Lactating dads? Male breastfeeding kit wins 'meaning-centred' award

PETALING JAYA: A male breastfeeding kit has become the winner of the inaugural Meaning-Centred Design Awards.

Chestfeeding for Dads is the brainchild of designer Marie-Claire Springham, and it's a kit that provides all the necessary hormones a man needs to produce milk for his baby.

It also comes with a pump and compression vest.

The Meaning-Centred Design Awards celebrates the best brands, organisations, services, apps and products that manage "their own meaning or category they live in" and gives recognition to designs that generate social impact and inspire cultural change.

A panel of experts convened last week at London’s Saatchi Gallery to select the winners.

Awards Chairperson Julie Jenson Bennett said: “In our inaugural year, we were blown away by the number, breadth and quality of entries we received. They provoked many questions about what meaning is, why it matters both to business and society, and how design can change culture."

She noted that the chestfeeding kit deserved particular attention because it challenged the fundamental meanings of being male and female, father and mother, parent and child.

"At a time when we increasingly use hormones, medication and technology to change the life options available to us, Marie-Claire’s design concept goes right to heart of our taboos,” said Bennett in a statement.

Award winner Marie-Claire Springham said: “I’m thrilled to have won such a prestigious award.

“The kit has the power to take what we thought we knew about parenting and turn it on its head, breaking down the strict gender and societal roles we have created for new parents.

"I hope the discussions raised by this project are taken further and inspire even more innovation and progress.”

The idea is still at the concept stage, but Marie-Claire said she hoped the innovation would help to provoke a profound debate about the meanings behind gender in parenthood.

The male chestfeeding kit was one of six category winners, coming out on top of a final shortlist of some 18 entries in the student-gender dynamics category.

The other winners include Jelly Drops, a sweet designed to tackle chronic dehydration in people with dementia, which was honoured in the student–healthcare category; Get Compensation!, an app-based tool empowering the survivors of domestic abuse to seek financial redress, was declared the winner in the social change category; and Grohe Sense & Sense Guard, a water leak detector designed to protect homeowners from astronomical repair costs caused by flooding, came out on top in the Technology category.