BASF’s Coatings division has received an award for design. BASF designers, along with the Raum Mannheim agency, have received the “Red Dot Award: Communication Design 2014” for the design of their “Under the Radar” Global Color Trend Book.

Every year, BASF publishes a trend book exclusively for its automotive customers. It presents the latest automotive color trends from Europe, Asia Pacific and North America. The trend book also describes the social trends and developments observed by the BASF designers that they use to determine the color trends. It serves as a tool for the designers of the automotive manufacturers, offering both information and inspiration.

“We are very proud of the distinction. It strengthens the BASF brand in the global design industry and demonstrates that we have our finger on the pulse of our time with our color developments,” said Astrid Van der Auwera from the global design team of BASF’s Coatings division. “With the trend book we are paving the way for future-oriented design solutions and approaches.” The designers received the same award for a previous edition of the trend book in 2012. This year’s Red Dot Award is the fourth design prize received by BASF’s Coatings division in the area of customer communication.


What makes the trend book so extraordinary is the fact that it visualizes the color trends with originally coated color samples. “This allows us to make the fascination of color a real experience and illustrate to our customers the effect a coating can have,” explained Mark Gutjahr, head of Design Europe at BASF’s Coatings division. “For the trend book, the way the color, effect and surface interact is a key factor.”

The trend book also highlights BASF’s capacity to think interculturally and to offer the coatings for specific markets. “Drivers for color trends may be global, but when we translate them into color, we have to gear them to brand recognition, market development and consumer behavior in the respective regions,” said Van der Auwera. For this reason, the trend book always takes both global and regional color themes into consideration.