NYWIFT Designing Women Awards 2017 

By Tenlie Mourning
​June 7, 2017

Actress Amy Schumer

Non-profit New York Women in Film and Television (NYWIFT) held their annual gala last night at the NYU School of Law. The star-studded event honored some of movie and TV's most outstanding creatives in hair, makeup, and styling divisions. The awards ceremony was hosted by former Saturday Night Live comedian Sasheer Zamata, who spoke with grace, humility and reverence for the women who were granted awards. In her opening remarks, she boasted her blue, sequined dress as being a $25 find, which was the perfect set-up for award presenter Amy Schumer to point out her frock as a "bridesmaids dress". Schumer closed the individual awards section of the ceremony, presenting the NYWIFT honor to her makeup artist Kyra Panchenko for her work on Inside Amy Schumer and other award-winning productions.

Awards were also given to hairstylist Melissa Forney for her notable work in Selma, Hidden Figures, and TV sensation Empire. Costume designer Melissa Toth was brilliantly introduced by her longtime friend and actor, David Costabile, for her work in Manchester by the Sea and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The NYWIFT Designing Women gala is annually co-hosted with Variety Magazine. 

The magazine sponsors the Variety Award, which was given this year to the entire costume, hair, and makeup team for TV hit Jessica Jones. The Variety award closed the ceremony, and was facilitated by A-list actress Rosario Dawson. 

Guests were invited to a closing reception that featured Jessica Jones themed food and drinks, with an exhibition containing many of the costume pieces from the works honored. For more information on NYWIFT visit: http://www.nywift.org/