LVMH Prize For Young Designers
London menswear talents Craig Green and Christopher Shannon are among the semi-finalists in an international design competition, hosted by a leading French luxury group. LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton SA – owners of brands including Marc Jacobs, Kenzo and Nicholas Kirkwood – recently announced the thirty short listed names, which also features Thomas Tait and Simone Rocha. The winner of the inaugural Prize for Young Designers will receive a €300,000 (£245,000) sum accompanied by a year of expert mentoring. News of the conglomerate’s prize broke in November last year, spearheaded by Louis Vuitton general manager Delphine Arnault. According to WWD, the initiative received over 1,200 applications. The reduced list will go on to present collections in front of a judging panel of industry experts at Paris Fashion Week later this month. “I think it’s a great thing to support fashion and support designers,” Arnault told WWD. “It’s really our responsibility to find the talents…and to help them grow,” she added. “It was really hard to do a short list of 30… I was really amazed at the number of applicants and the quality of the dossiers we received.” In total, eight UK designers made the cut, making up around 27 per cent of the semi-finalists. New York is just behind with six nominations. Following the presentations, judges will narrow the entrants down to ten designers who will continue to compete for the overall accolade. Designers and industry experts including Karl Lagerfeld, Humberto Leon, Carol Lim, Raf Simons and Riccardo Tisci will make the decision. An overall winner is expected to be announced at the end of May. The full list of semi-finalists is available over at the LVMH website now.
