KIGI Co., Ltd. – Yoshie Watanabe, Ryosuke Uehara — Tokyo, Japan

“When people request work from us, we want to give them back something that will make them happy. We also want to surprise them, so we always try to give them a little more than they expected. It’s often said that design is not the place for a designer to express him/herself. Though we know that and understand it as a sound argument, if we do not fit into that mold then we are fine with not being ‘proper’ designers.”

Kigi was formed by the collaboration of Yoshie Watanabe and Ryosuke Uehara, both former senior staff members at Tokyo-based design company Draft. The pair joined forces to form a unique entity that is possessed of both exceptional creative sensibility and a markedly humane artistic conscience.