Finalist
Short-listed candidates
Panelists
We are delighted to announce that Prachi Mishra, Director of company <oxymoron> from Delhi has won the exclusive title of 'Indian Young Fashion Entrepreneur of the Year 2008' which then throws wide open, the doors to the UK to compete for the International Title – International Young Fashion Entrepreneur of the Year Award.
As a winner of the International Young Fashion Entrepreneur of the Year title, Prachi will receive a financial award of £7,500 which will be linked to the UK and tailored to her specific needs. As a national finalist from India, Prachi will also get an opportunity to tour the UK fashion industry in February 2008.
London Fashion Week will form a key part of her UK visit. LFW is run by the British Fashion Council (BFC), the official voice of the designer fashion industry. It aims, with the help of industry benefactors, to promote British fashion design worldwide. London Fashion Week is now established as one of London's premier events, attracting a target audience of key fashion leaders, retailers and press who attend this biannual showcase for British designer fashion.
Prachi Mishra, a graduate of the National Institute of Design, India, started <oxymoron> as a company offering design services to organizations and other companies in fields related to textiles, fashion and crafts. The main aim of the company is to consistently indulge in intelligent design while simultaneously acting as a bridge between design brands and socially relevant organizations/production companies. Various brands and organizations now work with <oxymoron> to produce and market products created by non-government organizations, craft-groups and livelihood development organizations, as part of their own collections.
Born in Rajasthan, Anuj Sharma did post graduation in Apparel Design at the National Institute of Design, India. He was then awarded prestigious Charles Wallace India Trust Scholarship in 2002 to study Masters in High performance Sportswear Design from the University of Derby, UK. He mainly works with areas of craft development and performance wear and has shown his collection in Japan and at the Lakme Fashion Week, Mumbai.
Born in Kolkata, Padmaja Krishnan graduated from National Institute of Fashion Technology and worked for a few years as a design and crafts consultant. She set up Transit Design in 2005, a small scale fashion and textile laboratory, developing non-confirmative, quirky and peaceful clothing and accessories that are exquisitely hand crafted with impeccable details. Through her work, Padmaja seeks to observe and reflect the relationship between design, clothing and human behavior.
Designer duo Rahul Mishra and Samar Firdos endorse the brand mutually Rahul & Firdos. Together the backgrounds of apparel design & textile design bring out the flavors of international fashion design.5 fashion week old (4 Lakme fashion weeks and 1 Australia Fashion Week) this designer duo has shown all on the platforms of national as well as international fashion scenarios.
Varun Sardana, an alumnus of National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT) Delhi 2003, launched his own label in August 2004 when he won the Bijenkorf Fashion Design Award 2004 held in Amsterdam.His debut Wills India Fashion Week collection, “The Grammar of Seeing” at the recently concluded event in Delhi, garnered rave reviews and was adjudged as the best debut collection for Spring/Summer ‘08. Varun has also been designing costumes for theatre and film, uniforms for Air India Express, the new Air India airline.
Alice Cicolini
British Council India’s Head of Arts and leads on the Innovation Economy programme currently in development. Previously Alice was a design curator with British Council Art, Architecture & Design, with a specific focus on fashion. She trained in fashion theory, buying and art direction from the prestigious London College of Fashion and Central St Martins. She completed her Masters in Fashion History & Theory and published The New English Dandy with Thames & Hudson in 2005. She is currently working on her PhD on 1920s salon culture in the UK. She has worked for designers like Tom Dixon and curated various exhibitions - 21st Century Dandy, Inside Out-Underwear & Style in the UK, UK Styling, Sensurround Manchester (DJ/VJ project), Global Local. She also commissioned and produced the internationally acclaimed A Midsummer Nights Dream, directed by Tim Supple, as well as conceived and initiated Creative Futures, a creative entrepreneurship programme for young Indian entrepreneurs.
Archana Pillai
Group Publisher, Ogaan Publications Limited.
Archana has spent over 18 years in the media industry. She headed the marketing function for four years at Spectrum Magazines. In 1996, she joined the start up team at Ogaan Publications to launch ELLE in India. Starting out as vice president marketing, she took over as publisher in January 2000. Since then, the company has added three new magazines (ELLE Décor, Brides Now & Beautiful People). The Ogaan Cancer Foundation was set up by her, to channel funds raised through the ELLE Breast Cancer Campaign.
Bandana Tewari
Fashion Features Editor, VOGUE India.
Bandana Tewari heads the fashion features department at Vogue India. She brings with her immense experience in the field of fashion journalism and is responsible for planning, visualizing and ideating fashion features for the ultimate style bible. As fashion and lifestyle journalist, Bandana has comprehensively written on style for some of India’s leading lifestyle magazines and fashionweekdaily.com - the online edition of The Daily (NY).A regular attendee at fashion weeks, Bandana commissions fashion stories, presents fashion forecasts and decodes international trends providing the latest in fashion news, reviews and stories for Indian reader. Bandana was awarded as the Best Fashion Journalist of the Year at the ‘F’ Awards in 2006.
Sangita Kathiwada
Proprietor, Melange, Fashion House and Director, Morarka Centre for Craft (NCPA)
Sangita, born in Indore, established Mélange, one of the country's most significant fashion houses in 1993. She has identified and encouraged new talent making her a mentor to several now-famous designers including Priyadarshini Rao, Sabyasachi Mukherjee, Narendra Kumar, Savio Jon and Aki Narula to name a few. Mélange judiciously blends her passion with pragmatism, to create two groundbreaking organizations. Sangita is also committed to the cause of redefining the role and reach of the national fabric Khadi – Innovation of new threads from our tradition.
Award
The Winner of the International Young Fashion Entrepreneur of the Year title will receive a financial award of £7,500 which will be linked to the UK and tailored to the winner’s specific needs. The national finalist from each of the participating countries will get an opportunity to tour the UK fashion industry in February 2008. The programme will be tailored to the finalists’ interests, and include both a group itinerary for the finalists to get a shared overview of the best of the UK fashion scene and specific meetings to introduce them to UK contacts who may be of particular interest to them for commercial or collaborative purposes.
The International Young Fashion Entrepreneur of the Year UK tour will include:
London Fashion Week
International Young Fashion Entrepreneur of the Year finalists will possibly participate in LFW in the following ways:
- Be promoted at a British Council space in a LFW static exhibition.
- Be included in an exhibition of fashion design from the 10 emerging markets represented in International Young Fashion Entrepreneur of the Year – tentatively to be shown in prominent retail windows in London and/or another UK city. The precise details of this opportunity are still being discussed and negotiated, but our aim is to create an opportunity to showcase a piece of work from each participating country, work that has not previously been seen or licensed in the UK.
- Participate in the International Young Fashion Entrepreneur of the Year award ceremony, where the inaugural award winner will be announced.
Eligibility
A participant must:
- Be aged between 25 and 35
- Already work in the fashion sector (as defined above)
- Be entrepreneurial and have shown their ability in the promotion of the fashion business in their country, in either a commercial context, public context, or both
- Through their character, drive and abilities demonstrate their potential to be a future leader of the sector in their country
- Have English language skills equivalent to IELTS 6 - ‘competent user’ or above
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