The World Jewellery Confederation (CIBJO) is collaborating with the Kering group of luxury brands to introduce the Kering Generation Award X Jewelry. Poli.Design, a partnership of Politecnico di Milano, Italy’s largest technical institution, will administer the international challenge, which aims to reward visionary talent whose work displays excellence in sustainable design and jewellery making processes.
Under the theme “Second Chance, First Choice,” the inaugural “Kering Generation Award X Jewelry” will challenge students from jewelry design schools and industry start-ups to reinvent waste as a resource by making jewelry out of discarded materials. The program aims to challenge the traditional view of trash by investigating the possibilities of creative reuse.
Participants will be encouraged to create a jewel, whether a single piece or a collection, that transforms garbage into something priceless, demonstrating the intangible power of creativity.
The first edition of the international challenge will include ten world-renowned colleges and academies that offer courses on jewellery and sustainability, as well as existing jewellery start-ups.
Each school will be required to present at least three projects, and students will be aided and supervised by local professors in developing the projects for presentation to the jury. The start-ups will introduce their unique inventions.
Four finalists from all of the proposals submitted will be presented to the jury in June next year at the 2025 JCK Show in Las Vegas, two from the student category and two from the start-up category.
CIBJO President Gaetano Cavalieri commented, “CIBJO is proud to be part of a project that promotes innovation and creativity among jewellers taking their first steps in our industry, and the same time underlines our commitment as an industry to the Sustainable Development Goals, and in particular those that aim to protect the health of the environments in which we live.”
Professor Alba Cappellieri, Head of Jewelry at Politecnico di Milano and the Awards’ scientific coordinator, stated that the “Kering Generation Award X Jewelry” symbolizes the ideals of innovation and sustainability, which are critical for crafting a future in which beauty and ethics coexist. We are establishing a collaborative platform that celebrates creativity and sustainability by bringing together young talent from major academic institutions and start-ups around the world.