A Leeds student has won the Joseph Stannah Award for designing a pregnancy loss support tool.
Lucia Guest, who studies product design at the University of Leeds, was announced as the winner for creating a tool named Vilo.
The first handheld physical support tool for bereaved parents, the product is designed to offer comfort and mimic a connection through warmth, vibration and light.
Lucia thought of the idea to develop Vilo when communicating with parents who had experienced miscarriages and hearing about charities that offer different forms of support.
One charity mentioned was Aching Arms, who provide comfort bears and a community to help parents facing loss.
Andover Advertiser reports that Stannah’s innovation and design manager, Max Woodhams, praised Lucia’s work as “a beautifully resolved and emotionally intelligent design that addresses a very real need”.
In a post on social media, Lucia described feeling “incredibly honoured” to have received the award.
The Joseph Stannah Award recognises designs “that addresses real-life challenges through empathy, inclusivity, sustainability and commercial understanding.”
The product design student was also named runner up for the Seymourpowell Shape the Future Award and runner up for the Cambridge Consultants Associate Prize for Excellence in Breakthrough Design.
“These acknowledgements mean so much, not just personally, but because they recognise the value of designing with empathy and focusing on real human needs that are so often overlooked,” she added.
Lucia believes Vilo has the potential to help bereaved parents “feel a little less alone”, and is proud that her design has already sparked conversations around pregnancy loss that she feels are “long overdue”.
The New Designers exhibition attracts more than 2,500 graduates from more than 100 universities annually. This event celebrates work in different design fields including interior design, textiles, graphic design, furniture making, ceramics and more.
Alongside a £1,000 prize, Lucia will also receive career-boosting help like work experience opportunities and, in some instances, graduate roles.
