ISABELLE AOUT
Style Office Director Maison Martin Margiela

Born in Belgium in 1976, Isabelle Aout is a graduate of "La Cambre" (ENSAV) in Bruxelles.
During her last year of studies she chose to carry out a training position at Maison Martin Margiela in Paris, where she has remained for the past eight years. Since December 2006, she fulfilled the role of "Directrice du bureau de style" for the design studio, its teams and collections.


MARC AUDIBET
Creator for Madeleine Vionnet and New York Industrie

Marc Audibet designs were entirely about bi extensible fabrics called Stretch. There are no hooks, eyes, buttons or zippers. He makes seamless asymmetrical creations that cling to the body, following the lines of the model's figure. He is both a fashion designer and an industrial designer. He is celebrated in the fashion world for his research into stretch fabrics. This expertise was acquired while working as an Assistant to Emanuel Ungaro in 1972, and then as a designer for Pierre Balmain, Madame Gres and Nino Cerruti. He is an admirer of Vionnet and Claire McCardell. He believes that fashion is a matter of anatomy and that innovation starts with fabrics. Audibet presented his first collection in 1983. From 1981 to 1984, he designed for Basile and Laure Biagiotti. He then continued with his own label till 1988 when he designed for Parallel.. Throughout the 90's he has continued to design and create his seamless garments to accent the beauty of "stretch" made from Lycra mixed with a wide range of otherfabrics like cotton, silk, linen and wool. Audibet also designed for Hermes during the 90's. From 1990-1996 he designed 9 collections for Prada.He became the architect of Prada's growth. After Prada, Audibet designed the sport couture  for the Italian house of Trussardi. During 2002 until 2006 he was advisor for Cesare Paciotti..


WILBERT DAS
Diesel Creative Director

Diesel Creative Director Wilbert Das was born in Holland in 1963. He grew up on his family's dairy farm, where he worked a year before departing in 1983 to study fashion design at the Academy of Fine Arts in Arnhem, Holland. Upon completing his degree in 1988 Wilbert was interviewed for a job at Diesel and hired on-the-spot literally interviewed one Autumn morning and began work that very afternoon. He started as a designer on the Male, Accessories, Leather, and Kids lines. Wilbert soon rose to head the style office of Diesel, and in 1993 was given the official title of Creative Director, with responsibilities ranging from clothing & accessory design to advertising & communications, merchandising, retail & interior design (including showrooms & even hotels), planning of fashion shows & events, as well as working on new businesses. Literally all aspects of the Diesel brand's style and image have fallen under Wilbert's responsibility.
Wilbert's legacy as creative director has featured a concentration on constant innovation, both in clothing and communications. The defining aspects of his personality are humility and a quiet, low-key approach to the industry. Wilbert stays largely out of the fashion spotlight, focusing instead on creating a harmonious creative culture within his team, a structure based on collaboration and nurturing rather than individualism and competition. Participation in events such as ITS and other programs to support young, unproven creatives are a natural extension to this. Wilbert was a founding member of ITS and is now is in his 5th year on the jury.


DANIELA FEDI
Journalist - Il Giornale

Daniela Fedi is the head of the fashion area of the Italian daily newspaper Il Giornale. She is a fashion, lifestyle, beauty and society journalist and is editor of the Lifestyle supplement.
She started writing for La Repubblica in 1979. She started to collaborate with Mondadori (100Cose, Panorama, Linea Italiana), and she worked for 100 Cose until 1986. That same year, she became editor-in-chief for the monthly magazine Taxi. She decided to work free-lance collaborating intensively with Harper's Bazaar, Elle Italy, Elle Greece and Elle Japan. After working exclusively with Elle Italy for a long period, she started her collaboration with Class publishing for Class and Madame Class. After five years, she went back to Il Giornale. She also taught Fashion publishing at the European School of Design and, most recently, at the Costume and Fashion Academy of Rome, the University of Bologna, Rimini and Venice. She wrote two books about jewellery and a travel guide to Egypt. She is currently writing a book about the forms of media and fashion together with Lucia Serlenga for Adriano Salani Publishing.


