The BFC's International Fashion Showcase is back

The International Fashion Showcase kicks off today in London, with over twenty embassies and cultural institutes participating in the showcase of emerging design talent.

The British Fashion Council established the IFS last year, inviting embassies to partner up with their fashion councils to provide a platform for talent from their respective countries. Each territory was asked to select emerging fashion designers, whose applications range in medium from photography to film, art installations to fashion collections. Chosen designers will then have their work displayed in their nation's embassy.

Sarah Mower MBE, BFC Ambassador for Emerging Talent and contributing editor to American Vogue , will chair a panel who will choose an overall winner from each country's edit of designers. The winner of the Emerging Talent Award will be unveiled at Somerset House on Sunday 17th February, during London Fashion Week. Candidates, who must be in their first four years of industry, will be judged on the quality of their work in terms of innovation and curatorial display.

Keen bean members of the public will also have the opportunity to view all the projects on display around London for the duration of Fashion Week. Embassies including Luxembourg, Nigeria, Portugal, Trinidad and Tobago and Tanzania will throw open their doors to intrepid explorers, who can pick up a 'passport' from any of the participating embassies or Somerset House and get their booklets stamped at each venue. People can pick up hard copies of the guides/maps (the map and passport come inside the guide) at the participating exhibition venues across London, at Somerset House and from British Council's Gallery or they can download it from our blog with the guide

We've been keeping tabs on Denmark's Anne Sofie Madsen, marked out as a favourite by American Vogue at Copenhagen Fashion Week, and Swedish designers Altwai Saome, recent winners of the Elle newcomer of the year award in Sweden.