London fashion students win JCA competition

By

Nigel TAYLOR

Published
May 1, 2023

Two 18-year-old fashion students have won a Jimmy Choo JCA/London Fashion Academy competition to design a new staff uniform for Saïd Business School at the University of Oxford. 

Londoners Valeria Peeva and Maxi Purton were inspired by Oxford’s architecture in creating their winning look, which will be rolled out later this year for all student facing professional service staff.

Nowlan also won an additional prize for her print design, which will be used in new student merchandise.

The pair will now be given a place on the School’s new Oxford Venture Series made up of three, six-to-eight-week online programmes with tutor support and live lessons. There was also a cash prize of £500 to each of the uniform winners, and £250 to the print design winner. 

The Oxford Venture Series aims to help new entrepreneurs, start-ups, scale-ups and small and medium enterprises, conceptualise and launch their business ideas.

Stephen Smith, CEO at the JCA, said: “One of our goals with our programmes is to help entrepreneur designers launch their designs to the market and this design competition is a great platform to do so.”

Tania Hanniford, Oxford Saïd’s Head of Brand, who led the judging panel, added: “The standard of all our finalists was exceptional. Valerie and Maxi have created something special that honours the history of the University of Oxford, whilst reflecting the modernity and innovation of the Business School. We are looking forward to working with them to manufacture the designs.”