Yesterday at YVR, Vancouver Airport Authority launched a $100,000 partnership with Quest Food Exchange to reduce hunger and foster sustainability.

As part of the event, Airport Authority employees pushed fifty shopping carts full of food donations.

Food donations were loaded into the Quest truck. As the Official Transportation Sponsor of Quest, the Airport Authority will donate $100,000 to Quest over the next two years as part of its community investment program.

Vancouver Airport Authority's Larry Berg, presents the Airfield and Emergency Services Blue Team with the President's Award for Safety Excellence trophy.

Read a story about BC's Best Young Designer finalist, Karen Wong, in last week's Richmond Review.

There's a great story in today's Victoria Times Colonist about the importance of early literacy and reading to children in the very earliest stages of life. The story also mentions the amazing Books for BC Babies program which is struggling to survive after losing it's funding from the provincial government. The Books 4 BC Babies program puts literacy tools in the hands of every family with a newborn in British Columbia, and it's an important program to save.

Find out more about how your company can help save the program here.

Morgan Crossing's BC Best Young Designer competition was featured on Shaw TV's The Express. Check it out on Youtube... the segment starts at 5:29 of the clip.

Read The Surrey Now's story on the Morgan Crossing's Best Young Designer Competition.

Read The Peace Arch News story about the BC's Best Young Designer Competition.

BC's Best Young Designer competition in the Vancouver Sun:

What the young have done

Bold is not cold in this Morgan Crossing home decorated and furnished by a young designer, Jennifer Scott of Vancouver. Six Morgan Crossing homes decorated and furnished by the finalists in a young-designer competition, organized by the developer of the new-home community in south Surrey, now are open to the public. One of them is the home shown here. The competition's grand prize is an all-expenses- paid trip to New York City and a pass to the Architectural Digest Home Design Show. The fan favourite prize is $2,000 cash.

The six finalists were chosen by a panel of judges from video entries. (Only B.C. residents 30 years old or younger could enter the competition.)

The judges are: Kari Henshaw, Insight Design Group; Sarah Bancroft, editor-in- chief of Vitamin Daily, and Matthew Budgeon, film and television production designer.

The other five finalists are: Britt McMaster, Vancouver; Joanna Kado, Burnaby; Daniel Meloche, Vancouver; Penelope Sloan, Vancouver, and Karen Wong, Richmond.

The winners of the judges' prize and the public's prize will be announced Feb. 28. Check out bestyoungdesigner.com to learn more.

The six finalist in Morgan Crossing's BC's Best Young Designer competition have finished their entries. I've just come from a sneak preview of the suites where I was blown away by what these up-and-coming designers have accomplished.

The competitors had five weeks and a $10,000-$12,000 budget (depending on the size of the suite) to completely furnish and decorate a suite in the Morgan Crossing Village. A panel of judges will award one overall winner an all expenses paid trip to New York City to attend the Architectural Digest Interior Design Show. A fan favourite (chosen by the public) will win $2,000.

The suites are open to the public for viewing from 12pm-5pm every day except Friday until February 20th. Visit the Morgan Crossing Presentation Centre to vote for your favourite.

Photos from each of the designers are below, and you can learn more about the competition here: http://www.bestyoungdesigner.com/

And to get a sense of what these young designers have accomplished, here is a "before" shot of one of the suites:

(All images are available for media use.)

Jennifer Scott designed suite 451 at Morgan Crossing. Jennifer has a Bachelor of Design from Ryerson University, a minor in Business Communications, and a diploma in Fashion Merchandising. She currently is part owner of A Good Chick to Know Design Consultation where she works with clients on both wardrobe and interior design.

Joanna Kado designed suite 461 at Morgan Crossing. Joanna completed her Interior Design Certificate at BCIT and also holds a certificate in Architectural Drafting from University of the Fraser Valley.

Daniel Meloche designed suite 452 at Morgan Crossing. Daniel is a graduate from the Art Institute of Vancouver and has two in half years experience working as an Interior Designer and Project Coordinator for Northland Properties.

Karen Wong designed suite 459 at Morgan Crossing. Karen is a LEED Green Associate specializing in restaurant and hotel design and works as an interior designer for a Vancouver hospitality group. She works on a variety of projects including both new builds and renovations all over Canada.