International Sportswear Design Winner

MUNICH – Johns Creek’s Hope Kemp-Hanson, who is in her junior year of fashion design at Savannah College of Art and Design, was named one of two winners in the Adidas x Woolmark Performance Challenge Nov. 14 in Munich.

An international competition organized by Adidas and The Woolmark Company and aimed at early-career creative thinkers in the sports and performance categories, the annual competition brought together 1,060 students from 115 tertiary universities in 21 countries. Their assignment was to develop a product from a combination of high-tech and merino wool for the activewear market, in which wool as a fiber currently has a relatively small market share.

After attending workshops and conferences in Shanghai in September, the 10 finalists presented their innovative concepts – from energy-generating Merino wool base layers to seamless knitting technology through body-mapping – to an esteemed industry panel in Munich in November. Kemp-Hanson said her apparel design entry aimed “to blend urban streetwear with skateboarding equipment by creating a line of hidden impact protection that portrays a satirical look at the story of South Korean skateboarders.”

Kemp-Hanson, 21, the youngest finalist and only undergraduate student chosen, was named co-winner and awarded a six-month paid internship with Adidas in Germany.

Though her initial interest was haute couture, for which she had her first fashion internship at 14 and then debuted a formal dress line as a senior at Chattahoochee High School, Johns Creek, her focus soon took a sportier turn when she signed to play soccer at SCAD. That shift – to designing sportswear using smart textiles with a concentration on sustainability – resulted in being chosen for the 12-week Pensole Fall 2018 Design Intensive in Portland, Oregon, a highly competitive program founded by D’wayne Edwards, the former Jordan Design Director at Nike. And, this past winter, Kemp-Hanson was named to a design cooperative sponsored by Pensole at Boston’s New Balance headquarters, where she placed first in apparel design.

For more information, go to woolmarkchallenge.com.