DEANNA FERRETTI
Entrepreneur

Deanna Ferretti Veroni started her career in Reggio Emilia, Italy more than 30 years ago. She has since then successfully collaborated with some of the most important designers of this past century. She met Kenzo when she was barely 25 years old and with him she worked successfully for over 20 years. During the 70's she collaborated with Yves Saint Laurent (Tricot e Variation), Rena Kraft, Chiwitt, Frapp, Luis London, Blaky Dress, Giorgio Correggiari, Popy Moreni and Michelle Bruyere.
In the 80's she started to have her first licences with Adrienne Vittadini, Armani and Joseph. Their collections were drawn by John Galliano and John Richmond.
In the 90's, she worked for Martin Margiela, Gai Mattiolo, Valentino, Neil Barret and for many others brands. She has a wide experience in textiles and knitwear but she cannot be called neither a fashion designer nor simply a business woman. Actually, she is an atypical figure born to realise almost every designer's dream. Now, every three or four years her company supports a new young talent, because Miss Deanna is a symbol of originality and quality.


BARBARA FRANCHIN
Talent Scout

She was born in Trieste, Italy, and living in a border zone has led to her openness and curiosity in terms of interfusion in all its forms. She took her first steps in the fashion world establishing an atelier with a friend aimed to the creation of extravagant womenswear clothing. Her propensity for exchange, comparison, curiosity and the search for the creative spark lead her to create and organise in 1993 Mittelmoda, a project created to provide space for the elaboration and search for talent within the fashion world.
Barbara left it after the 2000 edition to launch a new and autonomous entrepreneurial project in Trieste; an agency, EVE, of which she is Director & Project Supervisor. As director of EVE she has been organising ITS - International Talent Support since the very beginning.


MARIA LUISA FRISA
Curator & Journalist

Especially interested in the phenomenon of overlapping in the arts, fashion and design, Maria Luisa Frisa studies the complexity of the contemporary imagination in her transdisciplinary projects. She curated (with Francesco Bonami, Stefano Tonchi) the exhibitions: Uniform: Order and Disorder, at the Stazione Leopolda of Florence and at the New York's PS1 (2001); (with Stefano Tonchi) Excess. Fashion and the Underground in the 80's at the Stazione Leopolda of Florence (2004); Italian eyes. Fashion photography from 1951 to today, at the Rotonda di via Besana in Milan (2005); (with Francesco Bonami, Stefano Tonchi) Human Game. Winners and Loosers at Stazione Leopolda of Florence (2006); The Coloured Rooms in occasion of 60 anniversary of Emilio Pucci, Palazzo Pucci, Florence (2007); (with Vittoria C.Caratozzolo, Judith Clark) Simonetta. La prima donna della moda italiana at Galleria del Costume, Palazzo Pitti, Florence (2008).
She is the fashion curator for the editorial and communications projects of the Fondazione Pitti Discovery of Florence. With Mario Lupano and Stefano Tonchi she co-authored Total Living (2002), and with Raf Simons and Francesco Bonami, The Fourth Sex. Adolescent Extremes (2003). With Francesco Bonami, she edited the catalogue of the Biennale di Venezia entitled Dreams and Conflicts. The Viewer's Dictatorship (Marsilio, 2003).
She directs Mode (Marsilio Editore), a publishing project focusing on the ideas and figures in fashion.
Since 2003 she has been working on the nomad project Laboratorium, a name for a variable nucleus of people from different professions experimenting strategies in visual communications processes.
She chairs the Degree course in Fashion Design at the Art and Design Faculty of the "Università di Venezia" (IUAV).


VALENTINA MAGGI
Director of the Design Practice at Floriane de St. Pierre

Graduated in Architecture from the Politecnico di Milano, Valentina Maggi began her professional career in the Conservation and History of Architecture Department of the Politecnico di Milano. With her passion for Design in the wider sense, Valentina Maggi joined FLORIANE DE SAINT PIERRE & ASSOCIÉS in 1999 and has headed up the Design Practice since 2000.


