Goldwin opens entries for a second student exhibition on earth-friendly clothing -- not a contest, by design
Goldwin, the Tokyo company that runs The North Face's entire Japan business, is calling for a second round of student entries on "earth-friendly future clothing" after 788 submissions last year -- styled deliberately as a non-ranked exhibition rather than a competition, a small but telling bet on environmental education as a way to build tomorrow's shoppers.
Goldwin Inc. said it has opened entries for the second edition of its Earth-Friendly Future Clothing "Hirameki" Exhibition (地球にやさしい未来の服、ひらめき展, hirameki meaning roughly "a flash of inspiration"), according to the company's October 28 announcement. Entries open November 1 and close January 31, 2027, open to elementary, junior high, high school, vocational and university students living in Japan, submitting individually or as a class or school group.
Entrants work in one of two tracks -- a text-and-illustration category or a free-creation category -- on the theme of how clothing is made, worn, kept in use and disposed of. The company said the first edition drew 788 entries nationwide, spanning essays, illustrations, videos, models and wearable garments, and that Goldwin staff left comments on every one of them. The exhibition itself carries no prizes and ranks no entries, the company said; fashion designer Yuma Nakazato, who supports the programme, is quoted saying he is looking forward to discussing the future of clothing with entrants again this year.
The finished exhibition runs March 20-28, 2027, at Goldwin's Tokyo headquarters, the Aoyama Seiho Building in Minato Ward, the company said -- giving the programme a fixed public date and venue even though the entries themselves face no judging.
That framing is deliberate, not an oversight: calling the programme an exhibition rather than a contest, and removing prizes and rankings, lowers the bar for a school class to take part and keeps the focus on getting students to think through a garment's whole life rather than to win. For Goldwin, which holds and runs The North Face's entire business in Japan, that is a long game rather than a marketing stunt -- a bet that today's schoolchildren handling the brand's sustainability pitch in a classroom are tomorrow's customers deciding whether to believe it on a shop floor.