MFA - From Liane Maertens

This here I was invited as Moda model to participate at MFA showcase, and I got realy involved with the wonderfull and generous idea of the coordenations.
MFA started as a clothing fair called the Merovingi Clothing Fair on 2 sims, with the good feedback recived from the visitors and contestants among with some suggestions how to improve the show. One of these, where to not select fashion labels but to let people nominate themselves.
So the organization asked Second Life residents in January to nominate who they think should participate. Every Second Life resident was invited to nominate one (1) fashion company who only exist in Second Life, only Second Life businesses could be nominated. Fashion Labels that has a business registered in Real Life could not be nominated. in each 5 given categories.
Judging will be based around 5 categories:

1. Best Female Fashion Label
2. Best Male Fashion Label
3. Best Goth Fashion Label
4. Best Furry Fashion Label
5. Best New Fashion Label

Over 5000 nominations later, the top 5 nominees in each category has been invited to attend. The top five (5) labels that gets most nominations are offered to participate at the MFA Show-grounds. Here, they were offered a spot on the grounds where they could put on display there creations and offer visitors a chance to have a close look at there work before voting.

Last year’s show event helped to raise money for the American Cancer Society’s Relay for Life, and this year the plan are make things even bigger, by raising money for Doctors without Borders and the National Breast Cancer Foundation.

This year the show is twice as big, spread on 4 SIMs in Second Life. In comparison to passed shows, the coordenation didnt hand pick designers, instead they left the Second Life community nominate and vote for those it thinks should be the winners. During the week-long event, visitors are offered to visit the show grounds and vote for who they think should win, in each of the categories. Each Second Life resident could vote one (1) time. Voters must had minimum 30 days old to vote.

Also this year, they award a brand new Apple iMac 20" computer to each winner, and an iPod Nano is raffled among those who nominate and vote!

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Osmium/191/198/22