They’re worth a ring’s weight in gold.
Instagram has announced the launch of its Rings awards, a program made to celebrate the creativity of the more than three billion monthly active users on the platform.
“We felt that it was time to have an award that recognizes people who take these creative chances on our platform,” Eva Chen, the head of fashion partnerships at Instagram, told the Hollywood Reporter.
Chen, who helped come up with the awards program, added, “These people are cultural catalysts, and they’re sparking conversations, and by doing that, they encourage people to express themselves as well.”
Just 25 Instagram users will receive Rings — both a physical ring designed by English fashion designer Grace Wales Bonner, as well as a digital golden ring for their Instagram profile and stories.
The ring around your stories that’s typically an orange-pink gradient, or green for close friends, will be golden for Ring winners. Winners will also be able to customize the background color of their profile, and their content will be in a separate spotlight and feed within Instagram.
The star-studded judges panel includes Chen, Wales Bonner and Instagram head Adam Mosseri, as well as other experts across creative fields, such as director Spike Lee, rugby star and Olympian Ilona Maher, makeup artist Pat McGrath, designer Marc Jacobs, actress Yara Shahidi, the artist KAWS and more.
Each judge worked with Instagram’s creator teams to narrow the list down from billions to the 25 winners.
“Instagram is a community of three billion people, and those three billion people probably reflect a billion different interests, so the criteria was really tough,” Chen explained, noting that winners will be across a range of content topics and categories.
“I’m saying this as a judge, seeing the huge list of nominees, and being able to cull it down just to 25, it was a challenge, and I know that, like the other judges, it was too many great people to choose from.”
She shared that judges looked for users who take creative changes and are “always pushing the envelope and thinking about new ways to talk to their audience.”
“I think that’s one the most magical things about Instagram is that it shows every moment of someone’s journey,” Chen said.
The idea of Rings is to reward creators who have been open about their lives, art and vision across the different parts of Instagram.
“These are multifaceted creators who can tell stories in so many different ways” she said. “They’re multilingual when it comes to communicating with their followers.”
“It’s so important now for creators to take creative chances and to continue to hone their craft and feed themselves on this ever-growing platform. So I think that the hope is for us to be able to do this for years to come, and every year, just keep on kind of upping the ante in terms of creativity and spotlights.”
