Final word of the Hempel Award 2013

In this year's competition helmets and hoods were a trending topic, I would say. In several collections the designer covered the head of the model. Its funny to see how these trends coming out of somewhere are unconsciously followed/interpreted from Canada to China.

In a fashion show "the bigger the better" works well and to achieve a show stopper wide hemlines and extensive use of fabric will help. At first I felt tiny among all those big creations, but finally when seeing my clothes on models I was calm, because I liked what I saw. I liked my designs and the style of them, but I have to admit now being myself there in the competition that I should have exaggerated more. Instead of spending something like 50 euros for ribbons I should have spent 150 euros for them. Instead of focusing to wearability I should have been focusing on to create more a "show stopper" -collection. For some reason I thought the competition would have been more towards industrial collections, but clearly it wasn't.

On the next day of the runaway few members of the jury had a public chat and they explained what they looked after when selecting the winners. The clothes had to be well made (I was a bit surprised of this), they should be wearable (good, good!), not too industrial or realistic, but also not too absurd either. They also sought after innovation of some sort. The winners this year had innovation in material, combination of material (plastic and fabric) and then two collections had used leather in a bit new way. I really appreciate that afterwards we received some kind of feedback of what was good and what could be improved and finally I was also happy that I hadn't put any helmets on my models heads. Too big isn't good either.

Below I attach photos of my clothes, few making ofs and some pics of my favorite collections.

Models getting their make up

Rehearsal (stage is still covered with a carpet), I was competitor nro 20

The front texture of the trousers turned out well.

When sewing the clothes the black dress with its ribbon details was actually my favorite, but then on stage the dress looked really tiny and you really couldn't see or appreciate the black ribbon details.

Lights off and models out of stage.

Nro 7 Tania Dasilva from Canada with this simple but well coordinated wool clothes. 

Adorable feathers and beautifully textured fabrics from Nro 25 Maya Guerrero Rivas from El Salvador (and who is studying here in Barcelona in Felicidad Duce).

A prototype of my skirt, having a bigger flower than finally on the runaway.

Needlepoint belt getting its stitches.

Ribbons, ribbons, ribbons...

Post feelings of Hempel Award

I am back from China. I have already been few weeks in Barcelona, but only this week I have finally recovered from the trip. At the end of my stay in Beijing I catched a flu and have been sneezing ever since. Now I start to feel fine.

I enjoyed the competition. It was well organized, with professional staff for the catwalk, really nice. We were all together 29 competitors from various countries. The collections were fantasies, more or less industrial, mine was (too) industrial, and then there were something in between. The most innovative collection towards material won. It had used bamboo chips made by using porcelain technology. I have nothing to add to that. The winning clothes had even their "bodyguards" during the stay there. Impressive.

Most winners were from Asia region, only a shared 2nd price winner was from Germany. In a way I can understand that as this competition seems to have much bigger hype and reputation in Asia, which is completely normal. Hempel International Group is a huge and well known brand there.

The theme for this year was "Boundary" - How should those fashion editors dress up themselves when they go to fashion shows.

Here I put some of the winning collections to see.

The winner Wang Zhixian with her winning collection (photo courtesy of prcservice.com)

German Christina Sieber's collection "Motocross" shared the Silver Prize. This was also my favorite collection.

Korean Park Min-Seon's collection "Connections" shared the Silver prize (photo courtesy of english.cri.cn). I also liked this one, except the colors reminded me too much of Formula1.

Travel fever

Trip to China is approaching; I have my holiday request approved, we have plane tickets and the accommodation (organized by the Hempel Award -organization). We got our VISAs last Friday and that was a relieve as during the February I started to be anxious about everything, including the VISA.
We already have 2 travel guides and I couldn't be without buying the book "Living in China" by Taschen. It is not really useful in the trip, but it serves as an inspiration and as it cost less than ten euros I bought it.

Finally when reading about China I start to have typical feeling of long holiday journey and the butterflies start to move in my stomach. Until now I have been only cloth focused, sewing and thinking what is still missing to do (a lot...) + all the practical aspect of the journey; VISA, hotel etc. but finally, finally I realize we are going to China and that is a huge ancient culture really different what I am used to here in Europe. I am so happy that back in November I applied to the China International Fashion -contest.

For the past few days "Princess of China" by Coldplay ft. Rihanna has been a perfect soundtrack to me. The video is wonderful. 

Exciting news!

Yesterday I got a call from China! I was really surprised and didn't know to which country the dialing code +861 referred to. Of course I googled it and the call happened to come from China. First I thought that how weird as I'm not expecting a call from China, but then I recalled that indeed I might receive a call from China, Beijing. In November I participated to the Hempel International Fashion Contest and if I would be selected to be a finalist they would inform me in mid and late December. Wow!

I will be a finalist in the 21th Hempel Award China International Young Fashion Designers Contest! So exciting and great news to finish the year!
Thank you Melissa for calling me! Here I come Beijing!