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.
Emerging designer, Jessica Chang, was announced the winner of Redress Design Award 2021′s first prize, following a fashion show featuring works from the award’s 10 finalists in Hong Kong on Sept. 11.
Chang’s prize includes working with Timberland over the next months to create a sustainable capsule collection that will be released for sale in conjunction with Chinese New Year.
“We bring a young designer into a big corporate process for a period of nine months,” explained Mahmoud Salahy, vice president and managing director of Timberland Asia Pacific.
“The core strength of these designers is technicality, but the point is, they don’t know to commercialise it or bring it to an audience, they need some guidance on who is the audience, how to engage with them, what is the narrative,” he added.
ADVERTISEMENT
Chang described chance to work with Timberland on her own sustainable collection as a “life-changer”.
“Entering this complex industry as an emerging designer is daunting because, so often, everywhere we look we see bad news and complexity. We know we can bring change. Yet it is hard to magnify our big ideas as start-up designers,” she said.
Redress is an NGO that aims to reduce fashion waste and this is the 11th year it has held its design awards.
Learn more:
Can China Handle Its 20 Million Tonnes of Textile Waste?
China is the world’s largest consumer of fashion and a major production hub. How it tackles its mountain of annual waste will impact global brands’ ability to embrace a more circular supply chain.
Local streetwear brands, festivals and stores selling major global labels remain relatively small but the country’s community of hypebeasts and sneakerheads is growing fast.
This week’s round-up of global markets fashion business news also features Senegalese investors, an Indian menswear giant and workers’ rights in Myanmar.
Though e-commerce reshaped retailing in the US and Europe even before the pandemic, a confluence of economic, financial and logistical circumstances kept the South American nation insulated from the trend until later.
This week’s round-up of global markets fashion business news also features Korean shopping app Ably, Kenya’s second-hand clothing trade and the EU’s bid to curb forced labour in Chinese cotton.