Tribal College Blanket Design Competition
The Contest is Now Open!
The American Indian College Fund and Pendleton Woolen Mills are challenging tribal college students to express their culture and identity through original designs for our next tribal college student blanket. Blanket sales will support College Fund scholarships. Textile design experience is not necessary to enter, and student winners will receive the following prizes:
Grand Prize Winner:
- $2,000 Cash
- $5,000 Scholarship
- 6 x blankets
2nd Place Winner:
- $500 Cash
- $2,500 Scholarship
3rd Place Winner:
- $250 Cash
- $1,500 Scholarship
Only students who are currently enrolled at a Tribal College or University are eligible to submit. Students must be an enrolled tribal member, or the descendant of a parent or grandparent that is tribally enrolled.
Students cannot submit more than two designs, and a committee of Native artists, and College Fund and Pendleton staff will select the winners.
American Indian College Fund Student-Designed Pendleton Blanket “Drum Keepers” Available for Purchase
Winning Design Created by Little Priest Tribal College Student, Trey Blackhawk
Trey Blackhawk with his award-winning Pendleton Blanket Design.
Denver, Colo., March 26, 2024 — The 2023 winning Tribal College Blanket Design, Drum Keepers, is now available for purchase. The blanket is the latest addition to Pendleton Woolen Mills’ American Indian College Fund collection. The acclaimed lifestyle brand from Portland, Oregon has created wool blankets in partnership with the College Fund for more than 20 years. A portion of the blanket line’s sales provide approximately $50,000 in annual Native student scholarships. Pendleton also contributes to a scholarship endowment that, combined with the total of scholarships disbursed, exceeds $2.5 million.
Trey Blackhawk (Winnebago) is a graduate of Little Priest Tribal College with a degree in liberal arts who is currently working on an applied sciences degree. His design, Drum Keepers, was selected from 59 submissions. As the winning designer, Blackhawk will receive a $5,000 scholarship, $2,000 for books and incidentals, and six blankets for his design portfolio. Troy Tso (Navajo) and Cydnee Shangreaux (Oglala Sioux) placed second and third in the contest respectively. Tso’s Directions Home blanket earned him a $2,500 scholarship and $500 cash prize. Shangreaux’s Morning Storm crib blanket design won her a $1,500 scholarship and $250 cash prize.
Meet Past Winners
Meet the 2022 contest winner and Diné College student, Dustin, and learn more about his design “Many Nations.” Dustin explained that the design of Many Nations is meant to represent the identity crisis felt by Indigenous people who are descendants of more than one tribe or have some non-Native ancestry. Indigenized DNA strands pay tribute to water as the element we cannot exist without. The hourglass shape is made up of the initial M and B for “mixed-blood,” but the hourglass also symbolizes the Tsiiyéeł, or matriarchal society, for many Navajo artists. Star shapes represent parents, both biological and figurative, that pass along traditional teachings and help those struggling with their identity to navigate the world on and off the reservation.
Meet the 2021 contest winner and Fort Peck Community College student, Chelysa, and learn more about her creation “Unity.” Chelysa’s piece, titled “Bloom,” is a self-portrait that represents her personal growth with blooming flowers, open arms, and butterflies representing a healed soul and new beginnings. “The overall visual I wanted the piece to show is that no matter where you’re at in life, no matter what hardships you are going through, you have the ability to heal, the ability to start over. When we go through our different stages in life, relationships, hardships, pain, love, etcetera… we bloom through it all.”
Meet the 2020 contest winner and Little Big Horn College student and College Fund scholar, Deshawna Anderson and how she draws inspiration from historic and contemporary Apache beadwork, quillwork, and burden baskets (conically shaped and fringed baskets that traditionally were used by women to carry everyday items like food and firewood).
