Apple has always been known for its design and has plenty of awards to prove it, but those awards are generally for products that have actually been released. That didn’t stop the Apple Watch, which hasn’t even been released yet, from receiving a gold award at the International Forum’s annual industrial design competition in Munich this week. This will undoubtedly serve to fan the hype flames for the upcoming smartwatch. 

It’s not even on anyone’s wrist yet but Apple’s first ever smartwatch has already bagged a prestigious design award. The Apple Watch was one of 75 products out of 1,624 finalists to receive the gold award at a gala event held in Munich this week for the International Forum’s annual industrial design competition. Helping to push the hype around the watch to a level where waverers might now be ‘accidentally’ breaking their current wrist-based timepiece in an effort to create a justifiable reason to fork out upwards of $349 for Apple’s upcoming gadget, the competition judges, all experts in the field of design, arrived at their decision after evaluating products on criteria such as workmanship, material choice, environmental friendliness, design quality, safety, brand value, ergonomics, degree of innovation, and functionality.