Header: LIT Awards
The LIT Lighting Design Awards celebrated ten years of honouring top-tier light installations, products, and stage designs this week. On June 16th, the organisation held a grand ceremony in the middle of Paris to crown the winners of its Architectural, Entertainment, and Lighting Product Design categories.
The event took place at the Yachts de Paris right on the edge of the Seine, with views stretching out to the Eiffel Tower. It drew a crowd of 200 designers, judges, and industry professionals travelling from 25 different countries, turning the evening into a truly global gathering.
Afternoon talks set the stage
Before the main trophies were handed out, guests gathered by the riverbank for a series of short design talks and networking sessions. Winning designers from the 2024 and 2025 seasons took turns sharing the practical concepts and technical innovations behind their projects. This gave fellow professionals and the press a close-up look at how these massive installations and delicate products are planned and built.
Honouring the Best in Architectural and Product Design
The main awards ceremony covered several distinct fields, recognising seasoned studios alongside new, emerging talent. Among the 2024 winners present were Saumya Monga and Zerlina Hughes from Studio ZNA, who took home the architectural crown for their work on the exhibition Gabrielle Chanel. Fashion Manifesto.
Takahiro Matsuo, the founder of Lucent Design Inc., won the entertainment category for a project titled The Creation. On the student side, Vaida Atkočaitytė-Dališanskienė from Vilnius Academy of Arts won the emerging product designer title for her work, MOOD.
The 2025 winners also took the stage. Mariana Novaes of Atiaîa Lighting Design was awarded the architectural prize for Memorial Brumadinho. Martin Döller of One to One by Martin Döller won the product prize for Amphora, and James Tapscott of Studio JT Pty Ltd. took the entertainment trophy for Arc ZERO: Eclipse.
Younger talent swept the remaining 2025 categories. A team from the Deggendorf Institute of Technology, Franziska Rieder, Sabine Wiesend, and Jannick Lippert, won the emerging designer for Flight into Shadow. Yuxin Luo, a student at ArtCenter College of Design, won the emerging product title for CinderGlow.
A lifetime of work recognised
A standout moment of the night was the presentation of the 2025 Lifetime Achievement Award to Suzan Tillotson. As the founder and president of Tillotson Design Associates, she was commended for her long career and major impact on how buildings and public spaces use light.
Other notable firms making the winners list included global names like Maytoni, Hydrel, Expolight, Lichtvision Design, Artec Studio, Brandston Partnership Inc., L’Observatoire International, LELCO, Eleftheria Deko & Associates, Aslight, Sweco Architects, CD+M Lighting Design, Light Directions, and NEAL Lighting. Local French design studios were also well represented, with Concepto, Light is More, and Projetscénie picking up prizes.
A look back at the last decade
Astrid Hébert, the Director of the LIT Lighting Design Awards, reflected on how much the industry has shifted since the awards began.
“Ten years ago, we started the LIT Awards with a simple belief — that lighting design deserved a platform of its own. What this anniversary edition in Paris showed us is how far that community has grown, and how deeply it cares about the power of light. To see designers from across the world come together, share their work, and celebrate each other in a city that understands beauty — that was everything we hoped this milestone would be.”
The night wrapped up with a formal sit-down dinner. Each winner stepped onto the stage to collect a special anniversary trophy, capping off a decade of growth for the design community.
