1976 the design event of Colin King Grand Prix

Created by ICSID's first Patron Colin King awarded to distinguished industrial designers 1977 Lord Reilly (England) and in 1979 Kenji Ekuan (Japan)

  Kenji Ekuan

Founder and chairman of GK Design Group.A founding member of the internationally renowned Japanese of GK Design, Ekuan has been responsible for many designs of note ranging from the creating and redesign of Kikkoman soy sauce bottle through to Yamaha motorcycles, the Narita NEX express train, and the Akita bullet train.He was an important for a huge part industrial design in Japan, playing a key role in the bringing together a team of designers and leading organizations and bringing effective meaning to objects in everyday life.He graduated from the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music in 1955. And then in 1957, he found GK Industrial Design Associates, which later became the GK Design Group, where now he is chairmen today. In 1960 he was elected president of the Japan Industrial Designers Association (1960) and in 1976 his international standing was confirmed by his election to the presidency of ICSID (the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design). In 1987 he was awarded the prestigious biennial Osaka International Design Award, one of many such awards he has received.

Since 1998, he is chairman of the humanitarian organisation "Design for the World" and also has important positions in design-oriented associatons such as the Icsid, the Japan Design Foundation or the Japan Finland Design Association. Kenji Ekuan has received numerous awards including 1979 Icsid Colin King Grand Prix, the 1995 Sir Misha Black Medal (England), in 1997 the Officier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (France), and in 2000 "The Order of the Rising Sun" (Japan). In 2004, he received the "Insignia of Commander in the Order of the Lion of Finland." Kenji Ekuan interprets design activities in terms of their links with the overall picture of Japanese life culture, and he has written copiously concerning this ideology and the results of his research. Among his major works are "Thoughts on tools" (Dogu Ko), published in 1969 by Kashima Publishers, and "The Aesthetics of the Japanese Lunchbox," published in 1998 by MIT Press, USA.