Texprint 2012

The Chelsea College of Art & Design hosted the Texprint London 2012 awarding textile design graduates from several Art Schools in UK. On the 12th of July judges selected the winners for this year and during the evening a selected number of guests mingled among the students, admiring their works, all of them really of high quality. Keep an eye on these names and check many more on the Texprint website  www.texprint.org.uk  they will be the names of the future.

The evening got busier, the place was so packed with people from the fashion industry, ready to snap the new talents and offer them a place in their company. I would have had a hard work in deciding who should have won, because every one of them was so talented and with fresh ideas that the final votes really have been thought through.

Trinity Mitchell is a great girl from Cornwall, passionate about food, cats and mostly fashion. She introduce her collection of silk scarves in beautiful and colourful prints. I would see them in Liberty with no problem at all, they are just amazing and full of life. Trinity graduated from the University College of Falmouth and hopefully her 1950s inspired silk scarves will be stocked somewhere because are just small works of art.
www.trinitymitchell.co.uk

Carlo Volpi is from Florence in Italy and he is wearing one of his creations. The judges awarded him with the "Body" award for the best fashion fabric. Graduated from the Royal College of Art, Carlo Volpi makes incredible knitwear full of colours with great texture and combinations of stitch structures in order to have spectacular effects on his garments.
www.carlo.volpi.co.uk

Lovely Ying Wu is the winner for the Pattern Prize. No wonder that she had in the past a work placement at Liberty at the Art Fabric Design Department. She is wearing a pair of pyjama trousers with the pattern she created and they are absolutely fantastic. Her works are so intricate and full of details. One of them reminds me of the "Man of Palenque" that bas relief in Mexico where the stone is completely engraved with symbols and drawings. With a BA at the Central Saint Martins and a MA at the Royal College of Art  under her silky belt, this girl will go far.
www.alotofpatterns.com

Lily Kamper from the Royal College of Art has created a very architectural collection. Perspex, etched metal, are matched with soft materials like leather. The result is a great combination of soft and hard materials. Lily Kamper has made some pieces of jewellery with perspex and metal and a collection of bags with metal details. The clutch in the picture is fantastic.
www.lilykamper.com

In this picture we've got Laura Barnes and Sarah Burton both from Nottingham Trent University.

This is a sample of Laura Barnes ' work. The prints are hand drawn and the palette of colours used is wide, striking and bright colours describe scenes inspired by Arabic, Oriental and metropolitan worlds.

Sarah Burton introduces her collection inspired by circus performers. Her knitwear is so wearable, I love the combination of the yarns with hooks and rings.

These are the 24 graduated students who have been selected and who after a very hard decision have been round up to only 4 for the final prizes offered by the sponsors.

And here the final winners together with Caroline Burstein, creative director at Browns and founder of the luxury body and bath range Molton Brown.
Carlo Volpi, Manri Kishimoto, Ying Wu and Tania Knuckey.
Manri from Central Saint Martins wins the prize for Colours while Tania from the Royal College of Art wins the prize Space awarded for best fabric for interiors.