This years Design Excellence Awards Gala was a great presentation highlighting some of the best talents Florida has to offer. The competition this year was one of the closest contests in recent history due to the amount of high quality talent that submitted entries. All were talented, well trained and spot on. All were competing for the same prize, but the outcome can only have one "gold medalist".

We in South Florida are extremely fortunate to have such world-class talents and can most assuredly congratulate all who entered the competition. The 2009 Design Excellence Awards planning is already underway and you can be sure, with both the number of categories being expanded and the call for entries being opening in January 2009, that the opportunity to showcase the local chapter’s talents will be even greater.