2025 winners
High Sheriff Young Engineer Awards Oxford
We are proud to showcase the 2025 winners of the annual High Sheriff Young Engineer Awards Oxford. These talented young engineers have impressed with their innovative designs, technical expertise.
Please see below for the full list of winners and their projects.
Winner – Year 8 & 9 Award
Isobel designed and manufactured a unique mood lamp that exemplifies innovation and craftsmanship. She progressed from hand-drawn concept sketches with detailed annotations to developing CAD iterations, showcasing not only her artistic ability but also her competence with digital tools and her iterative approach to problem-solving. Her lamp features a range of materials and processes, integrating diverse techniques into a cohesive and visually striking product.
The lamp incorporates a beautifully crafted wooden base, an electronic circuit complete with a colour-changing LED, and a laser-cut, line-bent acrylic top shaped as a lily pad – bringing a natural and calming aesthetic to the design. Isobel further enhanced the visual appeal with a brass front panel and added a felt base for both function and finish.
Winner – Year 10 & 11 Award
Ethan crafted a contemporary coffee table inspired by Scandinavian design. The table combines clean, minimalist lines with a strong focus on natural materials and functional elegance. His use of timber as the main structural component showcases his proficiency with traditional woodworking skills, including the precise hand manufacture of wooden joints and the use of routing to shape and refine key details.
A particularly impressive feature is the pair of curved sliding wooden doors, which disappear smoothly into recessed compartments and are finished with carefully selected aluminium handles. The concrete tabletop, cast and reinforced by Ethan himself, adds contrast and balance to the timber structure, while the addition of integrated lighting adds another layer of sophistication, making the table both a functional and visually striking piece.
This project reflects not only a deep understanding of design principles and material properties, but also a mature appreciation for cultural context and stylistic coherence.
Winner – Year 12 & 13 Award and High Sheriff Award
Rachel’s project centred on the design, development, and functional testing of a waterproof prosthetic hand, aimed at enhancing the quality of life for upper-limb amputees, especially those needing independence in wet or humid environments. Her prototype integrates Arduino microcontroller technology, servo motors, and sustainable 3D-printed components to simulate flexible, tendon-based finger movement.
The prosthetic focuses on affordability, comfort, modularity, and environmental consideration, while integrating principles from biomechanics and robotic systems. What makes this project outstanding is not only its technical depth but its compassionate purpose – to help real people function better and feel more empowered.
Team Award Winner: Didcot Girls School
The brief for the school’s Senior Science Club was to design and build a portable marble run using limited materials. Thinking of their target audience – primary school children – the team aimed for a big and visually attractive structure.
To maximise the size of the marble run, the box was part-opened into an L-shape to form the frame. Two players can race each other with separate starting points leading to different runs, each with a vertical drop funnel leading to an obstacle run. The side barriers guided the marbles through the obstacles, which were made up of small pieces of card with a fold in the middle for sturdiness. Drawings were added to the front, side and back of the structure, making it visually attractive to the target audience.
The marble runs were displayed during the school’s Open Evening and this team’s creation stood out. It was very popular with the visiting primary school students.
