Key editors and buying directors from the UK and France attended yesterday's hotly-anticipated New Gen press announcement.

Hosted by the British Fashion Council, the exclusive brunch at Beach Blanket Babylon Shoreditch was the first of its kind for BFC New Gen, sponsored by Topshop.

It provided the assembled opinion formers with the opportunity to meet the latest roster of young designers that have been awarded New Gen and view their collections first hand.

This season, twenty of the UK's most talented young designers have been given the chance to show their S/S 09 collections, either in the exhibition or on the catwalk at London Fashion Week in September.

Of those twenty, House of Holland and design duo Peter Pilotto will be showing on-schedule for the first time under the New Gen umbrella.

Elsewhere newcomers to the BFC New Gen exhibition area sponsored by Topshop include ready-to-wear designers Mary Katrantzou, Matthew Cunnington & John Sanderson, Sandra Backlund, Simone Shailes and Cooperative Design. The milliner Nazir Mazhar will hold an event at Dover Street Market.

Since its inception in 1993, New Gen has been showcasing and promoting the cream of up and coming British design internationally.

It's considered the ultimate validation of emerging talent and is internationally regarded as the launch pad for the must see designers of London Fashion Week.