London’s Royal College of Art has announced the winners of the inaugural Hyundai Awards for Excellence in Sustainability and Creative Practice.

2024’s winners include Ankita Khanna and Yohaan Kukreja (MA Design Products) who won the Innovation award for their project ‘RAW Materials’. 

It features the world’s first rice straw-derived, biodegradable composite and sheet material, designed for footwear production in the fast fashion industry.

The project was created in response to the annual practice of rice straw burning in India, which creates air pollution resulting in significant health issues, economic losses and soil degradation. 

Through the creation of the bio-derived and biodegradable material, they “reshape the supply chain to prioritise sustainability”.

The awards invite students from across the RCA to submit projects “that question societal cultural norms, work towards solving the climate crisis or communicate world challenges around sustainability”. 

Other winners were Kahee Jeong (MA Painting) who took home the Aesthetics & Craft award for ‘Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going’, a series of works exploring the relationships between humans and nature, created using natural, non-toxic, handmade paints and reused objects.

And Paul Baule (MA Digital Direction) was this year’s winner of the Inspiration award for his project ‘WOOD YOU’, an immersive installation combining historic satellite images of deforestation in the Amazon with 3D animation and acoustics to create a personal interplay between humans and the forest.