Redress Design Award calls for next generation fashion designers from around the globe to make fashion circular before 17 April deadline 

[2 April 2026, Hong Kong] – Asia‑focused environmental NGO Redress opens the Redress Design Award 2026, in their urgent scout for game changing designers for the 16th cycle of the world’s leading sustainable fashion design competition. Together with Lead Sponsor, the Cultural and Creative Industries Development Agency (CCIDA), the competition educates designers from every corner of the world to clean up fashion’s wasteful and polluting act.

“With one garbage truck of textiles being landfilled or incinerated every second and only 0.3% of the global textile industry being circular, fashion  has a long way to go to become innovative,” said Dr. Christina Dean, Founder and Board Chair of Redress. “Eighty percent of a product’s environmental impact is determined at the design stage, so we must find the designers’ talents who can transform fashion.” 

Redress Design Award 2026 challenges designers, students, recent graduates and those with less than four years’ professional experience, to create contemporary, fashion-forward collections using waste textiles and guided by circular design strategies including zero waste, upcycling, and design for recyclability.

Textile waste worsens as global search intensifies

With textile waste projected to increase by 60% between 2015 and 2030, the need for circular solutions, which keep materials in use, becomes more critical. Since launch in 2011 in Hong Kong, the Redress Design Award has educated over 23,000 emerging designers through online resources and in-person programmes and attracted over 4,500 applications from 92 global regions, from Hong Kong, USA, UK and South Africa to designers living closer to the textile manufacturing waste hotspots of China, Vietnam and India. Redress Design Award 2026 Semi-finalists will join the Redress Alumni Network, which offers ongoing support to over 350 designers as they develop their careers in sustainable fashion.

Winning experience; empowering people to protect the planet

The previous 2025 joint First Prize winner Hugo Dumas from France said, “Winning is not just about my designs, it’s about proving that creativity can outpace crises.” Fellow 2025 joint winner Carla Zhang from Chinese Mainland added, “Winning this competition has empowered us to promote resourceful solutions to more of the industry and consumers, as a way to find value in overlooked materials. It’s challenging, and I’m ready to rise to the challenge.”

Orsola de Castro, Author and Co-founder of Fashion Revolution and 2026 Judge, adds, “Now more than ever, we need to address the real solution which is to design waste out of the system entirely. This competition empowers emerging designers to create beautiful, commercial collections that protect people and the planet.”

Competition prizes and opportunities

• A fully funded trip to Hong Kong for all Finalists, including masterclasses, industry immersion and participation in the Redress Design Award Grand Final Fashion Show
• Editorial features and global media exposure
• Expert mentorship from leading fashion and sustainability professionals
• Access to Redress’ global Alumni Network of 350+ like-minded designers

Applications are open now. Full guidelines, eligibility criteria, timeline and entry details are available at: Redress Design Award

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High-resolution images available for download here.

Media Enquiries

Shirley A. Wong | shirleyaun@redress.com.hk | (852) 9257 0778

The Redress Design Award (www.redressdesignaward.com) is the world’s leading sustainable fashion design competition that educates and empowers emerging fashion designers about circular design techniques to reduce fashion’s negative environmental impacts. Organised by Hong Kong-based, Asia-focused environmental NGO Redress since 2011, the competition partners with academic institutions globally and attracts designer applicants from over 50 countries and regions to win prizes that connect them with global-leading fashion businesses to accelerate the change to a circular fashion industry.

Redress (www.redress.com.hk) is a Hong Kong-based, Asia-focused environmental NGO with a mission to accelerate the change to a circular fashion industry by educating and empowering designers and consumers so as to reduce clothing’s negative environmental impacts. 

The Cultural and Creative Industries Development Agency (CCIDA), formerly known as Create Hong Kong (CreateHK) since 2009, was established in June 2024.  CCIDA is  a dedicated office under the Culture, Sports and Tourism Bureau of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR Government) to provide one-stop services and support to the cultural and creative sectors with a mission to foster a conducive environment in Hong Kong to facilitate development of the arts, culture and creative sectors as industries.  CCIDA’s strategic foci are nurturing talent and facilitating start-ups, exploring markets, promoting cross-sectoral and multi-disciplinary collaboration, promoting industrialisation of the arts, culture and creative sectors under the industry-oriented principle, and fostering a creative atmosphere in the community, thereby reinforcing Hong Kong as Asia’s creative capital and our positioning as the East-meets-West centre for international cultural exchange.

Disclaimer: The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region provides funding support to the project only, and does not otherwise take part in the project. Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in these materials/events (or by members of the project team) are those of the project organisers only and do not reflect the views of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, the Culture, Sports and Tourism Bureau, the Cultural and Creative Industries Development Agency, the CreateSmart Initiative Secretariat or the CreateSmart Initiative Vetting Committee.