Meet the students behind tomorrow’s FASHION art show

Fashion Forward Design Concepts and savvy entrepreneurial skills unite the design and business schools to create a unique never before seen fashion event, on campus.

For the first time at SU, the Fashion Design program and Entrepreneurship program are collaborating in the development of a conceptual design showcase that has opened the doors in fashion forward thinking, for not only the designers but business students as well.

Guests should expect to see a room full of mannequins dressed in out of the box attire, literally. Fashion Design students in Professor Long Nams’ conceptual design class have taken couture, creativity, and skill to the next level, and created 3-D garments using unconventional materials.

The usual conventional garments created by our fashion design students are made with fabrics and traditional sewing techniques which fit their forms for ready to wear attire. However, as I walked into my scheduled interview with Professor Long, in the warehouses 7^th floor, it was obvious these designs were far from traditional. The dress forms were dressed in cardboard designs that fit the forms to create 3D movement, rather than the common 2D tailored designs.

Cardboard was the least of the designers challenges’ for this project. Simon Perez, a Fashion Design major and entrepreneurship minor, stated his traditional design ascetic has always lead toward conceptual designs translated with conventional fabrics. This project forced him to step out of his comfort zone and work with materials like plexi glass, plastic, wood, photoshop and illustrator.

Junior Simon Perez shows off his plexiglass pattern he will heat and mold to create his piece

“I tend to be very conceptual with my designs, but what’s going to be different about this design is it’s so different that there’s no literal side to it. I’m nervous because it’s my first time doing something so conceptual and my first time using laser cutting, using plastic, and all these new techniques.”

Perez used illustrator to create the pattern and get it cut out at the warehouse work shop

Huanhuan Zhang, a senior Fashion Design major, said although she has already had her clothes exhibited, this time will be different because she’s creating a moving design made of three layers of cubed cardboard where her main challenge has been executing her vision.

Label reads ‘Do not move please’

“It’s really hard because you have to think about how it’s going to fit the body and how you’re going to construct it,” Huanhuan told The Tab.

The designers’ conceptual project didn’t just come with the challenge of creating a 3D design incorporating advanced technology, their concepts had to be reflective from images that inspired them.

Working off an image of paint being dropped in water, Senior Rachel Wendell explains translating her image into a 3D concept hasn’t be an easy process.

Rachel Wendell drew inspiration from this paint being dropped in water for her design

“My design is very curvilinear, it’s going to be all out of plexiglass acrylic, so to make the whole thing it’s all plastic giant pieces that I have to mold with a heat gun and weld together. It’s going to be a nightmare but hopefully it turns out okay.”

Wendell’s vision board

Wendell found her image on Pinterest, where she explains most of her inspirations for designs come from movement and line quality, but she never limits her creativity and finds inspirations from other types of graphics, photography, fabrics and nature.

For designer Maddie Hofmaier it was also easy to find inspiration for her design, although executing her ideas was the most challenging part of the process. Hofmaier explained not only was it difficult to use the techniques with the unconventional materials, it was also a challenge translating her visions onto paper and deciding how they would be made.

Hofmaier’s design was inspired by her interest in geography and the female form. She explained growing up in a beach town in Massachusetts, she would always go on Google Maps and look at the lines which made up her town. She decided it would be interesting to incorporate the lines of a map in her design, while also showing off the female form.

Maddie Hofmaiers’ conceptual design is sketched out with cardboard before adding on her cut out pattern made of plexiglass

Jacky Xu, a Senior CRS Major and Marketing minor, was in charge of most of the event planning.

Xu booked catering, gathered equipment, hired a DJ and connected with the fashion program to make sure the planning ran smoothly.

Stop by Whitman tomorrow evening between 6-9pm to admire the work of your talented peers. You won’t be disappointed.

Students will showcase their designs on mannequins provided by the design program, where guests will be able to get up close and personal to the forms. Guests will be able to socialize, eat food, and roam around the hall to get a closer look at the designers work.

The events flyers were created by designer Meagan Rafferty