Jury Alumni

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  Charles Johnson

  Assistant Professor, Carnegie Mellon University

  2023 Sports & Outdoors Jury Member

  For nearly three decades Charles has worked within the context of sports, fashion, and active lifestyle products for leading global brands such as Adidas, Puma, Converse, and Ralph Lauren. With a design degree from Carnegie Mellon, his professional starting point as a product designer has transformed to executive-level leadership shaping vision, teams, product experiences, and global strategies. Charles’ ambition to combine a humanistic design approach with digital technology informs his work.
  
  His consulting business, Driven By Charles, services a range of industries helping startups navigate their vision, corporate product engines shape new experiences, and venture capitalists and incubators in need of expert insight to help guide their investment decision.

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  Rebeccah Pailes-Friedman

  Founder & Principal, Interwoven Design Group

  2024 Sports & Outdoors Jury Captain

  Rebeccah Pailes-Friedman is a highly accomplished design professional working at the intersection of design and technology with a focus on wearable product, smart textiles and soft goods. With a background in performance apparel, product design and consumer products, she is a pioneering researcher in design methodologies and smart materials, and is Professor of Industrial Design at Pratt Institute. She is the author of Smart Textiles for Designers: Inventing the Future of Fabrics; has published many articles; and speaks internationally on design, innovation and the future.
  
  With over 25 years of corporate experience in athletic, medical, wearable, and consumer product design, she has held positions as Design Director for Fila, Champion and Nike and has been a key influencer in shaping innovative products. As the founder of Interwoven Design Group, she has led the creation of award-winning projects, including the Apex Exosuit for HeroWear, the Perci Emergency Preparedness V est, and the upcoming GLDN PNT padel collection. For the Core 77 Design Jury in the Sports and Outdoor category, Rebeccah emphasizes her extensive corporate background. Her dual role as a design leader and academic, coupled with her commitment to diversity in design, positions her as a valuable contributor to the evaluation of sports and outdoor design.

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  Nichole Rouillac

  Founder + Creative Director, level

  2024 Sports & Outdoors Jury Member

  Nichole is Founder and Creative Director of level, a West Coast, women-led industrial design shop based in San Francisco. The level studio is on a mission to create a global positive and progressive influence through smart, thoughtful design.
  
  Nichole’s work at level has helped create new industry categories and propelled products into the global spotlight. The studio’s portfolio encompasses the likes of Microsoft, Google, Logitech, FitBit, North, HTC, AliveCor, Tempo and Nex.
  
  level’s work has garnered wide recognition, including design awards such as FastCo., IDEA, Red Dot, iF and Spark. Notably, level was recognized as #03 in FastCompany’s Most Innovative Design Companies of 2021.
  
  Nichole remains committed to creating a diverse, inclusive industry. She has dedicated her career to balancing motherhood and empowering the next generation of female designers through mentorship, having served as chair of IDSA’s Women in Design from 2017-2021. level are active members of the Diversity in Design (DID) Collaborative, initiated in June 2021 to foster systemic change by increasing diversity and improving conditions for Black creatives across the design industry.

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  Tiffany Beers

  Head of Engineering, Gaming Audio, Sustainability & CMF, Logitech

  2023 Sports & Outdoors Jury Member

  Tiffany is a driven and curious innovator who brings game-changing products, experiences, systems, and strategies to life on behalf of the brands. Tiffany manages a large team of multidisciplinary engineering and Innovation professionals.
  
  Tiffany has 21 years of experience in the product & process innovation space including consumer goods (Nike, Saysh, Rubbermaid), Automotive (Tesla, amateur motorsports racing), and consumer electronics (Logitech G, Astro Gaming). She has been granted over 35 US patents and has worked alongside some of the top footwear designers, athletes, and entertainers in the world. She also successfully made the transition from the plastics industry to the footwear industry and is currently in the consumer electronics and gaming industries.
  
  Tiffany has spent over 15 years in the footwear space with Nike, Saysh, and her own Youtube Channel reviewing sneakers. She served as the lead Innovator on the Nike Hyperadapt, 2016 Nike Mag (auto-lacing), Air Jordan 29, Tom Sachs Collection 1, Air Yeezy 1, Air Raid Paranorman, Coraline Dunk, and many more Nike Products. For Saysh, she helped in starting the brand by bringing in designers, factories, and various partners to build the product, she also developed their first two products, The Saysh One and the Olympic track & field spike competed in by Allyson Felix in the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, where she won both a gold & a bronze medal.
  
