Luke Radloff wins Azzedine Alaïa Foundation x Orveda Prize

The Azzedine Alaïa Foundation in partnership with clean skincare brand Orveda has announced Luke Radloff as the inaugural winner of its fashion prize to continue its educational mission to support emerging talents.

The partnership will offer two prizes annually to two young, under-represented fashion designers to allow them “a new space to explore and share their perceptions of beauty with the world”. Each talent will be selected on their “atypical and aspirational profile”.

2023’s first winner is South African fashion designer Luke Radloff, who founded slow fashion brand Uni Form in 2019, which offers contemporary modular and trans-seasonal pieces that draw references from its location in Johannesburg, South Africa.

He was chosen by a judging panel that included Carla Sozzani, president of the Azzedine Alaïa Foundation, Olivier Saillard, director of the foundation, Marco Pecorari, director of the Parsons School in Paris, Sara Sozzani Maino, brand ambassador of the National Chamber of Italian Fashion and Condé Nast CNC creative adviser, and Nicolas Vu, chief executive officer and cofounder of Orveda.

Azzedine Alaïa Foundation teams up with Orveda to support the next generation of fashion talent

Radloff and subsequent winners will receive a one-month training programme and access to the foundation’s archives, as well as support from a reference tutor in collaboration with the Parsons School in Paris.

At the end of their residency at the Azzedine Alaïa Foundation, each selected talent will create a mini collection inspired by Azzedine Alaïa and the fashion masters in the foundation’s collection. That fashion collection will then be exhibited at the Foundation Azzedine Alaïa before being presented in the Orveda Maisons around the world.

Carla Sozzani, president of the Azzedine Alaïa Foundation, said in a statement: “Self-taught virtuoso, Azzedine Alaïa never stopped learning throughout his life in an insatiable quest for perfection. Self-improvement governed his research and his work. A great couturier without equal, he traced each pattern himself, cut each model, moulding the shapes during days and nights of working in solitude.

“Through his Foundation he wanted to share and transmit his knowledge to new generations. The project with Orveda will make one of his dreams come true; today the mission of his Foundation. Luke Radloff perfectly embodies the values and missions of the Foundation: social responsibility and support of the values of craftsmanship.”

Azzedine Alaïa Foundation names South African designer Luke Radloff as winner of inaugural fashion prize

Nicolas Vu, chief executive and co-founder of Orveda, added: “Science and technology is at the basis of everything we do at Orveda; we are driven by the power of human intuition, creativity and artistic expression. That is why alongside Orveda’s cutting-edge technological innovation we are also deeply committed to supporting and working with the Arts.

“The aim of Orveda’s collaboration with the Azzedine Alaïa Foundation is to provide a new arena for underrepresented contemporary creatives to explore and unleash their unique perceptions of luxury and beauty.”

Commenting on his win, Radloff said: “Being given the opportunity to explore the archive of one of history’s greatest couturiers, Azzedine Alaïa, will forever be a highlight of my career. This kind of cross-cultural exchange is so important and the work that the Azzedine Alaïa Foundation and Orveda are doing to further this conversation is commendable and faithful to the missions of the Foundation.

“I am so excited to interpret the Foundation archives through my own perspective that I call ‘emotional tailoring’ which feels authentic, given Azzedine Alaïa’s sharp and moving body of work.”