RCA students & alumni make the finals of the Mayor of London's Entrepreneur Programme

The projects span three of the four categories for this year's awards – Creative Industries, Environment and Health – representing a broad snapshot of Art & Design innovation at the RCA. Their success follows on from a win by MA/MSc Innovation Design Engineering team the Tyre Collective last year in the Environment category.

The finalists will go on to the virtual judging event on 22 June with teams invited to pitch their projects to a panel and take questions. Five winners will be announced at the end of the day – each receiving a £20,000 prize. You can register to attend via the Mayor of London's website.

Discover all the RCA projects our student and alumni teams will be pitching below!

KnitRegen was one of five new start-ups to join InnovationRCA last year. Led by our PhD student, Laura Salisbury, KnitRegen is developing wearable physiotherapy in the form of smart yarns to help stroke rehabilitation. Their textile nano structure provides targeted, continuous limb support by modifying neural responses to improve recovery. Laura has recently been awarded MedTech Superconnector and Advanced Materials grants from Research England and the Henry Royce Institute to further develop materials and scope wider applications for her design.

SCALED is a protective cast that uses biomimicry and parametric design to improve rehabilitation for athletes. The customisable design limits motion beyond a specific angle to prevent over extension of joints and further injury. Starting as Natalie's graduate project for RCA2020, SCALED now has funding from MedTech SupperConnector set up to foster innovative new medical technology.

shADe is an anti-greenwashing web plug-in that prevents brands with a bad records on sustainability pushing their advertising as you browse the web. Powered by AI, the plug-in favours brands with data to back up their sustainability claims. The MA/MSc Innovation Design Engineering student team won Fast Company’s 2021 World Changing Ideas Award earlier this year.

AIDEA is an AI-led visual discovery environment that uses collage to help designers discover new and unexpected ways of looking at form, palette, and function in their projects. It does this by providing users with a unique sequence of components (fragmented images) based on personal characteristics to inspire new directions. AIDEA is available to try out at www.aidea.design

The second nomination from our current cohort of MA/MSc Innovation Design Engineering students – the Waterless Washing Company brings together a multidisciplinary team of designers with skills across biomedical sciences, product design and engineering. Their innovative waterless washing system aims to reduce the impact of clothes on the environment. Instead of using water, their design uses a tumble dry system that eliminates odour and bacteria with proprietary cleaning pyramids.