About
The Redress Design Award is the world’s leading sustainable fashion design competition, educating emerging fashion designers around the world about sustainable design theories and techniques in order to drive growth towards a circular fashion system. By putting sustainable design talent in the global spotlight, the Redress Design Award creates a unique platform for passionate and talented fashion game-changers to transform the global fashion industry and rewards the best with career-changing prizes to maximise long-term impact.
The programme is organised by Redress, a Hong Kong-headquartered, Asia-focused environmental NGO, with support from Lead Sponsor, Create Hong Kong of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR).
ABOUT THE REDRESS DESIGN AWARD
Each competition cycle takes participants on an educational journey lasting several theory- and design-packed months. We work to educate designers about fashion’s negative environmental impacts, whilst inspiring them to use the core sustainable design techniques of zero-waste, upcycling, and reconstruction to cut waste out of fashion. Through our university talks, sustainable fashion workshops, the online Redress Academy, Redress Circular Fashion Design Course, and in partnership with more than 170 universities around the world, we provide young designers with the theory and techniques to help them understand the new circular economy and capitalise on its global potential for the fashion industry.
We then challenge participants to flex their creative genius and prove that they have the ingenuity and conviction to transform textile waste into stunning, scalable and commercially viable collections that will inspire and redress the world.
Our competition cycles to date:
2011: Inaugural cycle in launches in Hong Kong
2012: Second cycle in Hong Kong
2012: Inaugural cycle in Mainland China
2013: Inaugural international competition cycle open to Hong Kong, Mainland China, Taiwan, Singapore, UK, France, Belgium and Germany. Launch of the online open access LEARN Platform.
2014/15: Competition expands to include Hong Kong, Mainland China, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, UK, France, Germany, Denmark, and Sweden
2015/16: Fifth anniversary cycle expands to all countries in Asia and Europe, and our Frontline Fashion doco-series launches, following the competitors’ journeys.
2017: Cycle opens to designers in Asia, Europe, and for the first time, the USA
2018: Competition opens to be truly global and rebrands from the EcoChic Design Award to the Redress Design Award
2019: Competition open to global applications, accepting menswear collections alongside womenswear. The judging criteria are strengthened to include design for circularity alongside the transformation of clothing and textile waste
2020: 10th anniversary cycle open to global applications with two separate prize categories for the first time, and the introduction of our first online Pathway Course
2021: First digital-hybrid Grand Final Fashion Show and digital exhibition
2022: Rising Talents programme launches; exhibition features AR filters, allowing the public to ‘try on’ finalist designs
2023: Competition back in full swing with all Finalists in Hong Kong; officially signed a MOU with the Shenzhen Garment Industry Association (SGIA), organisers of Shenzhen Fashion Week, to promote sustainability in fashion in the Greater Bay Area