Fashion has always been dynamic. There is no telling what the future holds for fashion trends. However, since the inception of technological fashion inventions like 3D design and digital clothing, fashion is constantly evolving. The China-Italy fashion competition 2021 seeks to explore the possibilities in fashion tech and how it may change the way we consume fashion.
The event and its purpose
The theme of the competition is “tech for fashion”.
The event’s purpose is to gather designers and fashion technologists from two different cultures, China and Italy, and give them a platform for collaboration that hopefully will generate unique ideas for fashion design. The China-Italy Fashion Competition 2021 is open to Chinese and Italian fashion designers under 45.
The event has three categories: fashion design, fashion technology, and fashion lifestyle. The deadline for application submission is September 6, 2021. The winner will receive prize money worth $18,563.
The result of the competition will be announced on Oct 20 at the world’s Textile Merchandising Conference in Shaoxing, Zhejiang Province. The winning project will be showcased at the exhibition held at China-Italy Design Innovation Hub during the next year’s Milan Design Week.
The history of the event
According to Fu Zhiyong, the associate professor of Tsinghua University Academy of Arts and Design, and the Deputy Director of the China-Italy Design Innovation Hub, the event was established to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the China-Italy diplomatic relationship. He said in a statement, “We hope to build the competition into an international communication platform for designers from around the world.”
Chen Nan, professor at the Academy of Fine Arts at Tsinghua University, also shared his expectations about the event by mentioning that: “(events like this) can be helpful for the younger generations from two ancient civilizations to understand and communicate with each other in a fashionable way”.
He further added, “Just like Giacomo Puccini’s Turandot making Chinese folk song Mo Li Hua (Jasmine Flower) known to the world, young designers should learn from that and think about how to make Oriental elements understandable to the world.”
The event will be hosted by Tsinghua University in Beijing and the Polytechnic University of Milan in Italy. According to Li Jinliang, Director of the competition’s organizing committee, and head of Tsinghua University’s office of international affairs, the two universities will work together to strengthen cultural exchange between China and Italy.
Su Dan, the director of the Tsinghua university’s art museum has expressed hope in the event and expects to see applications that bring technology and clothing together.
Next year has been designated as the Italy-China year of tourism and culture and will promote a series of culture and art-related activities. China’s diplomatic relations with Italy started back in 1970 and, so far, have created a fruitful bond between the two nations. The China-Italy fashion competition 2021 hopes to take this relationship further to support cultural exchange.
This is one of the most important events of the “China-Italy of Youth Innovation and Entrepreneurship” program, which was launched back in November. Learn more about the event at Tsinghua.
If you are into fashion summits and competitions, you may find Kering’s recent partnership with lablaco for the circular fashion summit 2021 interesting.
