Calls for entries:Upcoming design competition deadlines

All of the following competitions deadlines present great opportunities to showcase your design efforts, market your work on an international scale through the published books, and "toot!" your own horn to clients, peers and the media:

Market Smart Design
(Crescent Hill Books - USA)
Deadline Extended: 12 June 2008
No entry fees charged

HOW Interactive Design Awards 2008
(HOW Magazine - USA)
Deadline: 15 June 2008
Entry fees charged

Communication Arts Advertising Competition
(Communication Arts - USA)
Deadline Extended: 16 June 2008
Entry fees charged

Communication Arts Design Competition
(Communication Arts - USA)
Deadline Extended: 16 June 2008
Entry fees charged

Gateways - an international exhibition of book covers
(Serralves Foundation - Portugal)
Deadline: 20 June 2008
No entry fees charged

The BEST Ads You've Never Seen
(Crescent Hill Books - USA)
Deadline: 30 June 2008
No entry fees charged

LogoPond Awards
(LogoPond - USA)
Deadline Extended: 30 June 2008
Entry fees charged

American Graphic Design Awards
(Graphic Design USA - USA)
Deadline Extended: 30 June 2008
Entry fees charged

LogoLounge 5
(LogoLounge - USA)
Deadline: 30 June 2008
LogoLounge paid membership required

The Big Book of Self-Promotion
(Crescent Hill Books - USA)
Especially seeking submissions of unique promotional products (games, toys, wearables) and fun seasonal promotions (calendars, holiday items).
Deadline Extended: 1 July 2008
No entry fees charged

The Create Awards 2008
(Create Magazine - USA)
Extended Deadline (with late fees): 7 July 2008
Entry fees charged

No Rules! Logos
(RotoVision - UK)
Deadline: 7 July 2008
No entry fees charged

TypeGallery 2008
(Society of Typographic Aficionados - USA)
Deadline: 9 July 2008
Entry fees charged

2008 UCDA Design Competition
(UCDA - USA)
Deadline: 11 July 2008
Entry fees charged

2008 Summit Marketing Effectiveness Award
(Summit Awards - USA)
Deadline Extended: 14 July 2008
Entry fees charged

Creativity Annual Awards
(Creativity Annual Awards - USA)
Deadline: 15 July 2008
Entry fees charged

Really Good Packaging, Explained
(Crescent Hill Books - USA)
Deadline Extended: 25 July 2008
No entry fees charged

Letterhead & Logo Design 11
(Rockport Publishers - USA)
Deadline: 8 August 2008
No entry fees charged

2008 Re:Design Competition
(Dynamic Graphics - USA)
Deadline: 15 August 2008
Entry fees charged

Like Colors: A Compendium of Prized T-shirt Designs
(Oxide Design Co. - USA)
Deadline: 15 August 2008
No entry fees charged

HOW International Design Awards 2008
(HOW Magazine - USA)
Deadline: 1 September 2008
Entry fees charged

For a Good Cause: Solidarity Design
(Index Book - Spain)
Deadline: 15 September 2008
No entry fees charged

A Homeage to Typography
(Index Book - Spain)
Deadline: 30 September 2008
No entry fees charged

Toilets - PictoSigns
(Index Book - Spain)
Deadline: 30 September 2008
No entry fees charged

H2O
(Index Book - Spain)
Deadline: 20 October 2008
No entry fees charged

Diagrams
(RotoVision - UK)
Deadline: 30 October 2008
No entry fees charged

Communication Arts Interactive Competition
(Communication Arts - USA)
Deadline: 16 January 2009
Entry fees charged

Communication Arts Illustration Competition
(Communication Arts - USA)
Deadline: 6 March 2009
Entry fees charged

Communication Arts Photography Competition
(Communication Arts - USA)
Deadline: 6 March 2009
Entry fees charged

HOW International Design Awards 2009
(HOW Magazine - USA)
Deadline: 20 March 2009
Entry fees charged

(To make sure you are reading the latest bLog-oMotives design competition update click here.)

You may want to read my article about participating in design industry competitions: A Winning Strategy. It has appeared on the Creative Latitude and NO!SPEC web sites.

Design competition calendars are also available at Icograda and Workbook. Lürzer's ARCHIVE also has an impressive online list of competitions sponsored by international magazines and organizations. DesignTaxi and Dexinger post competitions of great value to industry professionals - however designers need to be aware that some of the listings are for "spec" work as a requirement for submission. Requests for new, or speculative, work as a condition of entering a "contest" are much different than legitimate design competition "calls for entries," in which previously created works are judged for possible awards, exhibition, or publication in an annual or other book.

My own work appears in nearly 100 graphic design books. Many of those inclusions are the result of design competitions, or requests for submissions, like those listed above.

For the perspective from the other side of design competitions, I wrote a bLog-oMotives entry about judging the 2007 Summit Creative Awards.

Good luck!

© 2008 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives