The Middlecott Sketchbattle Experiment (MSBE) is an automotive design sketching competition and party, where today's and tomorrow's motor industry elite battle for recognition as the Middlecott Sketchbattle Champion. The recent San Francisco edition of the Sketchbattle consisted of two rounds of design sketching, lasting around 30-45 minutes each. Following the first round, a panel of top tier professional designers judged the sketches to determine who went through to the championship round.

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Each round had a theme. For the first round, designers had to sketch a taxi for 2050. Then, designers selected for the championship round had to shift focus and design an autonomous vehicle for long, rural commutes in Montana. This edition of the competition's judging panel included Chris Stoffel, Engineering Studio Lead at ZOOX, Tim Kentley-Klay, CEO and Co-Founder of ZOOX and Alikhan Kuljanov, Director of Design at SF Motors. 

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Art Academy, San Francisco student Philip Tandio walked away with the championship belt, a $1000 cash prize and a Brazen Sports watch, and the crowd walked away energized and inspired. As Micheal DiTullo stated in his recap of last year's SEMA sketchbattle, "So much of what we do is locked up behind closed doors for years, and sometimes forever. Getting a bunch of designers together and setting them loose is a good thing, even if only for a few hours."

Middlecott Sketchbattle Champion, Philip Tandio, and his prizes!

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Read the full re-cap of the first San Francisco Sketchbattle here.

To learn more about MSBE's mission and origins, we had a brief conversation with Middlecott Sketchbattle organizers, Brook Banham of Middlecott Design and and Frank Schwartz, founder of Advanced Automotive Consulting Services:

How did The Middlecott Sketchbattle Experiment begin?

Banham: The Middlecott Sketchbattle Experiment started in 2012 when my wife and I launched Middlecott Design, our Downtown Detroit design studio. When we launched the company, we wanted to have a party but with a twist. So I decided to host a live design sketching contest as an "entertainment" feature. The party was a great success, so we then went on to host a few more during the Detroit Design Festival and the next years Detroit Autoshow. That is when Frank came on board in 2013. With Franks huge connections with the auto design industry and business acumen, he was instrumental in helping to develop the Sketchbattle to where it is today.

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What is the overall goal of MSBE?

Banham: The Middlecott Sketchbattle Experiment, has multiple purposes: 1. To expose students and their sketching and design skills to hiring professionals in an informal setting. 2. Where normally design is a highly secretive process done behind high security and closed doors, we showcase the process of design and sketching in a public domain 3. We invite both parents and their kids to the events in an effort to kick off the idea that design is a fun and satisfying career. 4. Sketching is inherently competitive; whoever has the best sketches gets the best job or gets their design realized.

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The ultimate goal of the sketchbattle is to have a design sketching contest in major cities internationally. We are already in Detroit, LA, LV and San Francisco. We want ultimately hold a Sketchbattle in every major Autoshow like, Geneva, Paris/ Frankfurt, Beijing/Shanghai, and Tokyo. We also have our sites on product design sketch battles held in cities that have strong ID presence like: London, Chicago, Portland, OR (Footwear Design), Milan, Singapore, Honk Kong etc. Finally, we are planning on Sketchbattles in more universal events like Art Basel/Miami, SXSW/Austin and maybe even Burning Man. Basically, we plan to expand the sketch battles into the mainstream.

Schwartz: The overall goal of the MSBE is to elevate design and designers on par with professional athletes. Note, there are more professional football players in the United states than car designers in the world (NFL = 32 teams x 53 players + Arena Football + Indoor football etc). Our secondary goals are to crown the best of the best designers, expose the public to design and support local charities.

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The next Middlecott Sketch Battle experiment will be Oct 31st, from 8pm-1am, in conjunction with SEMA in Las Vegas. Get your tickets HERE, and bonus points for anyone that incorporates Halloween into their designs.