Grace Wales Bonner Wins LVMH Prize

The designer is the first menswear talent to claim the award.

For those whose attentions are not focused on the 22 men playing ball on a French football pitch this afternoon, some fashion news: Grace Wales Bonner has won this year’s LVMH prize.

Just days after the designer’s eponymous Wales Bonner label made its solo debut at London Collections: Men, this afternoon’s win, announced in Paris, further marks Grace as one of the city’s most exciting new talents.

Graduating from the BA at Central Saint Martins in 2014 – and picking up the L’Oreal Professionnel Designer of the Year Award for her final collection – the British-Jamaican designer’s rich aesthetic and focus on identity has won her fans throughout the industry.

In 2015 she was invited to show under Lulu Kennedy’s Fashion East banner for two seasons, followed by an AW16 show with MAN earlier this year; in April last year she was invited to stage four shows as part of the V&A’s Fashion in Motion series (here, and above), elsewhere collaborating with fka Twigs on her tour outfits.

The prize’s third recipient – she follows last year’s winners Marques’Almeida and Thomas Tait, who took home the award in 2014 – Wales Bonner is the first menswear designer to win, selected by a panel that includes Jonathan Anderson, Nicolas Ghesquière and Marc Jacobs.

www.walesbonner.net

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