A Franco-Indian Edition for the Year of Innovation: Anil Padia of Yoshita 1967 Named EU Finalist
France and India have long shared a conversation about creativity, craftsmanship, and responsibility. In 2026, that conversation takes a new and pressing form: a special Franco-Indian edition of the R|Elan™ Circular Design Challenge (CDC). Organized by Reliance Industries Limited, the United Nations in India, and Lakmē Fashion Week, in partnership with the Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode (FHCM), the initiative is supported by the French Institute in India and the Embassy of France in India as part of the India-France Year of Innovation 2026.
Within this framework, it represents one of the French Institute in India’s most significant cultural engagements of the year, reflecting our commitment to supporting projects at the intersection of culture, sustainability, and innovation.
About the Challenge:
Originating in India and developed in collaboration with the United Nations in India and Lakmē Fashion week, the R|Elan™ Circular Design Challenge has emerged as an international platform that supports young designers and entrepreneurs in India and globally, working at the intersection of fashion, sustainability, and innovation. By encouraging circular design practices across the fashion and textile value chain, the initiative nurtures new generations of designers committed to responsible and forward-looking approaches.
The 2026 edition builds on this legacy, inviting designers from India, France, and across Europe to reimagine what it means to create responsibly. This marks the first time the challenge has extended to Europe with a dedicated European track, co-led by FHCM. The European design community’s response was immediate: 18 applications were received from across the EU, 7 of them from France—a testament to the vitality of France's sustainable design community and the resonance of this programme. A clear signal that French designers are not just engaged with circular thinking but are leading it.
The European Semifinalists:
As part of the first phase of the challenge, six European semifinalists were selected for this edition, three of whom were French designers:
Iman Coccellato (France) - An Institut Français de la Mode graduate trained at Chloé, Jean Paul Gaultier, and Lanvin, Coccellato's eponymous Paris label works with deadstock luxury fabrics and artisanal embroidery. His work is rooted in timelessness: garments conceived as extensions of the women who wear them, designed to outlast trends and resist the logic of disposability.
Anil Padia (France) - Founder of Yoshita 1967, a label operating across Paris, Nairobi, and Delhi, built on the belief that circularity begins with people, not only products. Rooted in a Kenyan-Indian perspective, the work examines identity, hybridity, and inherited memory through womenswear that combines handmade construction and embellishment with the recontextualization of traditional techniques. In a challenge celebrating the Franco-Indian creative relationship, Yoshita 1967's triangular geography—Paris, Nairobi, Delhi—speaks directly to what that relationship can mean beyond borders.
Matthieu Ruiz (France) - A Paris-based designer originally from Eastern-France, Ruiz works at the intersection of artisanal dyeing and contemporary fashion. His garments are made from organic cotton produced in India, dyed using 100% natural plant-based techniques in his atelier in Eastern France, and certified GOTS, FairWear, and PETA. His practice is one of the most coherent circular propositions in French fashion today and perhaps the most literal embodiment of the France-India creative link in this entire cohort.
Dmytro Hontarenko (Germany/Ukraine) - PLN-GNS challenges conventional notions of waste by treating discarded sneakers and fashion industry leftovers as the starting point for new forms of design and culture. Operating between material recovery in Ukraine and design and production in Berlin, the brand transforms secondary raw materials into experimental, genderless streetwear while building a circular ecosystem around repair, resale, buy-back and disassembly.
Joana Duarte (Portugal) - BÉHEN explores how craftsmanship is not a relic of the past but a powerful design language for the future. The brand brings together antique textiles, upcycled garments, deadstock materials and natural fibres to create pieces rich in story and purpose. By designing for durability, repair and continued reuse, the brand keeps challenging disposable models of consumption.
Flora Rabbiti (Italy) - The brand, Florania, reimagines the future through a regenerative design philosophy rooted in resourcefulness, innovation and craftsmanship. Combining Italian sartorial expertise with material research, the brand transforms deadstock textiles, discarded garments and industrial waste into contemporary pieces that challenge conventional ideas of value and production.
The Paris Jury:
The European regional jury convened in Paris on 5 July 2026, in close collaboration with the Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode, an institutional partner for this edition.
The jury brought together a prestigious panel of leading figures from fashion, luxury, and sustainability:
Pascale Mussard—Vice President, Fondation Hermés and President, Villa Noailles
Sara Sozzani Maino — Creative Director, Fondazione Sozzani
Diane Pernet — Director and Founder, ASVOF
Anne-Gaëlle Lamort — Sustainability Innovation Lead, Kering
Katell Pouliquen — Editor, Marie Claire France
Serge Carreira - Director of the Emerging Brands Initiative, Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode (FHCM)
The panel reflected the full scope of what sustainable fashion must engage with today: editorial vision, creative excellence, luxury craftsmanship, and rigorous sustainability thinking.
The EU Finalist:
The Paris jury selected Anil Padia of Yoshita 1967 as the European finalist of the R|Elan™ Circular Design Challenge 2026. His selection is a testament to what the Year of Innovation stands for that is a shared ambition between France and India to build a more responsible and connected creative future.
From Paris to Delhi:
The journey does not end in Paris. Anil Padia will now advance to the Grand Jury at the United Nations Headquarters in New Delhi, ahead of the international finale at Lakmē Fashion Week, in partnership with FDCI, at the Embassy of France in India, Delhi, in October 2026.
This initiative follows in the footsteps of Textile Matters: Woven Stories Between India and France, an exhibition that closed in Paris in January 2026 and celebrated the rich shared heritage of French and Indian textile traditions. The CDC 2026 carries that spirit forward from historical dialogue to future-facing action.