LINNEA OLSON
Accessories Market Director ELLE USA

Born in Sweden and raised mostly in South America, Linnea Olson-Schwartz then spent her college years at Wake Forest University, in North Carolina. She began her career in fashion 11 years ago in the Publisher's office at Vogue magazine. After a year on the business side of publishing, she moved into the fashion department at GQ magazine. There she became Associate Fashion Editor and after four years left to join the relatively new team at Hachette Filipacchi Media start up teen title, ELLE Girl magazine. As Market Director at ELLE Girl, she would oversee both the clothing and accessories markets, style shoots and manage the fashion department. In 2006, after four years at ELLE Girl, Linnea moved into the Market Director position at ELLE Accessories magazine where she has since developed and led the fashion department while covering the market for the past two years.


ELISA PALOMINO
Head of the studio at Diane von Furstenberg

Born in Valencia, Spain, she leaves for London in 1989 to study at Central St Martins (MA Fashion and textiles).She started her professional career in New York in 1992, soon she moved back to London to work for Timney Fowler ( Furnishing Textiles ). In 1995 she joined Moschino and design for five years for the " Couture" and " Cheap and Chic " line. In 2000 Elisa moved to Paris at John Galliano as the head of the studio and she also worked on Christian Dior PAP and Haute Couture. Their collaboration lasted seven years. She was head of the studio for Roberto Cavalli for a short while. Currently she is the head of the studio at Diane von Furstenberg, New York. She is also an external teacher at Central Saint Martins, UK and at Shenkar University, Israel.


MARIA LUISA POUMAILLOU
Founder and Buyer for Maria Luisa Boutiques

Maria Luisa's adventure began in 1988 with the opening of her first boutique in Paris in a very unconventional street, 2, rue cambon, as unconventional were at that time the fashion designers' collections that she had chosen to launch: John Galliano, Helmut Lang, Ann Demeulemeester, Martin Margiela to name just a few! These almost unknown fashion designers were to become fashion icons quite immediately.
In the years to follow Maria Luisa's fame as a visionary woman spotting the most-famous-to-become designers has never stopped growing.
Maria Luisa now owns and directs 4 boutiques where some of the most innovative and outstanding fashion designers - from Balenciaga, Rick Owens, Rochas to Charles Anastase or Nicolas Andreas Taralis are displayed.
At 38, rue du Mont Thabor, the "mixte" shop, focused on younger and emerging talents It will welcome the collection of the winner of the Maria Luisa Award in the form of a dedicated shop-window.


GARETH PUGH
Fashion Designer

Describing his latest collection as Dorothy Gale [from Wizard of Oz] meets Predator, Gareth Pugh continues his journey, inspired by a constant obsession with light and dark.
The show opened with Coco Rochas starring as Dorothy as Warrior, with her costume fashioned from hundreds of zips supplied by YKK, an underlying theme within the show and collection, providing a stiff and strong material giving the wearer a tough stance. Showing for the 5th time as part of London Fashion Week, models strode the runway in cantilevered gravity-defying footwear, a collaboration with designer Nicholas Kirkwood, to a soundtrack mixed by his long-term collaborator Matthew Stone featuring one long remix of Adamski's Killer, with a finale of Gary Glitter's 'Do You Want To Be In My Gang? This is the 3rd selling collection from Gareth Pugh, who now has over 20 international boutiques selling his collection, namely Browns in London, L'Eclaireur in Paris and Tokyo, Colette in Paris, Barneys, Bergdorf Goodman and Seven in New York, and Podium 6 in Moscow. He enjoys finding the balance between creativity and commerciality, and is extremely focused on what will be offered to buyers beyond the realms of his show, although many of the more extreme showpieces have sold very well. He enjoys special commissions from private clients who include the artist Terence Koh and Marilyn Manson.


EK THONGPRASERT
Fashion Designer and Winner of ITS#SIX Fashion Collection of the Year

Born in Bangkok 1981, During the training in school of Architecture in Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok. he also assisted a lot of young designers, It was a time that he gain a lot of knowledge of fashion from different approach of each designer. After he graduated Ba in Architecture he were already known what he really like to continue, so that he choose to attend one of the renown fashion school, Hogenschool Antwerpen. The mixing atmosphere between functional approach form previous study in Architecture meet the artistic approach form fashion department in Antwerp give out the unique way to approach a work in fashion, which give him a chance to gain an award in ITS#SIX in year 2007. He will graduate in year 2008 and start his own label right after.


