Members DAME Design Awards Jury
The DAME Design Awards Jury is drawn from a mix of experts in their field, from the marine and broader industries. It typically includes those with naval architecture, boat design, interior design, user application and marine market experience and skills. The jury is supported by a non-voting secretary. The members of the Jury carefully assess entries for overall design, build quality, functionality, and use of materials. Other factors taken into account are originality, ergonomics, and price/quality ratio.
The DAME Design Awards 2025 Jury consists of:
Andre Hoek (Chair)
Andre Hoek is founder and director of the Dutch yacht design and naval architecture office Hoek Design for more than 35 years. Hoek Design is well known for their designs of timeless sail- and motoryachts. Andre studied naval architecture and has a MBA degree. He was raised in a sailing family and remained an enthusiastic sailor over the years, being part of race crews such as Adele, Marie, J class yachts Lionheart and Topaz.
Rory Coase
Rory Coase, a yacht designer located in Bergen, Norway, nurtured a passion for marine design from his upbringing in the UK. His early fascination with yachts and ocean liners led to a career in Naval Architecture, working with esteemed shipyards across Europe. In 2020, he founded Coase Design, expanding his projects globally with a team of collaborators. Outside work, Rory enjoys fjord swims, music, films, and Bergen's fleeting sunshine, often shared with friends and white wine.
Davide Cipriani
Davide Cipriani, President of yacht design engineering at Centrostiledesign srl, developed a love for boating in his childhood. He became passionate about the design world and soon began a career path in the 27-year-old family industrial design business focused on the marine industry, working with his father, Tiziano. Davide now manages the company, taking care of its customers and its 40 employees. Centrostiledesign srl is an industrial design company that is focused on yacht design, providing a very high quality service to clients who want to see their ideas become finished products, by following the production chain in every single step.
Amy Munro
Amy Munro is a sustainability professional working within the realm of sports and the arts as catalysts for social and environmental change. Her background has been in strategy development and implementation for performance sailing projects within America’s Cup and Ocean Race teams, and project management of the development of open-access sustainability tools and resources.
Patrick Hemp
Patrick Hemp is the Technical Manager for the International Council of Marine Industry Associations (ICOMIA). He graduated as a yacht designer after spending many years as professional crew upon privately owned classic sailing yachts. After working as the design coordinator for the Gunboat multihull company in South Africa he started Hemp Marine which specialises in the design, project management and yacht management of recreational sailing craft.
Arjen Jansen
Arjen Jansen is a senior lecturer in the school for Industrial Design Engineering at TUDelft, enthusiast sailor and sailing instructor. He loves to involve industry while training students to find innovative sports solutions. He currently runs the Alliance for Sports Engineering Education programme (A4See), an Erasmus+project and is member of the ISEA (International Sports Engineering Association) executive committee.
TU Delft is the oldest and largest university of technology of the Netherlands. The Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering is a breeding ground for first-class designers; it’s a multidisciplinary study, where students learn about every aspect of product design, such as practical design skills, a broad technological grounding and extensive knowledge of innovation processes.
Olivier Racoupeau
A keen sailor since childhood, Olivier graduated from the Toulouse University in mechanics and aeronautic technologies before joining Jean Berret in 1983. The pair created many highly successful yacht racing designs and designed many production boats for Bénéteau, including the ‘First’ range and their first catamaran for the Fountaine Pajot shipyard. Olivier continues to manage the Berret-Racoupeau design office today across a wide range of projects. Berret-Racoupeau Yacht Design was founded in 1994 and more than 15,000 Berret-Racoupeau designs are sailing today.
Ben Stein
Ben Stein is editor of Panbo.com covering marine technology. He also writes a monthly Getting Technical column for Soundings Trade Only, and serves as electronics editor for Power & Motoryacht and PassageMaker magazines. After 15 years in financial services technology, he left the corporate world to pursue his passion in boating. Ben is the current President of Boating Writers International, a USCG 100-Ton Master, and ABYC certified marine electrical technician.
Kim Hollamby (secretary)
Kim Hollamby works as a consultant and non-executive director, focused on marketing, communications, business growth, change management, human resources and people development. Previously Kim was editor of Motor Boats Monthly and group editor of the IBI portfolio of publications, publisher of ybw.com and director of a technology team for Time Inc in the UK before moving to the board of an IT and software development company.