To honor the 25th anniversary of The Council of Fashion Designers of America Scholarship Program, which was originally established in 1996 and has since awarded more than $2.2 million and 302 scholarships to design students, the CFDA has teamed up with the Swarovski Foundation to create a new sustainability scholarship named the Re: GENERATION Innovation Scholar Award.
Just in time for Earth Month, the annual $30,000 scholarship will provide one sustainability-focused full-time college student, who will be chosen by a CFDA–Swarovski Foundation committee via a portfolio review and virtual presentation, with mentorship. The Scholar will be tasked to embed creative innovation, care for the environment, and human rights within their narrative.
“Students are the future of American fashion and will be leading the charge in transforming today’s challenges into tomorrow’s solutions,” Steven Kolb, CEO of the CFDA, said in a statement. “Creative ingenuity is a prerequisite for impactful innovation in sustainable and lasting change. Through the Re: GENERATION Innovation Scholar Award, we look to students to imagine a new global and conscious fashion industry.”
“The Re: GENERATION Innovation Scholar Award reflects our shared vision to identify, empower and accelerate the next generation of leading fashion talent in the sustainability realm,” said Member of the Swarovski Executive Board and Swarovski Foundation Chair Nadja Swarovski. “Design students have a unique ability to use the creative process to examine sustainable development and lay the foundations of a new and better future for this industry. Their creative expression through fashion is a vehicle for evolution – not only for trailblazing concepts and products, but also for societal changes in thinking and behavior.”
With the new Re: GENERATION Innovation Scholar Award, $280,000 will be awarded through the 2021 CFDA Design Scholar Awards, the Suntchi Image Maker Award, the Liz Claiborne Design for Impactful Futures Award, and the Geoffrey Beene Designer Masters Scholar Award.
