The Business of Fashion
Agenda-setting intelligence, analysis and advice for the global fashion community.
Agenda-setting intelligence, analysis and advice for the global fashion community.
The nine designers with a chance to win the prestigious fashion award were announced Wednesday, after 32,000 people participated in a public vote to decide on who should be in the running.
In addition to London-based menswear designer Bianca Saunders and American designer Christopher John Rogers, the finalists include Kika Vargas, Lukhanyo Mdingi, Nensi Dojaka, Rui Zhou, KidSuper, Colm Dillane, Conner Ives and Charles de Vilmorin.
The winner will be decided in September by a jury, which includes some of LVMH’s top designers, and will receive €300,000 ($362,000) and a one-year mentorship programme. The runner-up will be awarded €150,000 and access to professional advice from industry experts for a year.
Designer Carly Mark sparked conversation about what it takes to make it as an emerging designer in New York when she announced she was shutting her ready-to-wear line and moving to London. On Thursday she held her last sample sale.
To stabilise their businesses brands are honing in on what their particular consumer wants to buy, introducing new categories and starting conversations.
That’s the promise of Zellerfeld, a 3D-printing partner to Louis Vuitton and Moncler that’s becoming a platform for emerging designers to easily make and sell footwear of their own.
With a new heavyweight backer in Italian firm Style Capital — which helped Zimmermann secure a billion dollar valuation — the French contemporary womenswear brand has ambitions to go global. But it sits in a competitive and hard-to-crack category.