Wendy Pepper

Pepper died on November 12, 2017, aged 53, in Washington D.C. She died from complications of pneumonia after battling cancer for several months.

Pepper showed her debut line, outside of Project Runway, on April 11, 2006 in Washington, D.C. Her ready-to-wear line was shown at the 2007 Cleveland Fashion Week in Cleveland, Ohio.

Pepper won two of the challenges, with her design for the Banana Republic challenge and the Grammy dress for Nancy O'Dell. Her win in the Banana Republic challenge allowed her dress to be sold in select Banana Republic stores in the United States as well as online. Her dress sold out within three hours online and within two days in stores. As a result of her win in the Grammy dress challenge, O'Dell wore an altered version of Pepper's dress to the 2005 Grammy Awards, despite some expressed reservations from the judges. She also had noticeable failures, including her outfit for the Innovation challenge and her dress for the Envy challenge.

Pepper was born in Dayton, Ohio and lived in the town of Middleburg, Virginia. She graduated from The Madeira School in 1982 and then attended the University of Washington in Seattle, earning a degree in anthropology. While in college, Pepper studied abroad in Nepal and began to sew carpets with local Nepali women. This sparked her interest in design and working with fabric. She returned home and continued to learn more about textiles, fabric-painting, and quilting.

Anne Eustis Pepper Stewart (August 23, 1964 – November 12, 2017), known as Wendy Pepper, was a fashion designer who appeared on the first season of the reality television show Project Runway, which aired on Bravo from December 2004 through February 2005. She was also a contestant on the second season of Project Runway All Stars. She was eliminated from the Project Runway All Stars competition in the second challenge.