PATTI WILSON
Fashion Stylist

Born and raised in NY, Patti Wilson has been working in fashion for as long as she can remember. Through out her career she has worked the most important fashion photographers in the industry, Steven Klein, Steven Miesel , Peter Lindeberg, Terry Richardson, and David LaChapelle are only of few of the many she collaborates with. Shooting covers for Italian Vogue, I-D, Numero, and L'Uomo Vogue all of which have had an important impact on the fashion world over the past decade. Patti continues to collaborate with the most influential designers and is recognized world wide for her eclectic taste and and continuous capacity to provide her clients such as Giorgio Armani, Dolce & Gabbana, Moschino ,Christian Lacroix, Valentino, and the industry with a window of which to observe fashion from a different perspective.


BERNADETTE WITTMANN GLITTENBERG
Founder and Head of BWG

Bernadette Wittmann Glittenberg has over 20 years of experience in the fashion industry, from marketing to consulting through sales strategy, production of fashion shows and selection juries etc. During her international career she worked with renowned fashion designers and houses such as Dries Van Noten, Rochas by Olivier Theyskens, Dirk Schönberger, and guided emerging talents and events such as Kostas Murkudis, Spastor, Bread & butter Studio to develop their businesses in both a creative and a commercial way. With her company BWG Fashion, Bernadette is mainly working in the fields of creative consulting and commercial guidance, and she recently started collaborating on special projects that relate to fashion and fashion design, for example collaborations with fashion schools and exhibition projects around the work of specific designers. BWG also acts as a bridge between fashion designers and the industry, drawing upon a well-established database (providing contact details of many key players in the fashion industry).

UMBERTO BORTOLETTO
Designer of Ferragamo


SUSANNE HAPPLE
Accessories Designer and Winner of ITS#SIX Accessories Collection of the Year

Susanne was born in Germany in 1978. She grew up in a house filled with Jugendstil treasures from various flea markets and inherited her mother's love for finding odd and beautiful objects. After a 2 year detour of an economic study she decided to not only dedicate her spare time but her life to a creative career path. In Eindhoven, Netherlands, she completed her bachelor's degree as an industrial designer earning public approval for her 2004 graduation work which was exhibited in various shows worldwide. Her dedication to learning languages and integrating into foreign cultures was triggered again when she got the opportunity to go to London to do her Master's degree. At the Royal College of Art she finished the Accessories design course in 2007. In her work she combines influences from both industrial design and fashion. Currently Susanne is employed as accessories designer at Adidas Stella McCartney.


KEI KAGAMI
Fashion Designer

Kei Kagami initially studied architecture and worked as studio assistant to the pre-eminent figurehead of Twentieth Century Japanese building design, Kenzo Tange. During this period Kagami realised his true vocation and promptly enrolled at Tokyo's Bunka College to study tailoring. Building a bridge between the two disciplines, the move into fashion was a sort of logical progression. In 1989 arriving on the doorstep of John Galliano's studio in London his talent and determination were instantly recognised and Galliano put him to work without hesitation, and he remained there as Galliano's studio assistant for three seasons working very closely with his mentor.
In 1990 with the help of Sisheido, Kagami enrolled at the prestigious Central Saint Martins. In 2001, his first catwalk show was held off-schedule at The Bulgarian Embassy in London. He has shown in London for several seasons and now presents his catwalk show in Milan. Kagami's first shoe-exhibition was held at a gallery in Milan in 2003. Transcending fashion, Kagami's intricate, structural designs have been displayed in museums and galleries across the world including the Museum of Modern Art (Belgrade), Au Musée du Textile et des Costumes de Wesserling (France), Design 21 exhibition ( New York), triennale (Milano), Rooms (Tokyo), 'The Fashion of Architecture ' (London and New York), 'Body Extensions' (Switzerland).

