Fashion show features students’ designs
Utah State University students can expect something a little different from the Family Life Fashion Show this year. For the first time it will showcase all student-designed clothing.
The fashion show will take place March 28 in the Sunburst Lounge of the Taggart Student Center. The theme this year will be “Fashion Out Loud.”
“I feel like this is going to be a really good show,” said Nicole Nielson, academic adviser for apparel and textile students. “The students have worked really hard. Each year we feel we have to outdo the last show so it gets better and better. This year we’re raising the bar a little more.”
The show will have different sets with music that the clothes have been inspired by. For example, there will be street-wear clothing to hip-hop music, Polynesian clothing to Polynesian music. Nielson said they picked the theme because there is so much they can do with it. The theme is decided by what gives the designer the inspiration for what kind of clothes she designs. This year, designers were allowed to choose their own music so they had the freedom to design whatever they wanted.
“Fashion and music go hand in hand,” said Jeanine Owen, the fashion show coordinator. “With a lot of music there is a way of dressing that obviously goes with it, like with country music you have cowboy clothes.”
Owen also said they were able to feature all student-designed clothing this year because the apparel and textile department had so many student designers. In past years it was the merchandising student’s job to go to retail stores and pick out clothes for the models to wear on the runway, but this year they will have displays set up in the back of the fashion show to show their visual talents.
The apparel and textile students will get credit for the event, and it is also a good way for them to get material for their portfolios, Owen said. There will be a lot of different retail stores and fashion design people who come in to check out the student’s work and decide if there is anyone they want to hire.
“This is a way for students to get hands-on experience they can’t learn from a book,” she said.
Owen said she is excited about the event.
“Being able to make something as big as this happen is really gratifying,” she said. “We came up with the theme, but it is cool being able to see people’s interpretations, thoughts and ideas come to life.”
Melissa Longhurst, a senior majoring in apparel and textiles, said she has designed 14 outfits for her cowgirl line called “Alabama Style.”
“I love [the program],” Longhurst said. “It’s so cool. We do all the sketching and sewing, we do everything. It’s a good program.”
Nielson said tryouts for models went really well this year, more men than women tried out.
She said they have been preparing for the event since the beginning of fall semester. There are about 65 students working on it and they’ve formed different committees for public relations, the set, lights, designing and merchandising.
She said preparing for the fashion show this year was an even bigger challenge than in years past. Since the College of Family Life was dissolved and apparel and textiles was moved to the College of Business, they’ve had a smaller budget. Students have had to pay for everything themselves. They’ve had to work extra hard, get donations, and compromise a lot of things they wanted for their projects to cut the cost.
There will be a 12:30 p.m. show free to the public and another show with a cost of $3 at 7 p.m.
–erina@cc.usu.edu
A group of students show off the designs of Jeanine Owen and Melissa Longhurst for the 2002 Fashion Show. (Photo courtesy of Jeanine Owen)
Charisse Dyring and Heather Anderson model fashions from the patriotic set designed by apparel and textile students Jeanine Owen and Melissa Longhurst in the 2002 Family Life Fashion Show. (Photo courtesy of Jeanine Owen)