Amidst the ongoing discussion about the place of women in design, the 2019 Australian Good Design Awards gave out its first ever Women in Design Award, for which there were more than 60 nominations. The award was given to Sharon Gauci. In 2018, Gauci was appointed Executive Director of Industrial Design at General Motors (GM) and now heads a team of 180 creative professionals in North America, Australia, Korea, Brazil and China who are responsible for designing all of the brands produced by one of the largest automobile manufacturers in the world. The jury explained that they awarded the accolade to Gauci because of her design accomplishments and, most of all, because of the stance taken by GM in appointing a female designer to such a position in the male-dominated automobile industry.
