Ireland Fashion Week Awards 2026: All the Winners

Irish fashion has never lacked talent. What it has lacked, for most of its modern history, is an occasion built to recognise that talent at home rather than exporting it and reading about it later. On 27 March 2026, at The Dylan Hotel in Ballsbridge, that gap closed.

The Night

The inaugural Ireland Fashion Week Awards took place at The Dylan, Dublin — one of the more significant evenings in the recent history of Irish fashion, and one that arrived with real momentum behind it. The ceremony followed the Ireland Fashion Week 2025 edition, which welcomed over 2,000 attendees, employed more than 500 people, and reached over 500 million people through social and press coverage.

For 2026, Ireland Fashion Week returned with an expanded schedule: 75 designers across eight shows and showcases, up from 55 the previous year, plus the introduction of the new Irish Edit showroom concept in Dublin city centre. The awards ceremony brought the industry together to honour the people behind all of it.

All the Winners

Ireland Fashion Week Awards 2026 — Full Results

• Young Designer of the Year (sponsored by Bioderma, presented by Laura Whitmore): Sasha Donnellan
• Model of the Year (presented by Rosanna Davison): Marwa Ali
• Noelle Excellence in Craftsmanship (presented by Lorraine Keane): Kieran Mulhern, Triona Design
• Breakthrough Designer of the Year (sponsored by At One, presented by Lynn Kelly): Rashhiiid
• Outstanding Contribution to Ireland Fashion Week: Glen Donnell
• Lifetime Achievement Award: William Costelloe, accepted in honour of his late father Paul Costelloe

William Costelloe's Lifetime Achievement

The most moving moment of the evening was the Lifetime Achievement Award, accepted by William Costelloe on behalf of his father Paul Costelloe, who died in November 2025 at the age of 80. Paul Costelloe had been a fixture at London Fashion Week since 1984 and was personal designer to Diana, Princess of Wales.

William presented his debut collection as Creative Director of Paul Costelloe this season — a triumph of structure, Irish wools and a final collaborative print — and accepted the award to a standing ovation. It was, in the room, less a tribute than a handover.

Ireland Fashion Week's mission will always be to nurture Irish design talent. We hope this financial support will help them take the next steps in their careers.

— Ireland Fashion Week

Young Designer: Sasha Donnellan

The Young Designer of the Year award went to Sasha Donnellan, presented by Laura Whitmore and sponsored by Bioderma. Donnellan's collection — architectural, considered, and distinctly Irish in its material sensibility — was identified by the judging panel as the most complete young designer presentation of the season. The prize includes a financial bursary to support career development, which is the part that actually matters: recognition without funding has been the historic failure mode of Irish design awards, and this one avoided it.

Why It Matters

Awards nights are easy to be cynical about. This one earns its place because of the sequence above: it recognises, it funds, and in doing so it gives emerging Irish designers a reason to build their careers here rather than leaving at the first opportunity. On that measure, the inaugural edition did exactly what it set out to do.

Hero photograph by Ilya Semenov on Unsplash.