Susanti Vijaykumar (MFA 2025 Design for Social Innovation) has been awarded the 2025 Don Norman Design Award in Excellence for her project, The Sapna Rannaghor (The Dream Kitchen) Cookbook Project. The Don Norman Design Award recognizes designers and educators who apply a holistic approach to addressing societal challenges, keeping in mind the needs of people and the planet.
Vijaykumar co-designed The Sapna Rannaghor Cookbook Project in collaboration with emergent bilingual Bangladeshi immigrant women participating Sapna NYC’s English for Speakers of Other Language (ESOL) classes. Together, they developed a project that centers Bangladeshi cultural assets and native Bangla language skills, using food and recipes as vehicles for building English proficiency and strengthening community.
After its incubation in Fast Track—an honors program within MFA Design for Social Innovation that focuses on prototyping—The Sapna Rannaghor Cookbook Project evolved into Vijaykumar’s graduate thesis. This winning project epitomizes social design through its community-centered approach to creating lasting social change.
Héctor Ruiz (MFA 2025 Design for Social Innovation) was also named a 2025 Don Norman Design Award finalist for his project, Estamos Hablando (We Are Speaking). Developed within the MFA Design for Social Innovation program, Héctor’s project creates spaces for community members to make a visual code in the form of a digital font designed “by” them.
Don Norman Design Award (DNDA) honors grassroots projects by early-career teams, design-trained or not, whose work embodies the core principles of Humanity-Centered Design (HCD+) and shows promise to make a substantial difference to the lives of the communities for which they are intended. The projects must address at least one of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. A distinguished international jury evaluates each submission based on the merits and assigns a score accordingly.
MFA 2025 Design for Social Innovation is proud of these two projects—and the designers behind them—and honored that they have been recognized by the Don Norman Design Award.
