From 327 to 20.
We searched for talent from universities around the world for this year’s Levi’s® x ARTS THREAD Design competition, attracting more than 320 impressive applicants! Out of those, 20 finalists have officially been named.
The Levi’s® x ARTS THREAD Design Challenge is an annual partnership with ARTS THREAD, which provides online portfolio hosting to design students around the globe. This year, applicants were asked to define their own philosophies and create capsule collections for a new version of Levi’s Engineered Jeans.
Out of the 327 applicants, our panel of experts had the arduous task of trimming it down to 20 finalists. Congratulations to the following students and their schools that made the cut:
Siwar Dridi, Birmingham City University
Lucy Elloway, University of Leeds
Cleo Harcombe, De Montfort University
Keun Il Choi, SCAD Savannah
David Weksler, Shenkar
Mikayla Ahmad, Moore College of Art & Design
Alissar Hammoud, University of Technology Sydney
Shaun Harris, Royal College of Art
Yusun Lee, Kingston School of Art
Ncedo Nid Matomela, University of Salford
C’era Wolffe, University of Salford
Da Eun Lee, Fashion Institute of Technology
Viet Do Tu, Hanoi University of Fine Arts
Danielle Onyia, Kent State University
Alice Michell, Academy of Art University
Shelby Herndon, Virginia Commonwealth University
Lea Laronce, Ecole De La Chambre Syndicale De La Couture
Elyse Jones, University of Hertfordshire
Rosie Baird, Edinburgh College of Art
Levi’s® Design team will narrow this list of finalists to eight. Only two will be chosen to partake in a 10-week summer 2018 internship at Levi Strauss & Co.’s San Francisco headquarters. They will get the opportunity to work with a group of designers led by Jonathan Cheung, Levi’s® Senior Vice President of Design, and take advantage of the LS&Co. Archives. Also, they’ll spend time at the Eureka Innovation Lab with Bart Sights, Vice President of Technical Innovation.
The focus of this year’s competition comes just in time for 20th anniversary of the Levi’s® Engineered Jeans, which were known for their ergonomically twisted leg seams. The collection reimagined the relationship of form, function and fabric, and prioritized the “freedom to move.”
Levi’s® is now looking for help to ignite another great revolution in denim while delivering comfort and performance in a sustainable way.
“We had an incredible group of applicants this year, which made it all the more difficult to pick these 20 finalists,” Jonathan said. “Each one of these students has the talent to make it in this industry and it was obvious that they put their hearts into this project. To get to the final 20 is something pretty special. Twenty special projects for the 20th anniversary of Levi’s Engineered Jeans!”
