Hampton Lumber names student winner for Fairfax mill wrap design contest

Hampton Lumber put a Hampton County High School student at the center of its push into Allendale County, selecting Ciara Bryant as a winner in its 2026 Lumber Wrap Design Competition. Bryant’s design will help mark the commissioning and grand opening of the company’s new Fairfax mill later this year, giving a local student a visible role in a project that is reshaping the area’s industrial footprint.

The contest was built around a simple but high-stakes idea: ask high school students to create artwork that will be printed on lumber wrap and shipped with products headed to markets across the country and around the world. Hampton said the 2026 competition expanded participation to schools in Oregon, Washington and South Carolina, including communities near Fairfax, where the company is building its first East Coast sawmill.

For Allendale County families, the most immediate payoff comes in the classroom. Hampton said the winning schools received $15,000 each for art and career-and-technical education programs, turning the contest into direct support for students and teachers. Kristin Rasmussen, Hampton Lumber’s director of public affairs and communications, said teachers often tell the company how meaningful it is for students to work on something tied to a real business.

The 2026 contest also builds on a much smaller first round in 2022, when Hampton said it received about 120 submissions and chose six winning designs. The company said artwork from that first competition now appears on lumber leaving its U.S. sawmills, extending student work far beyond the classroom and onto products that move through the company’s supply chain.

The Fairfax mill gives that visibility local economic weight. Hampton says the project is a $225 million investment that will specialize in Southern Yellow Pine framing lumber and create at least 125 jobs, with the company’s South Carolina page describing a full staffing range of 125 to 140 jobs once the mill is operating at capacity. The new facility is being built at Highway 321 and Barker Mill Pond Road in Fairfax, and Gov. Henry McMaster joined local leaders there for a ceremonial groundbreaking on Nov. 5, 2025. One report said the mill is expected to begin operations in early 2027.

For Allendale County, the competition is doing more than recognizing student creativity. It is linking schools, families and a major new employer before the first board is cut, while giving local young people a visible stake in a project that will soon be part of the county’s economy.