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Technical University of Munich

Fritz Frenkler

Prof.

Former professor of Industrial Design
TUM School of Engineering and Design

born May 5, 1954

fritz.frenkler(at)tum.de

CV

Prof. Frenkler studied industrial design at the Academy of Fine Arts (HBK) in Braunschweig. He worked for frogdesign in Germany and the US and was managing director of frogdesign Asia in Tokyo. He headed the company wiege Wilkhahn Entwicklungsgesellschaft and worked as head designer for Deutsche Bahn AG. In 2000, he founded f/p design germany gmbh with Anette Ponholzer, followed by the f/p design representation in Japan in 2012. The ongoing success led to the founding of the subsidiary f/p design co.ltd. in 2018 as an independent subsidiary of f/p design gmbh.

He was made an honorary professor at HBK Braunschweig in 2005. In 2006, he was appointed full professor of the newly-created Chair of Industrial Design at TUM. Fritz Frenkler is a regional advisor of the WDO (former ICSID) and has been jury chairman of the iF product design awards for many years. Since 2018, he is a board member of the iF Design Foundation, Hanover.

Since 2013 Fritz Frenkler has been a member of the Academy of Arts Berlin, Department of Architecture, and in 2021 he became the director of the Department of Architecture.

In October 2020 he was awarded the title of TUM Emeritus of Excellence.

Since 2000, Fritz Frenkler has won more than 70 international design awards, including 10 Gold Design Awards. For his achievements in the field of design, he received prizes such as the IF Product Design Award, the G-Mark Good Design Award or the Red Dot Product Design Award.

Fritz Frenkler has been a member of the Board of Trustees of the Dieter and Ingeborg Rams Foundation since 2022.

Awards (selection)

  • Braun Prize, Kronberg, Deutschland (1983)
  • Compasso d'Oro, Mailand, Italien (1998)
  • G-Mark, Tokyo, Japan (1997, 1999, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2009)
  • iF Product Design Award, Hannover, Deutschland (1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2010)
  • The Chicago Athenaeum Good Design Award, Chicago, USA (1996, 1999, 2000)

Explanations of prizes and honours can be found here (pdf-file to download 215 KB).

 

Key publications

Frenker F: „The Report. Industrial Design at the Technial University of Munich", 2020
                 published as pdf at mediaTUM https://mediatum.ub.tum.de/1580154

Frenkler F: „Das Design macht oft den Unterschied“. Logistik heute. 2010; 4: 42.

Frenkler F: „Nahverkehr und Design“. Der Nahverkehr. 2009; 12: 8-9.

Frenkler F: „Marketingdesign vs. Markendesign“. Architecture Preview. 2008; 2: 17-19.

Frenkler F: „Design + Architektur“. BDA Jahrbuch 2006.2007. 2007: 18-25.

Frenkler F: „Computer Aided Design im Industrial Design“. Diplomarbeit an der HBK-Braunschweig, 1983

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