It is hard to believe that Fashion Fringe is entering its fifth year. In that time, the catwalk competition, judged during London Fashion Week, has more than fulfilled its mission to uncover and nurture new design talent.

The track record speaks for itself. The previous winners, Basso & Brooke (2004), Erdem (2005), Gavin Douglas (2006) and Aminaka Wilmont (2007), are all successfully established on the international fashion scene. This year, the competition was reinforced with a new shoe category — won by the budding footwear designer Liam Fahy in June — after the heel king Rupert Sanderson asked Fashion Fringe to find him an apprentice.

The four 2008 contenders, whose work is showcased on these pages, are not just fighting for the prestige of winning, but the priceless mentoring and expert advice that comes with it. It is this that makes Fashion Fringe different from other design prizes and ensures that winners have success programmed into the DNA of their fledgling businesses.

Over the past five years, the competition has gained support from some of fashion’s most high-profile power players. Net-a-porter.com bought Wilmont’s designs hot off the Fashion Fringe catwalk last year, and now Donatella Versace is honorary chairwoman, replacing Tom Ford. The Italian designer this year invited all four finalists to her headquarters in Milan. They sat front row at her menswear show, partied at the Versace palazzo and toured her design studios. She will be heading the panel at the final next month, alongside Vogue’s fashion director, Lucinda Chambers; Natalie Massenet of Net-a-Porter.com; Ann Pitcher, the Selfridges buying director; Jonathan Akeroyd, the CEO of Alexander McQueen; the designer Roland Mouret; Roy Peach, of the London College of Fashion; and the Fashion Fringe founder, Colin McDowell. May the best designer win.

Sarah Easom

Softly spoken, with her eyes partly hidden behind a heavy fringe, Sarah Easom, 27, likes to let her clothes do the talking. Or should that be the shouting? The RCA graduate is not interested in making quiet pieces. Using her own hand-drawn prints as a starting point, she aims to make wholly original, extrovert clothes. “I want to capture a spirit of something really upbeat and fun,” she explains. “I want my clothes to say something, because a lot of clothes today don’t say anything — you could appreciate them for their beauty or for their cut, but they don’t scream.” Easom’s radicalism is refreshing. She draws inspiration from two of fashion’s most unconventional dressers, the Italian fashion writer Anna Piaggi and the English raconteur Quentin Crisp. “I’m hoping to re-create something of their aura. I like the idea that you can be bold and stand out, but be really subtle as well,” Easom says. The designer knows what she’s talking about: she wore one of her own bright yellow jackets to meet Donatella Versace in Milan. “You get looked at quite a bit,” she admits. “But that’s part of the attitude when you wear something that isn’t out there already.” While she accepts her take on fashion isn’t for everyone, she says: “I don’t mind the stares. A strong woman wouldn’t mind. I don’t think most women would: we do like to be looked at.”

Dress, above, by Sarah Easom. Boots, £450, by Chloé. Ring, £140, by Pebble; 020 7262 1775

William Tempest

William Tempest began making clothes at 15 — and we have Style’s fashion commentator Colin McDowell to thank for it. “I bought the John Galliano book that Colin wrote and I thought, ‘Wow, that looks amazing,’ ” he says. He channelled his amazement by hitting the sewing machine hard, making clothes for himself and his friends. He left school to start a fashion course at his local college in Cheshire, and from there, went to the London College of Fashion. He then completed a long internship at Giles Deacon and a stint at Jean-Charles de Castelbajac, where he made a stage costume for Madonna. His fashion icons include Eartha Kitt and Charlotte Rampling. Of the latter, he says: “She has rejected the Hollywood mainstream; her roles are subtle. She is aware of her sexuality and knows how to use it.” Unlike many of London’s new designers, he is left cold by the capital’s heady club culture. “A lot of people there want to be in fashion but don’t have the skills to back it up.” Not a charge you could level at Tempest: he relished the technical challenges involved in making his heavily corseted, 1940s-inspired collection, and, at 22, he has already launched his own label.

Go by a Secret Path

Eun Jeong Hong, born in South Korea, comes from a fashion family. Her parents are in the textile business, her sister is studying at the London College of Fashion and her brother runs his own label in Hong Kong. After finishing her MA at Central Saint Martins in 2002, she headed back to Seoul to start a label herself. Despite its success, she missed London, so she shut up shop and moved back to the UK to start Go by a Secret Path. “I spent my twenties here studying and I feel more comfortable here,” the 32-year-old explains. “It’s the second country in my life.” Her collection is made entirely of white cotton lace. “It’s usually used on collars or as a trim,” says Jeong Hong, who instead layers it in strips and drapes it on the body to create dramatic, twisting, organic shapes. “I don’t want the lace to be girlie because I don’t wear girlie clothes,” she says — and her intriguing silhouettes are certainly more powerful than pretty. They work as statement pieces: the tops, worn with simple skinny trousers, are possible alternatives to an evening dress. “People have said you could wear them as a wedding dress, too,” she says.

LF Markey

Louise Markey loves minimalism, but she admits to having a messy bedroom. Her approach to fashion is similarly contradictory. “I do have a signature look: it’s about sportswear mixed with high-end things,” says the Sydney-born graduate of Central Saint Martins. “I take inspiration from modernist design, but I also look at folk art and historical garments,” she says — as evinced by the pictures of Elizabeth I pinned to the walls of her studio. The brightly coloured, sculpted miniskirts and fitted bodices in her collection look like sexed-up, space-age versions of Tudor costumes. As well as fusing the modern with the historical, Markey plays with the concepts of rich and poor. Skirts made of duchess satin are worn with ribbed cotton vests, and the wrist cuffs her models sport on the catwalk look like corrugated cardboard cast in gold.

For Markey, 27, the highlight of the competition has been the mentoring she has received from the industry’s top professionals. “To start something like this without it would be difficult,” she says. On meeting Donatella Versace, Fashion Fringe’s honorary chairwoman, Markey says: “She’s a legend. It’s surreal to meet someone like that. Flashing forward 20 years, you could possibly imagine coming near that level of success.”

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