Written By | Fashion and Design Desk
The Chongqing-born, New York-based designer completes a remarkable year of prizes, as the fund that launched Proenza Schouler and Bode backs another emerging voice.
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NEW YORK
A year that began with little name recognition outside New York's downtown fashion circle has become a coronation. Zane Li, founder of the womenswear label Lii, has been named the winner of the 2026 CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund, taking home $300,000 and a program of industry mentorship. The announcement was made at a dinner at The Crane Club in New York, hosted by Tory Burch, CFDA Chairman Thom Browne, Vogue's Chloe Malle and Anna Wintour, and reported by StyleRave and Hypebeast on October 22.
The designer
Li was born in Chongqing, China, graduated from the Fashion Institute of Technology and launched Lii in 2024. Hypebeast describes his work as a 'clean blend of sport styles with unconventional silhouettes and bold color.' The Fashion Fund prize is his third major cash award this year: he previously won a Fashion Trust U.S. Ready-to-Wear Award in April and the Karl Lagerfeld Prize at the LVMH Prize ceremony in Paris.
Asked about the business, Li said running a label is the hardest part of his work, though he values the creative freedom it gives him. It is an unglamorous answer, and a revealing one: the fund exists in large part because the distance between a strong collection and a sustainable company is where many young designers fall.
The runners-up and the field
Emily Dawn Long and Aisling Camps each receive $100,000. Long is known for her 'Spoiled Boys' T-shirts, which have been worn by male celebrities. Camps is a Trinidadian-born engineer turned knitwear designer who made her official runway debut at New York Fashion Week in September.
The other finalists were Amir Taghi, Terrence Zhou of Bad Binch TongTong, Jamie Haller, Julia Ferentinos of Juju Vera, George Inaki of Milamore, Claire Sullivan of Miss Claire Sullivan and Zoe Gustavia Anna Whalen. The selection committee included Browne, Malle, Nicole Phelps, Aurora James, Christopher John Rogers, Eva Chen, Paloma Elsesser, Denise Magid and Yumi Shin. This year's finalists also took part in a Material Innovation Challenge, exploring bio-based, sustainable and cruelty-free textiles in partnership with Humane World for Animals.
A fund with a long memory
The CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund was founded in 2003 as a post-9/11 effort to support emerging American designers. It has since backed about 200 designers and provided more than $8.2 million. Its alumni roll reads like a map of contemporary American fashion: Proenza Schouler, Bode, Altuzarra, Billy Reid, Christopher John Rogers and The Elder Statesman. Past winners include Telfar in 2017, Christopher John Rogers in 2019 and Melitta Baumeister in 2023. Last year's top prize went to Ashlynn Park, with Julian Louie of Aubero and Stephanie Suberville of Heirlome as runners-up.
Sponsors this year include Bloomingdale's, Humane World for Animals, Instagram, Nordstrom and Vogue, a mix that signals the fund's dual purpose: capital for the designer and a retail and media pathway to customers.
What Browne said, and what it signals
Browne framed the competition as a reminder to champion original voices and creativity, adding that supporting emerging designers is an industry responsibility. That message lands at a moment of visible turbulence at the top of fashion: creative director exits and reshuffles have dominated the trade press this month, and Fashionista's recent roundups have tracked everything from a sales-driven share drop at Kering to rumored changes at Balenciaga. Against that backdrop, a prize for an independent label is a counterweight, a reminder that the industry's next chapter may be written by small companies rather than conglomerates.
What this means for you
For shoppers, a Fashion Fund win tends to mean greater availability: expect Lii to appear in more stores and in more depth as the mentorship and retail relationships take shape. The sport-inflected, color-forward direction Hypebeast describes is also a useful signal of where accessible, wearable design is heading. And for anyone building a creative business, Li's own comment about the difficulty of running a company is the more durable lesson: talent is necessary, structure is what lasts.
The bottom line
Zane Li's 2026 now includes three prizes, a $300,000 cheque and a seat in one of American fashion's most influential alumni networks. Whether Lii becomes the next Proenza Schouler or Telfar will depend on the unglamorous work he describes. But on the evidence of this year, the industry is paying attention.
