Press Release
Pan HS, Zhong MM and Wang Xh Receives the Bronze A' Design Award for New Chinese Style Urban Map in Graphics, Illustration and Visual Communication Design
Pan HS, Zhong MM and Wang Xh recognized for graphics, illustration and visual communication design by the international grand jury of the 2025 - 2026 A' Design Award & Competition
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
COMO, Italy, April 22, 2026 /DesignNewswire/ New Chinese Style Urban Map by Pan HS, Zhong MM and Wang Xh, designed for School of Architecture and Design, Harbin Institute of Technology, has been granted the Bronze A' Design Award in the Graphics, Illustration and Visual Communication Design category, A' Design Award & Competition has announced. The award was conferred within the 2025 - 2026 A' Design Award & Competition and was reached through blind peer review by an international grand jury panel of established academics, design professionals and press members, who scored anonymized entries against predetermined criteria.
About the Bronze A' Design Award
The Bronze A' Design Award is given to outstanding designs that showcase a high degree of creativity and practicality. It recognizes the dedication and skill of designers who produce work that stands out for its thoughtful development and innovative use of materials and technology. These designs are acknowledged for their professional execution and potential to influence industry standards positively. Winning this award highlights the designer's ability to blend form and function effectively, offering solutions that enhance people's lives and wellbeing.
More About New Chinese Style Urban Map
New Chinese Style is a hand-drawn urban map of Lanzhou, China. The map presents the only provincial capital through which the Yellow River flows. The line work is drawn with a fountain pen and then colored with watercolor on specialty paper, with a base sheet of 1.1 by 1.7 meters. A moving aerial viewpoint, inspired by classical Chinese painting, links landmark buildings, waterways, roads and folk scenes into one continuous picture. The finished product includes outer packaging, the map and two postcards.
Award Record
Pan HS, Zhong MM and Wang Xh is a winner of 1 A' Design Award, including this recognition.
About the A' Graphics, Illustration and Visual Communication Design Award
The A' Graphic Design Award is an international graphic design competition recognizing good graphic designs by best creative agencies and designers worldwide. It is organized within the A' Design Award & Competition and is open to graphic designers, communication designers, graphic artists and illustrators from all countries. Typical entries include logos, posters, infographics, brochures, packaging designs and business cards. The awarded graphic designs are published at https://dezigners.org/design-category/graphics
About A' Design Award & Competition
Organized annually since 2008, A' Design Award & Competition is an international, juried design accolade. The competition is open to entries from all countries. The philanthropic mission of the A' Design Award is to advance society through good design, by recognizing and promoting superior products, projects and services that benefit society, and by creating a global awareness and appreciation for good design practices and principles. Nominations are peer reviewed and evaluated anonymously by an international grand jury panel of established academics, design professionals and press members against predetermined criteria such as functionality, ergonomics, engineering, presentation, innovation, usability, sustainability and technology, with score normalization applied to remove biases. Awards are conferred at Platinum, Gold, Silver, Bronze and Iron levels. Eligible laureates receive the A' Design Prize, which includes the award trophy, the certificate of design excellence, the hardcover yearbook, a lifetime license to use the A' Design Award winner logo, exhibition of awarded works, an invitation to the gala night and award ceremony in Italy, inclusion in the World Design Rankings and Designer Rankings, and public relations and publicity services. Registration, uploading a work and receiving a preliminary score are free of charge, and Professional and Digital Edition laureates are not contractually obliged to pay further fees to claim the A' Design Prize. More information is available at https://competition.adesignaward.com
Press Resources
- Winner Page: https://dezigners.org/178418
- A' Design Award Page: https://competition.adesignaward.com/178418
- Media Showcase: https://www.designnewsroom.com/!178418
- Laureate Profile: https://dezigners.org/d/371395
Media Contact
Giulia Ferrari, Press Office
Designers.Org
Via Leone Leoni 32, 22100 Como, Italy
press@designers.org
+39 031 4491953
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Fact Sheet
The Work
- Project
- New Chinese Style Urban Map
- Function
- Urban Map
- Category
- Graphics, Illustration and Visual Communication Design
- Discipline
- Communication Design
- Industry
- Branding & Advertising and Arts
- Colors
- Tan, Silver, Rosy Brown, Burly Wood and Gray
- Images
- 5
- Client
- School of Architecture and Design, Harbin Institute of Technology
The Recognition
- Laureate
- Pan HS, Zhong MM and Wang Xh
- Country
- China
- Recognition
- Bronze A' Design Award
- Edition
- 2025 - 2026
- Design ID
- #178418
Credits
- Team
- Husheng PAN, Mingming ZHONG and Xiaohong WANG
- Image Credits
- IP and copyrights belong to Husheng Pan and Wang Xiaohong.
Design Details
- Unique Properties
- This design represents a visual exploration that employs contemporary design language to recount the story of a Chinese city. Anchored by the spiritual core of "Golden City Lanzhou," the work takes its point of departure from a unique geographical and cultural fact: Lanzhou is the only provincial capital through which the Yellow River flows. The design transmutes the city’s historical memory, urban development, and folk customs into a readable, palpable, and "Guofeng" (Neo-Chinese style) visual narrative.
- Inspiration
- Taking the expressive methods and painting styles of ancient Chinese classical art, mainly drawing inspiration from the famous Northern Song painter Zhang Zeduan's 'The Qingming Festival along the River'.
- Research
- In order to fully showcase Lanzhou’s urban development and the new vitality of its social folk culture, this work innovatively uses the unique loess landscape of the region as its foundation, skillfully integrating the multi-point perspective composition and ink-and-color-on-silk techniques found in the classical Chinese artwork Along the River During the Qingming Festival. By adopting a mobile viewpoint, it dynamically captures landmark architecture, waterways, roads, and folk scenes, weaving these complex elements into an elegant and cohesive humanistic picture.
- Challenge
- The entire hand-drawn map's illustration design is burdensome, taking a total of 1,200 hours to complete. There are 143 buildings and scenic spots alone, more than 100 different character shapes, and there are more flowers and trees. On the other hand, distilling and organizing these complex elements requires a profound level of creative thinking and design experience.
- Realization and Technology
- The process begins with creating the line drawing using a fountain pen (ink: Catfish brand, pen: LAMY/extra fine). Then, watercolor is applied for coloring. Based on this, the final hand-drawn map product consists of three parts: "outer packaging + hand-drawn map + 2 postcards." The material used is specialty paper.
- Operation and Interaction
- With the aerial perspective of "mobile point of viewing", combined with the Yellow River and urban roads passing through Lanzhou. Together, they create an intertwined spatial structure and visual guidance, showcasing the architectural sequence of Lanzhou's urban area as well as its folk culture and daily life.
- Project Duration and Location
- Completed Date& Duration: October 2023, Duration: approximately 6 months; Project Location: Lanzhou City, Gansu Province, China
- Specifications
- Drawing specifications: the base paper for drawing: 1.1 * 1.7 meters.
- Keywords
- The spatial narrative is grand, the details are richly illustrated, and the use of color is elegant and refined.
