Bowled over by success
A County Derry product designer has scooped a prestigious award at a US pet fashion show for his unique dog bowl design.
By Orla McNicholl
Dungiven man Justin Magee and his business partner Stephen McGilloway teamed up with Derry pet firm HugX to create the award winning design, which won the ‘Lifestyle Innovation Award’ in the pet dinnerware category at New York’s Pet Fashion week recently.
The HugX bowl, which has been hailed as a “total rethink in dog dining” beat off stiff international competition from top designers, including Italian design house Alessi, to pick up the coveted award.
And orders for the bowl, which won’t topple over thanks to its unique design, have been flooding in from pet lovers all over the world ever since.
Justin and Stephen, both lecturers at the University of Ulster’s Magee campus, already have a bursting portfolio of designs, which includes new product concepts for international design projects such as Lego systems, the Smart car, Mercedes M Class and Audi A2.
The designers, known as Bigsmall Design, worked with the Derry firm to develop a range of concepts, culminating in the prize-winning effective and attractive product.
Justin said: “Our work with HugX is a good example of how staff at the university can use their expertise to work in partnership with local companies to help them bring their ideas to fruition.”
“Jane Grant, CEO of HugX, came to us with a series of design issues on the subject of pet dining from which we then developed a focused design brief.
“We delivered a broad range of concepts and took the project through to prototype and to mass production,” added Justin.
