Gen Art Fresh Faces in Fashion 2009

For 15 years, Gen Art Fresh Faces in Fashion has been showcasing emerging design talent, helping launch the careers of Phillip Lim, Cloak, Eugenia Kim, Sari Gueron. The recent 15th Anniversary Fresh Faces New York show was hosted by new Gossip Girl Joanna Garcia, and featured collections from womenswear designers Cloak & Dagger, Duskin, Linus, Min Young Lee, Vicente Villarin and Yeojin Bae - and one menswear designer, S2VS. Three accessories in installations were also presented which included Dieppa Restrepo (sexy unisex shoes), Wendy Nichol (bags & jewelry), and Samma (sculptural jewelry).

Enjoy these lil' tidbits about each one:

A graduate of the Whitehouse School of Fashion in Australia, Bae has worked as a senior designer for Australian labels Saba and Charlie Brown, and interned at Anna Sui and Marc Jacobs. She launched her eponymous line in late 2006, and has a capsule collection available at Barneys (NYC), Liberty and Matches (London), and Sauce (Dubai). A 2007 winner of the Tiffany & Co. Young Designer of the Year Award in Australia, she also collaborated with Target on an exclusive line of dresses which launched Australia-wide as part of the Designers for Target collection. YeojinBaeDesign.com

"I felt there was a decline in the care of garment construction and the way women dress. The shapes and fabrics I was looking for were not in the market. I wanted to make clothes that were fun and comfortable, yet chic and refined," explains Pratt grad Brookelynn Starnes (who also happens to be based in, yes, Brooklyn) about what prompted her to launch Cloak & Dagger in 2006. During her last two years at Pratt, she began working as a stylist assistant and high-end tailor to stylists, designers, ad campaigns & editorials which included Prada, Valentino, Drew Barrymore, Maggie Gyllenhaal - and has consulted for Libertine for the past three years. CloakAndDaggerNYC.com

Although Duskin is barely a year old, Stephanie Tran's designs have already appeared in Elle, InStyle, and on Style.com. And despite grim economic conditions, the label goes from success to success in stores like Steven Alan (NYC) and Confederacy (L.A.) - which isn't surprising given her well-rounded background experience in retail (Forever 21), editorial (Vogue), and design (American Eagle Outfitters). Duskin-NY.com

Joanne Cordero Reyes was already hand-sewing and embroidering garments by the age of nine, and designing for her fam's women's boutique by eleven. After graduating Parsons, she interned for Vivienne Tam, Maggie Norris Couture, Jill Stuart and House of Diehl. As part of the J.Mendel team, she helped create gowns for glitterati such as J. Lo, Demi Moore, and Salma Hayek, followed by a move to LA to design the Monique Lhuillier Fall 2007 RTW collection. Launching Vicente Villarin represents a lifetime aspiration in the form of "fashion as an art form" aimed at a sophisticated woman who is classic but has an edge, and lives full-tilt. VicenteVillarin.com

Ever since she spent time as a child in her mother's L.A. clothing store, Stella Lee has been passionate about fashion. She began her career working for the Azria brothers at BCBG, where she designed everything from sweaters to dresses, to tees, and knits. Then she met her French American husband, Daivd-Michel, in 2000, who helped her realize her dream of starting her own women's line. When the pair were based in Paris, her freelance collections for French labels sold at Printemps and Galeries Lafayette. LinusTheLabel.com

As a budding classical pianist in her native Korea, it wasn't performing that Min Young Lee loved as much as what she performed in: a cashmere shift dress, white hose, and black patent shoes. These days, the Parsons grad has already launched - and shuttered - M Collection, a successful women's clothing line that raked in $2 million annually and sold at Barneys, Scoop, Intermix, and Fred Segal; was Director of Design for Calypso designing the high-end "Christiane Celle" collection; and now has her own line of separates featuring hand-sewn embroidery and hand-crochet details. MinYoungLee.net

For the past five seasons, Sean William Salim - born in Jakarta, raised in Singapore, worked with Isaac Mizrahi & Tim Hamilton - has tried to make his brand reflect high design at an affordable pricepoint, and embody today's youth culture as "a reflection of the past but with a curiosity of the future that is to come." Translation: vintage details mixed with futuristic and utilitarian details that are both current and trendproof. S2VS.com

Fellow Columbians Andrea Vargas Dieppa and Elisa Restrepo met through mutual NYC friends after Dieppa had graduated from NYC's SVA and was art directing Fashion Advertising for Lloyd & Co. (and others), while Restrepo had been enjoying a fun year in Paris, BFA in Theatre from NYU in hand. Their refined, androgynous shoes are inspired by classic gentleman's style, and elegantly blur the "unisex" gender line. DieppaRestrepo.com

The Swedish word for "same", Samma is the brainchild of Hanna Sandlin, a RISD grad who was trained as a sculptor and didn't debut her jewelry line until 2009...which was launched thanks to serendipity: a break-in at her apartment during which all her jewelry was stolen, and she started retooling materials from her studio into temporary jewelry. Her second solo exhibition was held in June and was entitled "How many are several? How many are few?" (photo: source) MaryamNassirZadeh.com

Bag and jewelry designer Nichol lives in Brooklyn and works out of her lower Manhattan studio on Crosby Street, where she hand-cuts and -sews local materials and embellishes them with paint made in nearby Red Hook. The line is available at Bergdorf Goodman, Bird, Oak, and is coming soon to Barney's Co-op. WendyNicholNYC.com

- Lesley Scott