About
Redress Design Award

About Redress Design Award

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-based, Asia-focused environmental NGO, with support from Lead Sponsor, the Cultural and Creative Industries Development Agency (CCIDA).

The Designers' Challenge

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, our online educational resources, Redress Circular Fashion Design Courses, and in partnership with 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 journey through the years

The RDA
journey

2011

Inaugural cycle launches in Hong Kong!

2012

Second cycle in Hong Kong.

2013

Inaugural international competition cycle open to Hong Kong, the Chinese Mainland, Taiwan, Singapore, UK, France, Belgium and Germany. Launch of our online open-access educational platform.

2014/15

Competition expands to include Malaysia, Denmark, and Sweden.

2015/16

Fifth anniversary cycle expands to all countries in Asia and Europe, and our Frontline Fashion docu-series launches, following the competitors’ journeys. 

2017

Competition 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 opens 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 opens to global applications with two separate prize categories for the first time, and the introduction of our first online 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. We 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.

2024

With our focus on Asia, we launched the cycle with a gathering of key industry leaders to discuss ‘Circularity – Why Asia and Why Now?’ Plus, we returned to Shanghai Fashion Week for the first time in 12 years to spotlight select Chinese Alumni designers. 

2025

Celebrating our 15th anniversary with the theme of ‘Rising to the Challenge’, we spotlighted competition alumni who are proving that circular fashion isn’t just possible—it’s powerful. And for the first time ever, we had two joint First Prize winners.

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