ENRICO BOSSAN
Director of Photo Dept. Fabrica, Editorial Director Colors Magazine

Enrico Bossan was born in Dolo (Venice) in 1956 and since 1975 he has been dedicated himself to photography. Since 1985, he has published his photography reports in national and international magazines, and since 1992 he has been represented by Contrasto Photo Agency. In 1987 he won Kodak's award for professional photography. His shoots have been showed at Houston PhotoFest, at the International Photography Biannual of Turin, in Amsterdam, Arles, Milan, Rome, Salonika, Tokyo and Venice. His reportages became books: "Pechino-Parigi" (1989), a journey around Asia and Europe following the adventurous track of Italy; and "Exit" (1992), a "two vision" story about the America of nowadays created in collaboration with the photographer Roberto Koch. His travels don't follow only geographical routes. Bossan worked also on a sanity project. He proposed a deep view on the life of patients in hospitals (Romeo Martinez Award, 1996). His interest in life and work in charitable structures lead him to develop a series of photograph and publishing projects. In 2000, he published "Esodo", views from a house that accommodates people with HIV and "Un privilegio difficile", a black-and-white reportage about socio-sanitary cooperation in the South Saharan Africa, for Cuamm Doctors for Africa. In 2002 he published "Il cerchio della Salute" in wich he examines the health care of the city in which he lives, Padua. In 2003, thanks to the "èAfrica" reportage he gave a positive image of everyday life in Africa, with its people, objects, colors and smells. He directed four short films about patients and health operators. In 2004 he started giving lectures for the Master in Journalism at Padua University. He is currently busy with a social cultural project of the Health Care Corporation of Rovigo, and since June 2005, has been Fabrica's Photography Department director. Since April 2007 he is Editorial Director of Colors Magazine.


MARIA TERESA CERRETELLI
Photo editor-President of G.R.I.N.

Maria Teresa Cerretelli lives and works in Milan. After her degree she entered in the publishing world and dealt with iconography research for Rizzoli (an Italian publishing house). She is a professional journalist and photo editor for Class, she is working on different publishing projects, brochures and books and she is a curator of art expositions. Since May 2004 she has been the President of Grin, a group of iconographical editors and researchers.


DENIS CURTI
Photographic Critic and Director of Contrasto, Milan

Denis Curti in the last fifteen years has been involved in many of the most important Italian institutions and projects regarding photography. He has been director of "Fondazione Italiana Per la Fotografia"for ten years, from 1992 to 2002, in Turin and took care from 1995 to 2001 of the "Biennale Internazionale di Fotografia". In 2000 he became a member of the international comittee of critics which organized the first edition of "BIG, International Biennale of young artists" in Turin. He collaborated as photography critic for Milan newspaper Corriere della Sera and weekly magazine VIVIMILANO from 1990 to 2004. In 2002 and 2003 he has been curator of photography auctions for Sotheby's, Milan. From 2001 to 2003 he provided artistic counselling for "Contrasto" exhibitions and from 2003 he is director of the Milan "Contrasto" centre and member of "Forma-Centro Internazionale di fotografia" boards of directors.


CECILIA DEAN
Editor of Visionaire

Cecilia Dean was raised in California. She moved to New York where she began modeling at the end of high school when she met Stephen Gan as photographer and James Kaliardos as make-up artist. Dean modeled in Paris, Milan, London, and Tokyo and has worked with photographers Richard Avedon, Mario Testino, Steven Meisel, David Sims, Steven Klein, Irving Penn, and Peter Lindbergh.
In 1991, Dean received her Bachelor of Arts degree in English and French literature from Barnard College, Columbia University, NYC.
In April 1991, Visionaire Publishing was launched with collaborators Stephen Gan and James Kaliardos. In September 1999, V Magazine was launched along with the Visionaire Gallery. In September 2003, VMAN magazine was launched.
Currently, Dean runs Visionaire from creative concepting to sponsor relations to distribution and press.Dean is also a visiting professor at Parsons School of Design where she teaches a course on publication design.


MARIA GIULIA GIORGIANI
ITS#SIX Finalist involved in the MINI Clubman Tour

Maria Giulia Giorgiani was born in Urbino, Italy, in 1979. She studied animation cinema, graduated at ISIA - Istituto Superiore per le Industrie Artistiche, in Urbino and now works and lives between Milan and Vicenza. Photographer and graphic designer, she was the ITS#SIX photography finalist selected to participate in the MINI Clubman Tour, shooting pictures in Tuscany together with renowned Italian photographer Gianni Berengo Gardin. Said photos were gathered in an exhibition called "Il Gigante e la Bambina" presented at the International Center for Photography "Spazio Forma" in Milan in November 2007.


