rachel Smith is a Product Designer at Facebook, was formerly a Lead Mentor with The Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum and previously has worked with companies such as Nordstrom and The Home Depot. The rest of the time, the LA native works on a range of creative projects, both within her local and global communities.
Miya Osaki is a partner at Diagram, a New York based, women- and minority-owned healthcare design studio. Miya brings her passion for design, research, collaboration, and storytelling to improve outcomes and create more caring and equitable experiences for people and our communities. Prior to founding Diagram, Miya served as Director of Experience Design at Johnson & Johnson’s Global Strategic Design Office, where she created innovative services for patients managing chronic conditions. Miya is also the Chair of the graduate Design for Social Innovation (DSI) program at the School of Visual Arts, the first MFA program in social design, and serves on the Board for the Public Policy Lab. She is the co-host for the podcast, Yah, No, focused on the intersection of design, business, and healthcare. A west-coast native, Miya currently lives in Brooklyn, NY.
Raja Schaar, IDSA (she/her) is Director and Associate Professor of the Product Design Program at Drexel University Westphal Collage of Media Arts and Design. She co-chairs IDSA’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Council is the past Education Director for the organization. Raja studies the ethical implications of design and technology through the lenses of speculative design and climate change. Her current projects address biases maternal health through wearable technology and participatory design; community-based co-design for engaging black girls and underrepresented minorities in STEM/STEAM; and generating frameworks and tools to embed Afrofuturism, biomimicry, sustainability, and climate justice into Design praxis.
Nadia Beyzaei (MRes, BSc) is a designer and researcher working in the spaces of health and community engagement. Nadia is the Coordinator of the Health Design Lab at Emily Carr University and an instructor in the Faculty of Design + Dynamic Media. Through her role at the Health Design Lab, Nadia has been a communication designer and design researcher on Indigenous health, aging, and complex care projects, while supporting the dissemination of research both locally and internationally.
Nadia holds a Master of Research in Healthcare + Design degree from the Royal College of Art, with her thesis work focusing on how design can enhance engagement in evidence-based medicine.
Through her 7 years at BC Children's Hospital Research Institute, Nadia has worked on a range of behavioural health research projects, including UX/UI projects which aim to improve access to care, and service design projects across clinics at BC Children's Hospital. Her practice focuses on making complex topics accessible and approachable through visual and strategic design.
Boriana Viljoen is a hybrid UX/service designer with extensive experience in the wellness and health tech industry. Boriana utilizes a human-centered design approach to create experiences that aim to improve people’s lives. Based in San Francisco, CA, Boriana has a passion for displaying complex information in easy to grasp ways, simplifying complicated user interactions, and making digital products intuitive and appealing.
Emilie Lasseron is a seasoned leader working at the intersection of brand, innovation and design. A human-centered approach to products, systems, and storytelling drives her work.
Most recently as Senior Strategy Director at Wolff Olins, Emilie created new brands for Sage Therapeutics, a biopharma focused on brain health disorders including the first and only treatment specifically approved for postpartum depression, and Zymergen, a molecular technology company using a unique integration of biology, machine learning, and high-throughput automation to create previously unimaginable materials.
Previously, she led in-house design and innovation teams at Memorial Sloan Kettering Hospital and Celmatix, a biotech focused on women’s health. She also spent years at IDEO and other innovation consultancies working across diverse challenges including improving the bone marrow transplant process and repositioning long-acting birth control.
Linda is based in Mountain View, California, where she is an Industrial design lead within Google’s fast-growing hardware design team. She is currently focused on designing Google’s next generation of Pixel and Chrome products.
With a background in consumer electronics, Linda has a passion for designing a future based on innovation and compelling experiences. Prior to joining Google, Linda served as the Head of Industrial Design at Essential Products, a Palo Alto-based startup that launched its first PH-1 smartphone in 2017. Before moving to Silicon Valley, Linda was a Senior Designer with Motorola’s Consumer Experience Design team in Chicago, Illinois.
Linda was born in Chengdu, China but grew up in countries across the globe, including Belgium, Spain, and eventually the United States. She received a Bachelor’s of Fine Arts in Product Design from the College for Creative Studies in Detroit, Michigan. Go Peacocks!
As Wearables Industrial Design Manager at Google, Gina leads a team making radically helpful products, bringing together the best of Google AI, software and hardware. Notable launches include Google’s headphone family and watch bands.
Prior to Google, Gina has worked at the New York based innovation agency Redscout, Industrial Design agency Smart Design and Philips Design in The Netherlands.
She’s designed for some of her favourite brands, including Nike, OXO, and Microsoft, and for which she has some fancy awards that decorate a shelf in her Santa Cruz Mountain home, where she lives with her wife and two cats.
Sunil Achia is an award winning industrial designer at HealthCraft Group, a Canadian manufacturer of fall prevention products designed to help people live more independently at home.
During his +20 years with the company, Sunil has become a leader in all aspects of product design and business development. He leads a team of talented designers through product development, manufacturing and creative marketing initiatives. He is also part of the leadership team at HealthCraft, responsible for the strategic direction and culture of the company.
His design approach is smart and curious, never shy to challenge the social stigmas and assumptions surrounding mobility support products. This curiosity led to the development of a new product category: 2- in-1 combination grab bar + bathroom accessories. This category has won HealthCraft several universal design awards at major exhibitions across North America, and most recently a 2023 Red Dot Design Award (a bucket list item for Sunil) for the Plus Series.
In his spare time, Sunil does what he loves - Design! He is the Chapter President of Carleton University's Industrial Design Alumni Association, where he partners students with alumni professionals for one on one mentorship. Sunil is involved in design education, teaching ID courses at Carleton. He also runs a freelance business with his wife (also a successful industrial designer), providing environmental graphics services.
Sunil makes time for his #1 love - music. He can be found playing bass in bands around town, or playing solo acoustic guitar at fancy dinner events.
Life motto: Do what you love.