Six industrial design students from Western Washington University won $6,000 in scholarship money for their furniture designs during the annual Mount Baker Products Furniture Design Competition.

The competition’s objective was to design a piece of furniture for either the Make.Shift art space or the Spark Museum of Electrical Invention, both located in downtown Bellingham.

For their Make.Shift designs: Travis Malloy of Vancouver won first place and a $1,500 scholarship for “Shelving Bench,” a bench that shelves flat art work underneath its seat; Jonathan Mayfield of Santa Cruz, Calif., won second place and a $1,000 scholarship for “The Roadie,” a fold-out amplifier stand with a cable storage drawer; and Scott Broberg of Wenatchee won third place and a $500 scholarship for “Shift,” a shelving system.

For their Spark museum designs, and for the same prize amounts as the Make.Shift winners: Aiden Borer of Lake Stevens won first place for “Stack,” a reading bench with an incorporated book display; Matthew Lider of Bellevue was second for the “Arc Step Stool,” a three-legged stool designed to allow children to better view the Spark museum’s collections; and Kathleen Mahon of San Antonio, Texas, won third place for “Incite,” a children’s book shelf and display.

Entires were judged on a variety of design factors.

Judges for the contest included: Lisa Van Doren, owner of the Ideal design shop in downtown Bellingham; Dell King, a WWU industrial design professor; Ann Bargetz, director of education at the Spark Museum; Cat Sieh, a manager of the Make.Shift project; and professional woodworker Michael Flaherty, owner of Flaherty Woodworking.

The winning furniture pieces will be given to the two participating organizations.