ROBERTO GRECO
Executive Creative Director Ogilvy & Mather

Roberto Greco was born in Milan in 1956. With more than 20 years of experience in advertising, he is one of the most important Italian authorities in this field. He is copywriter and creative director for clients like Fiat, Microsoft and Infostrada. Among the several international awards he has received, in 1999 he won the Bronze Lion at the Cannes Festival with the Spring/Summer '98 Swatch campaign, and the Golden Lion in 2003 with the Peugeot 206 "The Sculptor" campaign. Since 2006 he is Executive Creative Director of Ogilvy & Mather, Communication and Marketing Agency.


SARAH MOON
Photographer

Born in England in 1941, Sarah Moon started her career as a model working between Paris and London. In 1968 she discovered her passion for photography. During these years she became a renowned fashion and advertising photographer, developing a long and fruitful relation with Cacharel for which she created her first advertising campaign. In 1979 she won the Cannes Grand Prix, and during the following years she continued her personal research concerning photography and films. "Impressionist photographer" Sarah Moon has spent her entire career dancing down the high-wire tension line strung between fine-art and fashion photography, using capricious techniques like sepia colouring on matte paper, toned silver gelatin printing, solarization, monochrome Polaroid pack, etc. Since the publication of her first book "Souvenirs Improbables" (Delpire, 1980) Sarah Moon - with her delightful and fairy style - collected "visual stories" in exhibitions, films and books known and beloved in the world. Among her best books: "Coincidenze" (Contrasto, 2001) and the new upcoming "12345", that will be published by Delpire and Contrasto in Fall 2008.


LEE SWILLINGHAM
Art Director of POP

Born in Manchester, Lee Swillingham finished his studies in Graphic Design at St. Martin's School of Art in London in 1991. He then worked as a designer for "Arena" Magazine and in 1992 at the age of 23 he was made art director of "The Face" magazine. He remained the youngest magazine art director in Britain for about four years, a fact which featured in a number of magazine and newspaper articles. The magazine prospered and the circulation and advertising revenue nearly doubled in the time he was there. During his years at "The Face" he won a number of awards and was invited to speak and judge at various events including those organised by the Society of Publication Designers in New York, British Design and Art Direction in London, the Institution of Contemporary Arts in London. Around that time he was asked to guest edit and art direct "Big", a New York based magazine. The two issues he worked on became some of their biggest sellers. In 2000 he went on to co-launch another successful magazine, "Pop", of which he is creative director today. He continues to lecture, appear on adjudicating panels and win awards. He has also been invited to lecture at his old art school Central St. Martins, and at Parson's School of Art in New York.
His work has been featured in several books and periodicals nationally and internationally, including Taschen's "Graphic Design for the 21st Century" and Lawrence Kings survey on magazine design and art direction "MagCulture". He founded his own advertising agency called "Suburbia". In 2005 he was elected as a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.


ANNE URBAUER
Chief Editor MINIInternational magazine

Anne Urbauer was born near Munich, Bavaria, where she studied journalism, politics and history. She has worked as Lifestyle Editor for German 80s Zeitgeist Zentralorgan "Tempo", as head of the modern living department at "Stern" Magazine and "Die Woche", a weekly newspaper as well as a contributing editor for "Wallpaper" magazine (issues 1 to 50). Freelancing since 1999, she has founded "H.O.M.E.", a magazine for design and architecture based in Berlin, "Spruce", a fashion oriented line extension for "Wallpaper" magazine, "STIL", the style section of the Sunday edition of Neue Züricher Zeitung (NZZ) in Zurich, Switzerland and MINIInternational, the culture friendly corporate magazine sponsored by MINI. In 2004, she edited "Perspectives", a book on the visions of 24 designers and architects, published by Gerd Bulthaup. Currently she is contributing editor to NZZ am Sonntag, executive editor of Amica Germany and editorial director of MINIInternational. She now lives in Munich.