UW Students Place in International Interior Design Competition for Second Consecutive Year

For the second year in a row, University of Wyoming students in the design, merchandising and textiles bachelor’s degree program have been recognized for their quality interior design work in the Interior Design Educators Council (IDEC) Student Design Competition.

The competition invites interior design students from universities around the world to solve a prescribed design problem, which typically aims to meet the needs of an underserved or marginalized population.

Britt Bardman, a senior from Bondurant; Abby Metzger, a junior from Colorado Springs, Colo.; and Corah Miller, a senior from Jackson, were awarded an honorable mention for their design, “The Harbor,” a sanctuary that “provides dedicated space for neurodiverse students to dock during turbulent mental weather.” Their design was ranked in the top four in a field of 101 international submissions.

Imagined as a hub for mental health, the building features a double-curved façade that would allow plenty of healing, natural light into a community atrium and small-scale collaboration space. Deeper within the space, the team conceptualized privacy pods for bright light therapy sessions to help combat seasonal affective disorder.

“Participating in the IDEC design competition with my team was an immensely rewarding experience,” Metzger says. “Exploring the prompt to create a healing space for neurodivergent individuals not only ignited our creativity, but it also sparked a profound sense of purpose.”

Every fall, IDEC introduces a new competition that challenges students to harness the powers of empathy, research, space planning and creativity to design spaces that allow occupants to thrive.

Design competitions are “pedagogical powerhouses” in UW Senior Lecturer Treva Sprout Ahrenholtz’s interior design courses.

“Competitions like IDEC’s highlight and advance the best of what interior design has to offer society,” Sprout Ahrenholtz says. “Student success and recognition in these competitions over the last few years only underscore what we have known all along -- our students are outstanding.”

Last year, Miller and Wheatland’s Elyse Rutherford, who graduated from UW last spring, were awarded second place in the IDEC Student Design Competition. Their design, “Fallout,” highlighted the imagined journey of a nuclear refugee family and how they could design a shelter out of a limited number of objects in the high plains of Mongolia. Students had one week to research, design and present a feasible idea that would suitably and safely shelter the occupants.

“I am very honored for my design work to be awarded by IDEC two years in a row,” Miller says. “So much work and thought went into both ‘Fallout’ and ‘The Harbor,’ and I could not have done it without my brilliant project partners. I also am immensely proud to have the University of Wyoming recognized through our work. I appreciated the IDEC Student Design Competition for creating a collaborative environment, where I could work with peers to research and develop human-centered design solutions.”

To view “The Harbor,” go here, and to view “Fallout,” click here.

For more information about IDEC, visit https://idec.org.