If you want to take the pulse of the young fashion scene, the LVMH Prize is a good place to start. Now in its second year, the prize is awarded to designers under the age of 40 and provides them with a €300,000 grant and business and brand-building support. Last year's winner was London-based designer Tomas Tait and special prizes were given to Hood By Air and Mumbai-based designer Miuniku. This year the luxury conglomerate has announced its shortlist of 26 young designers and it includes a broad range of menswear, womenswear and luxe streetwear brands including Virgil Abloh's Off-White, Astrid Andersen, former Beautiful People Baja East, Agi and Sam, Craig Green, Nasir Mazhar, Jacquemus and more. The list of 26 will be whittled down to eight finalists by a panel of 45 experts that include the likes of Vogue Paris EIC Emmanuelle Alt, Business of Fashion's Imran Amed, Cathy Horyn, Natalie Massenet, Suzy Menkes, Carine Roitfeld, Juergen Teller and more. The eight finalists will then appear before a jury consisting of LVMH artistic directors Jonathan Anderson (Loewe), Nicolas Ghesquière (Louis Vuitton), Marc Jacobs (Marc Jacobs), Karl Lagerfeld (Fendi), Humberto Leon and Carol Lim (Kenzo), Phoebe Philo (Céline), Raf Simons (Dior), Riccardo Tisci (Givenchy) along with execs Delphine Arnault, Jean-Paul Claverie and Pierre-Yves Roussel.
Hats off to the finalists, the complete list of which you can see, below.
Agi and Sam, by Agi Mdumulla and Sam Cotton
Andrea Jiapei Li, by Andrea Jiaipei
Anton Belinskiy, by Anton Belinskiy
Arthur Arbesser, by Arthur Arbesser
Astrid Andersen, by Astrid Andersen
Baja East, by Scott Studenberg and John Targon
Coperni, by Sebastien Meyer and Arnaud Vaillant
Craig Green, by Craig Green
Devon Halfnight LeFlufy, by Devon Halfnight LeFlufy
Faustine Steinmetz, by Faustine Steinmetz
Huishan Zhang, by Huishan Zhang
Jacquemus, by Simon Porte Jacquemus
Jourden, by Anais Mak and Benny Woo
Koché, by Christelle Kocher
Marques Almeida, by Marta Marques and Paulo Almeida
Nabil Nayal by Nabil El-Nayal
Nasir Mazhar by Nasir Mazhar
Off-White c/o Virgil Abloh, by Virgil Abloh
Orley, by Alex Orley, Matthew Orley and Samantha Orley
Ryan Lo by Ryan Lo
Ryan Roche by Ryan Roche
Sankuanz by Zhe Shangguan
Vetements, by Demna Gvasali
WrittenAfterwards by Yoshikazu Yamagata
Xiao Li by Xiao Li
XimonLee by Ximon Lee