  Tiffany is experienced in product development from concept thru mass production of consumer goods. Tiffany has been featured in Wired Magazine (Oct ‘16), Netflix-Abstract the Art of Design, The Today Show, The New York Times, and the book “Sneakers” for her innovative work on Nike’s Electro Adaptive Reactive Lacing (EARL) Technology.
  
  Tiffany grew up in a small town in Pennsylvania and studied at Penn State Erie, The Behrend College for her Bachelor of Science in Plastics Engineering Technology.

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  Scott Wilson

  Founder + CEO, MNML

  2023 Sports & Outdoors Jury Member

  Scott Wilson is a design entrepreneur and founder of the brand acceleration and product innovation studio, MINIMAL (MNML), in Chicago. With a diverse background in industries spanning lifestyle, sports, furniture, medical, consumer products, agriculture, and technology, Wilson has a passion for solving problems through beautifully simple solutions that connect emotionally and rationally with users. His studio has received numerous awards and recognition for its 15-year track record of commercial design successes creating billions of dollars in revenue for its clients and partners.
  
  In 2010, Wilson's Apple Nano LUNATIK Watch campaign sparked both the crowdfunding and wearable era and became the first $1 million Kickstarter fundraiser in history, changing the face of entrepreneurialism forever. He has been recognized as one of TIME Magazine's and Fast Company's Most Influential Designers and is a recipient of the prestigious Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt National Design Award, which is bestowed upon the top designer in the nation each year by the White House.
  

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  Charlotte Logeais

  Footwear Designer, Nike

  2024 Sports & Outdoors Jury Member

  Charlotte is a Footwear Designer at Nike WHQ in Portland, Oregon. She received her Bachelor of Industrial Design from Pratt Institute and Master of Science in Integrated Design, Business and Technology from USC ’s Iovine and Young Academy. Her work is imbued with a strong aesthetic sensibility and a heightened sense of how people emotionally connect with a product.

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  Natalie Candrian

  Creative Director, OMORPHO, SAYSH

  2023 Sports & Outdoors Jury Captain

  Natalie Candrian is a Swiss designer, living in Zurich, Switzerland and is currently creative design director at fitness brand OMORPHO and footwear brand SAYSH. Her career has been focused on the world of sport, creating footwear, apparel and accessories for the world’s largest brands and iconic athletes.
  
  Candrian worked with icon Allyson Felix to design and develop the SayshOne, followed closely by SayshSpike, a bespoke track spike for Felix, worn during Tokyo 2021 Olympics where she earned two medals becoming the most decorated female track & field athlete in history. Candrian began her career at Adidas where she designed the signature TMAC 1, 2 and 3 basketball sneaker for icon Tracy McGrady. His signature TMAC 1, 2 and 3 are still being reproduced today having sold with more 1.5 million units.
  
  At Nike she joined the exclusive Explore design group reporting directly to the President, designing innovative concepts relating to consumer and product experiences. Working closely with athletes she changed the game of tennis with the release of Maria Sharapova’s “little black dress”. Sharapova won the US Open title that year.
  
  Natalie is named FastCompany’s 100 Most Creative People in Business in 2022.

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  Evan Huggins

  Industrial Design Manager, SRAM

  2024 Sports & Outdoors Jury Member

  Evan Huggins is a San Francisco based designer with deep roots in the outdoor adventure community. He directs industrial design for the bike computer category at SRAM, a global leader in bicycle component design and manufacturing. Evan’s work has spanned hard and soft goods from conceptual projects through to shipping products in both startup and corporate environments. He is a firm believer in a user- first research based approach that places technology in service of the humans who use it.

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  Jayson Simeon

  VP, YETI Design, YETI

  2024 Sports & Outdoors Jury Member

  Jayson is a design leader turning design thinking into action. He leverages the experience from his diverse creative career for the benefit of every challenge he takes on, bringing focus to the fuzzy front end, embracing the difficult challenges, collaborating transparently, leading with integrity.
  
  Jayson has led some of the industry's best industrial design and user experience teams through complex programs to create successful product + brand solutions in nearly every industry imaginable.