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The Hyères Festival, which has been held for a 30th time, is one of the most important fashion competitions in the world. This year the competition had an unusually strong Finnish presence, as three of the ten finalists were collections from Aalto.

The winner of the competition was Annelie Schubert, of French-German background. Elina Määttänen, who studies fashion design at Aalto, got two honourable mentions, making an impression on big names in the field of fashion.

'Carine Roitfeld, the founder of CR Fashion Book and former editor of Vogue, and Olivier Zahm of Purple Magazine want to follow my career, which is awesome', Määttänen said.

'The showroom was full of people in the field from journalists to representatives and recruiters of fashion houses. The feedback was really very positive"!

Positive playfulness

The entries from Aalto distinguished themselves in the final with courage, colour, and knowledge of the material.

'We were praised for audaciousness, positive playfulness, and skilful use of materials', says Elina Äärelä, who took part in the final with a men's collection that she designed together with Heini-Maria Hynynen.

'It was fantastic to get to demonstrate our skills before the top names in the world of fashion', Heini-Maria Hynynen says.

'I also got plenty of good contacts." Next I will continue designing men's clothing with my bachelor's degree collection. Then I will seek work abroad, at some major fashion house, to design men's clothing.'

The third finalist, Sophie Sälekari, is also jubilant about the people that she met.

'In the future I will keep in touch with the new people that I met and will build a strong foundation for new projects and job opportunities', says Sälekari, who designs prints for Hennes & Mauritz.

See also:

Pirjo Hirvonen, Professor of Fashion Design interviewed by the Finnish Broadcasting Company YLE: Creativity and vision have been demonstrated - now we need will (in Finnish)

Photos Meri Karhu, collections (from top) Elina Määttänen, Sophie Sälekari and Heini-Maria Hynynen & Elina Äärelä.

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(yle.fi)