Personal Recap: My Final Year in Fashion

When I was younger, I wanted to be a children's fiction author. I have folders upon folders of my handwritten stories in storage, accompanied by illustrations typical of a five-year-old. Once I was in my last year of elementary school, my best friend at the time mentioned wanting to go into fashion. I thought it sounded fun, so I followed her footsteps. It was as simple as that.

In high school, I had an amazing home economics teacher who had graduated from Kwantlen Polytechnic University's fashion design program. She had designed the school's sewing program to help students meet the portfolio requirements, such as the type of garments and details they wanted us to have examples of. Textiles was always my favorite class every year. When I wasn't doing other homework, I spent many afternoons and early evenings working in the sewing lab. While it could be stressful at times, it also felt like I had more freedom than I did in any other class.

I found out I was accepted into their fashion program by phone call. My best friend ended up going to another fashion school on the other side of the country and we lost touch, but I thankfully made some new friends in the program that I still hang out with today.

ABOUT THE FASHION DESIGN & TECHNOLOGY PROGRAM

The program itself was, in a word, difficult. We were always stressed, anxious, feeling like there weren't enough hours in a day to do anything and everything we wanted. There could be multiple deadlines at once, projects that would be due within a few days, and classes that felt too short to get much done. It was also fulfilling, rewarding, helping me grow confident and prepared for whatever else would come my way. It wasn't just about fashion or design, it was about being able to talk positively, walk confidently, and defend my work while accepting and incorporating fair criticism.

The biggest challenge of the program was the fourth and final year, where we spent the entire year developing and producing our graduate collections. Almost all of our classes revolved around this one final event, The Show. Brand development, design, technical specifications, marketing, career preparation - it all started in the summer before fourth year began.

SUMMER 2016 | CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT

The fashion program has a strict structure unlike most university programs where students have flexible options to choose from. We only get two sections for each class, and there are no classes in the summer. If we fail even one class, we can't proceed forward with the program for another year. Everything is a pre-requisite for everything else.

On our last day of third year, a few of our professors came to tell us what we needed to have prepared for our first day of fourth year. We needed a personal vision essay about ourselves and three potential collection concepts, preferably with visuals.

I wanted to be ahead of the game with less room for ambiguity, so I was very thorough with my concept development. I divided "myself" into three ideas that really spoke to me - gender-neutral childrenswear, feminine feminism, and cosplay basics. Each idea came with suggested genders and age ranges, keywords, and descriptions of who the customer was and what they valued.

While the childrenswear concept was my clear favorite, I knew I would be just as excited to produce any of the others. I brought all three to my teachers on our first day back. They wanted to discuss ideas with everyone and nudge us in the right direction. As I'd hoped, the children's collection was the winner, and I was given the go-ahead to proceed with research and design.

FALL 2016 | MARKET RESEARCH & FINAL ADOPT

My initial visuals for my inspiration were all in neutral colors. I soon realized that this was a potential gap in the market. How often do we see gender-neutral clothing in color? Children love color, will mix and match colors in ways that adults often would never think of.

This was quickly supported by my research. I observed playgrounds and malls, went through children's clothing stores and looked at runway shows online. I knew I couldn't make just another genderless fashion line in browns and grays. It had to be as vibrant as my target market's personality.

Athleisure was the obvious choice for the aesthetic. For children, it means clothes they can wear at school and on the playground. The looser silhouettes and casual fit made it perfect for both boys and girls.

Picking the color palette and design details also came easy to me. I thought of shows like The Wonder Years and Boy Meets World, the letterman jackets and striped skirts and baseball caps. As a 90s baby with an affinity for the 80s aesthetic, I was more than happy to use those decades as inspiration.

Pre-adopt and final adopt were stages of the process in which we would bring our work to our professors and receive an assessment. Going into winter break, I only had minor fixes to make in preparation for our final semester.

SPRING 2017 | DESIGNER SPOTLIGHT & FINAL PRODUCTION

Our final semester was almost entirely about production, with a side focus on promoting our brand and the show. Naturally, this was the most stressful stage for us. We had to test difficult details, produce multiple prototypes, and perfect the final pieces for the runway. Blood, sweat, and tears were a daily occurrence for us. Still, seeing everything get finished was the most satisfied we'd ever felt.

Part of our promotional efforts included doing interviews, press kits, and designer spotlight. The designer spotlight is an event that KPU holds every year. Each student puts together a presentation for the public, including prototypes, business cards, and moodboards. Students from other programs and industry members are invited to come and talk to us.

For my photoshoot, my high school friend, a professional photographer, was able to help me out. My models were my professors' children, who were already used to being models for students every year. Working on the photoshoot was one of the highlights of the year for me, getting to see everything come together as I envisioned it.

APRIL 5TH - 6TH | THE SHOW

The final days of the semester were spent working toward the show, and we were overwhelmingly nervous. With two shows on each day, we were there from early morning to late at night.

My memories of the show days are a bit of a blur. I remember running up and down the backstage stairs constantly. I remember setting up my table at the front-of-house, adjusting all my promotional materials inch by inch until it was perfect. Everyone was sleep-deprived and buzzing with excitement.

My most vivid memories were moments shared with others. I remember a huge group of my high school friends showing up to support me, along with my high school teacher. I remember my cohort watching every show together from the mezzanine, singing along with the songs and cheering each other's models on, feeling closer than we'd ever been.

After the very last show, we all went back to the front-of-house. Nearly all of us spontaneously burst into tears, myself included. We were hysterical, crying and laughing and trying to get it together before the audience came out to join us.

FINAL THOUGHTS

There are a lot of things about my final year at KPU that still make me feel stressed just thinking about thinking about it. At the same time, it was an experience like nothing else, emotional and triumphant and hard to describe. While I'm not currently working in fashion, design has always been my number one love. Getting to work in marketing has felt like an extension of what I'm passionate about when it comes to fashion design. Listening, observing, understanding customers and figuring out what they want and need. I will always look back on the fashion program and the people in it with fondness.