Which architects, designers, brands, products and events have produced the most hype over the last 12 months? Dezeen has crunched the numbers to come up with the answer — and the results make for fascinating reading.
Topping the inaugural list is the late Zaha Hadid, whose unexpected death on March 31 this year sparked an outpouring of tributes from fellow professionals, architectural critics and the wider public. Another architect came in second — Bjarke Ingels, having overseen a burgeoning portfolio of landmark projects around the world in the last 12 months, saw his firm’s work widely disseminated by design enthusiasts and commentators alike during 2016.
Zaha Hadid and Bjarke Ingels were the most talked about architects of the past 12 months; images via Dezeen.
Other architects to make the top 10 were Herzog & de Meuron (4), Kengo Kuma (5), Peter Zumthor (7), SANAA (8), MVRDV (9) and David Chipperfield (10). Indeed, architects dominated the list, with only major events, such as Milan Design Week (3), and iconic brands, such as IKEA (6) and Apple (11), trending with a similar frequency throughout the year.
You can check out the complete list of 400 here, but the chart below reveals the top five most talked about across nine different creative categories:
Via Dezeen
The Hot List was created using a carefully calculated combination of metrics drawn from audience data. Each entry is ranked based on the number of times it has been searched for by Dezeen’s global audience and the number of times stories about it have been viewed. The results constitute a fresh insight into the behavior of huge online audiences across the design world, illuminating the ways in which architecture and design news is consumed in the digital realm.
As Dezeen rightly emphasizes, the Hot List is “more than just a popularity contest”: These rankings could become a benchmark for identifying online trends across every creative discipline for years to come. Who will be the most talked about player in the design world in 2017? We can’t wait to find out.