BERLIN: Arab News, the Middle East鈥檚 leading English-language daily, has been honoured with a prestigious design award following the newspaper鈥檚 revamp unveiled in April.

The newspaper picked up a silver award in the 鈥渞edesigned product category鈥� at the WAN-IFRA Print Innovation Awards, held in Berlin on Oct. 9.

The award clinched by Arab News follows its revamp in April 2018, which saw a bold, modern new design across the printed newspaper and website, under the tagline 鈥淭he Voice of a Changing Region.鈥�

The redesign 鈥� part of the newspaper鈥檚 鈥渕ore digital, more global鈥� strategy 鈥� reflected a new approach to stories that is better suited to the Internet age. Articles are now supplemented with contextual analysis and elegant graphics and background facts giving richness to the newspaper鈥檚 output.

鈥淎s part of our strategy to make Arab News a globally recognized brand, we made sure our recent relaunch adheres to the highest industry standards in design. As such, we opted to enter this prestigious WAN-IFRA  international competition as opposed to a regional one; and so, to come out with the silver award is something we are very proud of,鈥� said Faisal J. Abbas, Editor-in-Chief of Arab News. 

鈥淭his recognition is dedicated to the Arab News team who has worked extremely hard to guarantee a smooth relaunch, while at the same time ensuring our daily operations didn鈥檛 get affected. I鈥檇 also like to thank our SRMG board of directors and our relaunch partners Innovation. However, the biggest thanks goes to our readers for their continued vote of confidence and the increase in readership we have witnessed since the redesign,鈥� Abbas added. 

Manfred Werfel, deputy chief executive of WAN-IFRA, noted the newspaper鈥檚 鈥渋nnovative鈥� redesign. 

鈥淚n April 2018 Arab News underwent an extensive and ambitious redesign using innovative elements. As 鈥楾he Voice of a Changing Region,鈥� Arab News developed a new identity and now offers a modern, stylish design,鈥� he said. 

Arab News's Global Creative Director, Simon Khalil said: "To be recognised on a global level with this award is a great honour. There were over 150 entries in the redesign category from all over the world so for Arab News to win silver is a brilliant achievement. We are the voice of a changing region and our design changed, and evolved, to mirror the changes in the Kingdom. This award will inspire the whole team to produce even better design and content for our readers and we are very pleased the industry has recognised our efforts with this prestigious award."

The World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers, or WAN-IFRA, is the global organization of the world鈥檚 press, and was founded in 1948. 

It organizes several award events, including the World Digital Media Awards and the inaugural Print Innovation Awards held today. The latter event 鈥� which attracted 54 registrations from 19 countries 鈥� was judged by members of the World Printers Forum Board members.

The other contenders in the 鈥渞edesigned product category鈥� were the Columbian titles Redise帽o de el Tiempo and Redise帽o Portafolio.