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Entry Sections 2026

OPEN

GALA - Open

 

A carefully designed statement piece worthy of a red carpet event. 

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This is your opportunity to create a garment that gets better the longer the eye spends on it – that draws one in and holds them there with an intentional, bold, and glamorous design. This garment should make its wearer feel invincible, and onlookers starstruck.  

WINTER SOLSTICE - Open  

 

A design that explores fashion during Earth’s coldest season. 

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In winter, many of us reluctantly pile the layers on, and with that often comes a feeling of stifled creativity. This is your chance to show that a change in the weather doesn’t mean a reduction of possibilities, but an expansion of them: Explore what the winter months mean for how we dress, from layering and texture to materials, accessories, and silhouette.

AVANT GARDE - Open

 

A radical design that is experimental and unconventional in its core features and identity. 

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This is your opportunity to take the norms that guide fashion design, and shatter them. Your design should go beyond convention and expectation, your intentional experimentation palpable. From experimental materials, texture, and construction, to silhouette, identity, and colour, wrangle the unorthodox into a cohesive yet surprising design. 

ANDROGYNOUS - Open

 

A design that erases the line between mens and womenswear, exploring genderless fashion. 

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Certain design features and languages have come to represent and express their intended wearer to be male or female. But contemporary gender experience and expression challenges the need for such distinctions. Design a garment that anyone, no matter who they are, could feel represented by and confident in – a garment that is neutral to the individual, yet elevates whoever wears it. 

COLLECTIONS - Open

 

A trio of complete designs that follow a cohesive theme. 

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This section is for going beyond the limit that a single design mandates. This is your opportunity to take those multiple ideas in your mind and make them co-exist. Walk multiple paths of possibility at once, or accentuate and emphasize a particular element or theme. Make intentional use of the opportunity, and ensure that each design is individually strong, but elevated by its company. 

AOTEAROA - Open

 

A design inspired by the cultural, historical, environmental, and/or social identity of Aotearoa New Zealand. 

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What does Aotearoa mean to you? What memories, what feelings, does this place arise in you? This is your opportunity to explore those questions across any dimension you see fit – cultural, historical, environmental, social, or anything else. Is it ice cream melting in your hand on a hot day, or is it the ancestral land you are connected to? Is it native flora and fauna, or watching the All Blacks win the world cup on home soil? Whatever Aotearoa means to you, we want to see it expressed in your design in whatever way you choose.  

SCHOOL

FROM THE EARTH - School

 

A design which draws on pre-industrial materials and techniques. 

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This section is an opportunity to explore what clothing meant before synthetic materials and industrial production – to create something from the Earth and her gifts to us. From construction techniques like knitting, weaving and crocheting, to using materials like wool, flax, silk or leather, we want to see you intentionally using and emphasizing a careful, deliberate and sustainable approach to design and production. 

GALA - School

 

A carefully designed statement piece worthy of a red carpet event. 

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This is your opportunity to create a garment that gets better the longer the eye spends on it – that draws one in and holds them there with an intentional, bold, and glamorous design. This garment should make its wearer feel invincible, and onlookers starstruck.  

PREPPY - School

 

A design that explores preparatory fashion in the 21st century. 

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The design language of schoolwear is fluent all over the world; certain cuts, patterns, materials, graphics, and accessories are synonymous with school apparel. This is your opportunity to take these iconic elements and use them in new and fresh ways. 

ANDROGYNOUS - School

 

A design that erases the line between mens and womenswear, exploring genderless fashion. 

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Certain design features and languages have come to represent and express their intended wearer to be male or female. But contemporary gender experience and expression challenges the need for such distinctions. Design a garment that anyone, no matter who they are, could feel represented by and confident in – a garment that is neutral to the individual, yet elevates whoever wears it. 

© 2018 Hokonui Fashion Design Awards.

All rights reserved.

Designed by Jacqueline Byars Design

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