The most common question we get from people deciding whether to enter is some version of “what is the jury actually looking for?” It is a fair question and a hard one to answer in the abstract, so here is the concrete version: eight projects that won at the DIELINE Awards 2026, and what each of them says about how the work gets read.
Varus 775 — Olssøn Barbieri — Best of Show
The highest cumulative score of the entire competition went to a tin flask and a ceramic vessel for a German distillery in Lübbecke. No novelty structure, no gimmick. Restraint of this kind only works when every single decision is right, and the jury tends to recognise that faster than it recognises invention for its own sake.
