We were invited to design the Trophy for the final year of Florentine luxury watchmaker Panerai’s Challenger Trophy initiative.
The Panerai Challenger Trophy initiative was created in 2017, by the Florentine luxury watchmaker Panerai and the Royal Yachting Association (RYA) – it’s an award that recognises young people between the ages of 8-18 years who have embraced the power of sailing or windsurfing to achieve a personal triumph to inspire us all. The Panerai Challenger Trophy was introduced for a 3 year period for sailing clubs to nominate an OnBoard member who has overcome physical, economic or social challenges to achieve a significant milestone within sailing or windsurfing. The award is intended to highlight these young people and to offer monetary support towards them and their sailing clubs.
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, we weren’t able to meet the 3 finalists in person – but we read the stories of each nominee, and asked them questions about their sailing clothing and cherished garments. From this research it became very apparent that sailing gloves are a very essential piece of kit. So we decided to create a pair of 3 fingered sailing gloves for this year's trophy.
We wanted to incorporate something from each of the 3 nominees to unite them, and were sent materials from each of the sailing clubs to create the 3 finger gloves – and the final pair incorporated materials from all 3 of the nominees clubs.