Claremorris woman scoops top graphic design title

Claremorris woman scoops top Graphic Design title

Ciara Galvin

A Claremorris Graphic Designer has beat off competition from over 1,000 entrants from 90 countries to win the prestigious International Yamaha Graphic Design Award.
Laurie Concannon won the top award when her piece ‘Kando’ was picked as the winner of the ‘Grand Prize’.
Late last year Laurie’s piece was selected along with 14 others to be reviewed by international graphic designers.
A graduate of Dublin Institute of Technology, Laurie said she was ‘thrilled’ with winning such a prestigious award and said the win will greatly advance her graphic design career. Laurie received $10,000 for her award winning submission and she now plans to further her education and broaden her horizons through travel and ‘continued experimentation in design’. ‘Kando’ was created through creating forms with light.
‘The mark reflects a composer’s hand gestures influenced by music’s universal ability to break language barriers communicating the emotive qualities of music,’ explained the talented Graphic Designer.
Neville Brody one of the world’s most renowned Graphic Designers was Head of the Judging panel. Mr Brody said the piece has ‘unlocked the potential to be used in many different forms of media’.

‘Didn’t expect to win’
Laurie said she enjoyed working on the project and didn’t expect to win the Grand Prize.
“I was absolutely thrilled to have been selected for the shortlist, to have been selected for the Grand Prize is just beyond words. It is such a fantastic honour to have had my work selected by such an esteemed company as Yamaha and by such a renowned graphic designer as head juror Neville Brody,” said Laurie.
“To know that a designer of his social standing and expertise has come into contact with a piece of my work is just breathtaking,” said Laurie, who believes the award will ‘help to open a lot of doors’ in the graphic design industry.
It has been a great couple of months for Laurie who graduated with a HND with Distinction in Graphic Design from The Dublin Institute of Design last year. She came first in her class and received the Student of the Year Award.
She is a former student of Mount St Michael Secondary School Claremorris and is the daughter of Ger and Catherine Concannon.