Image: Winner, Patrycja Guzik
International sustainable fashion competition The EcoChic Design Award recently crowned its winners for the 2015/16 cycle, with Polish designer Patrycja Guzik taking out top prize.
Held on Wednesday 20 January, the award’s Grand Final was the culmination of a week-long programme of sustainable fashion activities in Hong Kong and saw ten finalists from Europe and Asia unite to take on Hong Kong Fashion Week’s runway with their textile-waste-reducing collections.
Guzik’s prize includes the opportunity to spend three months in Hong Kong designing an up-cycled collection for leading Chinese luxury brand Shanghai Tang’s global retail. Her winning collection was created using up-cycling and reconstruction design techniques and she made her fabrics by tufting damaged textiles and unraveled secondhand garments.
Second prize was awarded to Italian-born, Spain-based designer Cora Bellotto, whose collection reused secondhand wedding dresses and bed linen and has won her a tailored mentorship with pioneering eco fashion label, Orsola de Castro.
In addition, during the grand final week the finalists took part in The Redress Forum: Ford Design Challenge and British designer Amy Ward and Chinese designer Pan Wen were awarded the winning prize of an educational grant.
Judged by supermodel Janet Ma, Guzik also won The EcoChic Design Award 2015/16 Special Prize and she will design a sustainable outfit for Ma to wear at a high profile public event and in a photoshoot to redress consumers’ attitudes towards sustainable fashion.
Christina Dean, founder of Redress said, “In contrast to the majority of the industry, emerging fashion designers are demonstrating that they, as tomorrow’s leaders, are more in tune with solutions and they are creatively cashing in on the environmental and economic opportunities within reducing and re-using textile waste. These designers are cementing a positive future for fashion.”