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How can a personal idea be turned into a fashion product, a casting flaw give rise to a new form, or observations of the city inspire a design intervention? At MOME’s 2026 Autumn Course Week, students worked alongside guest practitioners from Hungary and abroad. In a series of intensive workshops, they experimented with a variety of approaches, from traditional craft techniques to digital prototyping, while exploring themes such as memory, care, and ecological responsibility.

How can ways of thinking, sensitivity, and attitudes to work be passed down from one generation to the next? What role do time spent together, working side by side, attentiveness, acceptance, and even conflict play in relationships between masters and students? Offering a fascinating cross-section of Hungarian craft and design, Patterns That Live On, a new temporary exhibition organised in collaboration with the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design (MOME), explores the continuity of the institution across generations, the personal relationships between practitioners and the passing on of knowledge, perspectives, and experience. The exhibition opens on 18 October at the Ráth György Villa.

The recipients of the Stefan Lengyel Scholarship of Excellence for the spring semester of 2026 have been announced. The sixteen winning projects include an animated series exploring children’s rights, a contemporary cemetery and memorial site, an inclusive tableware set for children, a documentary on collective trauma, and a project exploring the legacy of Tungsram.

A fresh take on a forgotten lamp, a sauna on the banks of the Danube, and sustainable fashion collections – five creative practitioners affiliated with MOME, including last year’s graduates, have been selected for the 2026 BIG SEE Perspectives Award. Dorottya Bató, Valentin Szarvas and Nóra Szilágyi were nominated in the product design category, and Julianna Skrabák and the girls can scan collective in architecture. Their work forges links between current challenges in industrial design, the social issues explored through fashion, urban communities, and architectural heritage. On 21 May, the participants of the Perspectives 2026 introduced their projects to an international professional audience at the BIG SEE Festival in Portorož.

This year, the MOME community celebrated the graduates of twelve MA and nine BA courses in a festive ceremony. Speeches were given by interior designer Mrs. Bánki née Laura Szerdahelyi, one of our jubilee graduates, who turns 91 this year and designed the interiors of Déli Railway Station; Curator and László Moholy-Nagy’s grandson Daniel Hug; and designer Stefan Lengyel, who is celebrating a milestone anniversary this year. In addition to conferring the degrees, this year’s Rector’s Special Awards and several professional awards were announced, and the Gold, Diamond and Iron jubilee graduates also received their certificates.

This year, MOME product design students are debuting their work in Eindhoven as part of The Class of ’25 exhibition at Dutch Design Week. This international showcase celebrates the emerging talents of European design education, with sixteen higher education institutions taking part. Together, they highlight the vital role of design education in shaping the future and reveal how the next generation of designers think about social and environmental responsibility. The MOME projects are grouped around the distinctly Hungarian notion of “gógyi” – quick-witted, resourceful practical intelligence. Working across different scales and media, the students demonstrate how this mindset translates into contemporary product design.

How can the former Tungsram factory district, once home to 12,000 workers, be brought back to life? What does collaboration between the university and the Hungarian Charity Service of the Order of Malta look like? And how can data visualisation help interpret health data collected from smart devices? These are just a few of the questions explored through MOME’s events at this year’s Budapest Design Week. Alongside the fields most closely linked to classical product design, the university’s students and researchers will present a wide range of projects, from socially engaged design to urban-scale interventions and contemporary challenges in visual culture and material innovation, offering a comprehensive picture of MOME’s complex professional activities.

This year’s Budapest Design Week brings MOME’s past and future into focus. The 360 Design exhibition showcases the legacy of Sándor Borz Kováts and its impact on today’s designers, alongside contemporary works. Meanwhile, the Passages exhibition offers a glimpse into the future of product design through the latest student projects. For over fifty years, MOME’s Product Design BA and Design MA programmes have been at the forefront of Hungarian design education, nurturing generations of designers who have gone on to become defining figures in both the domestic and international creative scenes.

A Moholy-Nagy Művészeti Egyetemre jelentkezni nem csupán egy képzési forma melletti döntést jelent, sokak számára hosszú ideje dédelgetett álom, szakmai és alkotói célkitűzés. Éppen ezért a felvételi eredmény elmaradása csalódás lehet, különösen akkor, ha csak néhány pont választotta el a jelentkezőt a bekerüléstől... A folytatásra több lehetőség is van, nem muszáj feladni. A MOME oktatási ökoszisztémájában számos olyan alternatív útvonal létezik, amely segít újratervezni, továbblépni, akár frissen érettségizettként, akár már diplomásként.

In the next instalment of our Q&Alumni series, we spoke with Ádám Tóth, who graduated from MOME in 2018 as a product designer. After his active university years, Ádám founded Malom Projekt, a design studio focusing on product development and interior design, experimenting with the reuse of plastics and natural materials, while also running creative workshops. He has collaborated with MOME on several projects, including the Művészetek Völgye Pavilion, completed last year, which will once again welcome visitors this year in Kapolcs at the MOME × Harcsa Veronika courtyard. Ádám told us about this project – and many others – in our conversation.

The winners of the eighth ArtHungry Award in the Product Design category include several former MOME students, such as Máté Guthy, Róbert Kristóffy, and Nóra Szilágyi for their ‘At Least’ home workout bench, and Márk Dávid for his ‘Puritaan – 03’ collection. The main prize in this category went to MAIII COLLECTIVE for its Fragments collection, which debuted at this year’s Stockholm Furniture Fair. In the Graphic Design category, Nóra Kaszanyi also received a main prize for her album and exhibition design ‘Biedermeier Lifestyles. Art and the Rise of the Middle Classes in 19th-Century Hungary (1815–1867)’. The awards were presented on 6 March at a ceremony held at Deák Palace in Budapest, which also marked the opening of a pop-up exhibition featuring the finalist projects.

‘What happens when we push the boundaries of car design?’ was the question posed by automotive design guru Chris Bangle when he returned to the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design in February to review the designs created during the Course Week masterclass. Bangle is a familiar name to fans of iconic brands such as BMW and Fiat, but for MOME students, he is not just a legend – he’s also a teacher. Bangle began working with the students after the 2024 Future Materials Conference, where he was a speaker. It was here that he met the students of the Mobility Lab, the Product Design programme, and a few alumni, all of whom joined forces to rethink some aspects of the current, unsustainable automotive industry.