At the big-in-Belgium Bois+Habitat expo last spring, Romy di Donato won the Design Wood Etudiants category for her design for a transformable birch ply riding toy.

Snap the two arcs into the top, and it's a sweet, abstracted rolling horse [or maybe a mule, the by-product of a passionate night in a Brussels toy hostel, where a Creative Playthings Rocking Beauty was bunking next to a Svan Scooter. Obviously, it was a boy.]

But if you take the head off, you can also attach it to the side like a rolling contraption, perhaps inspired by the shipping container cranes along the docks of Antwerp. And to clinch the prize--and the all-expense-paid trip to Milano next year--diDonato lets you switch the wheels, flip the rig over, and turn it into a slightly hacked-looking wagon.

There's some promsing design DNA in there, to be sure, but I don't think it's quite resolved enough for actual production. I'm sure when it's finished, though, DWR will knock it off and claim it as their own design. Soyez patiente, Romy!

Une étudiante en design primée à Namur ! - 30/3/2007 [saintluc-liege.be via promateria]