Design Forward ran online in its first year in 2010, and the public also got to vote for their favourite designer and from there the top 3 faced our jury. Our first winner was Vancouver based Nicole Bridger. We took a long break from DF to focus on our Showroom and our online store, and in 2016 held our first in person Design Forward. Rather than choosing a winner, we instead featured three looks from the 10 selected designers out of 100+ applicants.
In 2017 we brought back the award along with a live runway presentation of the 10 nominees, followed by a later event during the Design Exchange’s EDIT with the 3 finalists in a fireside chat with our founder. Our final year was in 2018 where we featured only the top 3 finalists in a live presentation, and a talk emceed by Canadian fashion icon Jeanne Beker. Watch our short videos!
