Applications for Hyères Fashion Festival now open

By

Dominique Muret

Translated by
Nicola Mira

Published
Nov 30, 2022

Applications are open for the Hyères International Fashion, Photography and Accessories Festival. Emerging designers aged 18 or over are invited to register and submit their applications by December 5, in order to enter the renowned young designer competition that was won this year by Jenny Hytönen from Finland. The Festival’s 38th edition will be held again in the autumn, after the September fashion week marathon, on October 12-15 2023.

 
The festival, staged at Villa Noailles in Hyères, France, features three separate competitions, as well as exhibitions and round table debates. A jury of industry names will select 10 finalists for the fashion competition, created in 1986, another 10 for the photography competition, first introduced in 1997, and 10 for the accessories competition, launched more recently, in 2017.
  
Collective applications are accepted, but up to a maximum of two names. Entrants can apply only with men’s, women’s or unisex collections. “Mixed-collection entries will be refused,” the organisers have indicated on the Villa Noailles website, encouraging candidates to present “unique” collections, and to make “use of sustainable materials and processes.”

An initial longlist will be drawn up in Hyères in December 2022. A jury will meet in January 2023 to select the finalists, whose names will be revealed then, as well as the composition of the final's three juries, and their respective presidents’ names.

To produce their collections, the designers selected will be able to benefit from support by Première Vision Paris, the Aymeric Ledeun atelier, for buckles and covered buttons, Puntoseta, Supima, and CELC, the European confederation of linen and hemp producers. They will also have to create a look in collaboration with Chanel’s Atelier des Matières, and with one of the luxury label’s fine craftsmanship ateliers.

In the past three decades, the fashion competition's winners have included names like Viktor & Rolf, Gaspard Yurkievich, Felipe Oliveira Baptista, Christian Wijnants, Richard René, Anthony Vaccarello, Julien Dossena and Jean-Paul Lespagnard.

The winners of the most recent editions were Kenta Matsushige, Annelie Schubert, Wataru Tominaga, Vanessa Schindler, the Rushemy Botter and Lisi Herrebrugh duo, Christoph Rumpf, Tom Van der Borght and Ifeanyi Okwuadi.