Young Designer Award Winner

The Young Designer Award is all too often overlooked, perhaps because of the lack of fashion school at St Andrews, but has been a staple of FS for the past four years. Testing technical skills, f#ion know-how and, of course, creative flair, the five finalists who entered their designs back in November travelled to St Andrews this weekend, to see their pieces on the catwalk and find out who had won the generous £1000 cheque.

Coming from Manchester, Derby (x2), Wales and Leicester, the finalists are trying to enjoy the town – “It’s so quaint!” –  although nerves are clearly shadowing their minds when they meet for the judging at Lower College Hall. They are, however looking forward to the show later that evening.

“It will be a good release after all this!” says Joss, the single male finalist who has designed some amazingly tailored suits.

Louise’s wonderful lingerie and corsets, born from the inspiration of Alice in Wonderland alongside the “Bright Young Things” theme, have all been made by hand and have been a huge hit with the Facebook voters.

“I was inspired by Dita Von Teese from around age sixteen, really fascinated. They’ve got coutil, silk and lots of lace in them, and if I did nothing else it would probably take around two weeks to finish one.”

Lyndsay’s collection, although very different, is also inspired in some ways by underwear, and has similarly made everything herself, right down to the jersey and lace fabrics themselves, and employed laser cutting techniques.

Nicole is only in her second year at Coleg Sir Gar in Wales, and at age 20 is the youngest of the bunch. Her designs are arguably the most eye-catching, with stunning iridescent fabrics shaped into dresses using industrial machines, and embellished onto strappy white heels.

Less glamorous is Olivia’s inspiration from modern “chavs”, but she has nonetheless transformed it into beautiful tailoring. Olivia and Joss are the first menswear designers in the history of the award, but they aren’t less hopeful for it.

“Men’s wear is picking up loads of traction at the moment and this is a really good time to be getting in on it.”

Joss agrees, “It’s currently a lot more interesting, as it’s really pushing borders and changing all the time.”

After a brief chat, the finalists wobbled up to Upper College Hall for a champagne reception, and the announcement of the winner. All the collections are on show up here, and the massive amount of obvious talent and skill in the room is humbling. After a few more tense moments, Joss is announced as the winner, and a novelty cheque is handed to him, a huge grin on his face.

The obvious question is asked, and all the money will be going towards his next collection. Let’s hope he didn’t have time to cash it before the champagne started flowing at the show!

A huge congratulations to all the finalists, and The Stand is sure we will hear about them again in the future!