The Jamaica Observer reports that Jamaican designer Matthew Harris, who designs under the label Mateo, has just been named by Vogue CFDA as one of 10 Vogue Fashion Fund finalists.

The Montego Bay-born designer, who was first featured in the Jamaica Observer and was a 2015 Take Style Out guest, shared exclusively with the newspaper that he is honoured and humbled to have been considered and to be shortlisted. “It is humbling but I’m delighted that I can hopefully inspire more young designers to follow their dream”. Harris is the first Jamaican-born designer to have been short-listed.

This year’s selection committee includes four new judges: Nicole Phelps, Director of Vogue Runway; Eva Chen, head of fashion partnerships at Instagram; Roopal Patel, senior vice president and fashion director at Saks Fifth Avenue; and Joseph Altuzarra, who won the CVFF himself back in 2011.

Earlier today, they narrowed down the piles of applications to just 10 labels that make up the class of 2017. They’ll spend the next few weeks reviewing their current collections with the judges, and in October, they’ll go west to Los Angeles to put on a fashion show at the Chateau Marmont. Many of them will present their latest work at the Spring ’18 New York Fashion Week shows in September.

The winner and two runners-up will be announced at a gala in New York on November 6 [. . .].

For full article, see http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/lifestyle/Jcan_designer_Matthew_Harris_among_Vogue_Fashion_Fund_finalists?profile=1228