Fashion Visuals- London College of Fashion

During my time at the London College of Fashion we took a class entitled Fashion Visuals. In this class we learned about the importance of visuals in fashion and how to relate images that were completely unrelated. We were given freedom to take images from anywhere and across all spectrums of themes and create mood boards. We were allowed to use themes of color, contrast, line, texture, shape etc. I liked this class a lot because in any job you have or whatever department in the fashion industry that you work in, you will have to be working with visuals and a lot of times with mood boards to present your ideas and your plan. This class gave us the opportunity to really define our skills and make successful images to put in our portfolio. This class is not offered at Drexel and allowed us to improve our skills with visuals which some Design and Merchandising students are not as good at. Fashion Visuals was a fun class and allowed us to work with images that inspired us and give us a break from traditional written projects and presentations!

Styling Class- London College of Fashion

During our Fashion Business program at the London College of Fashion one of our classes was a styling course. In this course we were taught by a stylist working in the industry who has worked the names like the Kardashians, and many models and actors and large name magazines. We were also taught by a well known London photographer who has been published in many magazines as well. We had three main projects. Our first project was to style two looks for ourselves and two looks for a partner of a Sports Luxe theme. For my theme we chose to do more of a street style Sports Luxe photo shoot. Below are two looks that I styled, one on myself and one on my partner Evelin.

The second project included us styling ourselves and our partner taking two trends from the Autumn/Winter fashion week and combine the two trends into one photoshoot. I chose the two styles of Red as a Neutral and Oversized Coats. Below are the two photos that I chose.

For our final project we were required to create a 10 page, 10 look spread of a certain theme of our choice. We were in groups of four or five and each person in our group was given a role of model, photographer, stylist, editor, and finding locations. Our theme was 60's reboot and was set as a carnival and fair type of theme. We named our lookbook 2060 to play off of the idea that its the two thousands now and we are bringing back the styles of the 1960's but with a modern and unique twist. Below are two out takes from the shoot. The class overall was my favorite because we were able to take what we were learning and putting it into place and actually showing our skills and what we learned. It was good to have two shoots before our final lookbook because we were able to take the feedback from our first shoots and apply them to our final project and get the best results. It was fun to buy so many outfits and shoot them and edit them. The class was fun and a break from writing papers and reports which was awesome.

Traveling

Since I have been in London I have been able to travel so easily throughout Europe. One of the best things about being in Europe is that once you are here it is so easy and inexpensive to travel to other places in Europe. The flights are significantly less expensive than if you were to travel to these places from the United States. I had the opportunity to travel to Paris and Amsterdam. I was also able to travel to the countryside of the United Kingdom and visit the Windsor Castle, the city of Bath, Brighton and Stonehenge (one of the seven wonders of the world). The landscape in the countryside of London is so unexpected considering we live in London which is such a busy city. The landscape is breathtaking and  goes on for miles of hills and plains that are beautiful and is a good break from the busy fast paced lifestyle in London. Also some of my flatmates have traveled to Italy, Dublin, Barcelona, Ibiza, Monaco and many other places. Studying abroad is amazing for the fact that you get to live somewhere abroad for one-six months and have the ability to travel so easily to other cities and countries as well.

Bath 

Stonehenge 

Amsterdam 

Coming to an End

My program in London is all too quickly approaching an end.  Less than two weeks from now, I will be at home in the States and probably packing to go back to Drexel.  When I applied to study abroad this summer, my goals mainly centered around expanding my horizons and my point of view.  I wanted to understand this global industry from a British perspective and to see how they prepare their fashion students to enter the work force, making me more well-rounded.  I was surprised by multitude of differences in the approach to teaching and learning.  In the States, our grades are based on multiple assignments, how well we perform individually, and throughout the term, we take exams or have critiques.  At London College of Fashion, there was a more hands off approach.  We had one or two big assignments that we were expected to work on throughout the course on our own time, and when we were graded, it was based on how well we did in comparison to our peers.  It was definitely a wakeup call.  It was also beneficial to take classes with people from all over the world.  Working on assignments with them and hearing their input was interesting and also helped me see the business in a new light.  I have a new understanding of the world around me and am starting to see, more clearly, my place in it.  Overall, I feel like I have accomplished everything I came here to do and would do it all again in a heartbeat.      

London College of Fashion

During my time in London, I took eight weeks of classes at London College of Fashion.  I was able to take classes there that I normally would not be able to take at Drexel, like Historical and Contemporary Fashion Research Studies, which was a class where we met up in different areas of London.  It helped me familiarize myself with the city, learn to navigate in unfamiliar areas, and it taught me about what made each area unique.

I also took a few strictly fashion business classes, and although I had already learned the information in previous classes, our tutor presented it in a new way.  It was a different take on fashion business, but it helped me understand it more fully and acted as a supplement to what I came knowing.

The two shorter classes I took, Fashion Media and Visuals for Fashion, were great.  I wish there were more than three class meeting times for each because I haven’t had a lot of experience in either field of study and would have liked to explore the subjects even further. 

There was also a styling course, which I enjoyed a lot.  The class was split up into groups, and we had to set up, style, and shoot three photo shoots.  After each one, we received a critique to help us understand what to focus on to improve for the next one. 

At the end of the term, I was proud of all that I had learned and accomplished.  I was able to manage my time in order to complete all of my projects and still get to truly experience and fall in love with the city of London.

Arts Decoratifs Paris: Dries Van Noten

In Paris I went to a Dries Van Noten exhibition at Arts Decoratifs. Here is an explanation of my experience:

Arts Decoratifs Paris: Dries Van Noten

“What I do is neither a photocopy or a homage. It is all about being inspired by someone else’s work and transporting it into a different setting, an operation that is subjective as it is personal,” says Dries Van Noten in his first exhibition at the Arts Decoratifs in Paris. This sentence explains his exhibit in a nutshell, it is a not to be perceived as a collection of runway looks, but a collection of inspirations. Dries Van Noten is a Belgian fashion designer that is part of The Antwerp Six, a group of influential avante-garde fashion designers who graduated from Antwerp’s Royal Academy of Fine Arts between 1980-1981. Noten designed ready-to-wear collections for men and women of eclective influences; he looked towards Paris and London for inspiration, as well as discovering Japanese and English fashion.

The two-floor exhibition space started with an exotic flower entrance and then transitioned into a dimly lit room where the floor and ceilings were covered in words and meanings that evoked what he was inspired by. Some of my favorites were: taxi driver, Donna Summers, fashion algebra, Superman, and disco.He wanted his audience to understand his philosophy: “the starting point of a collection can be either very literal or abstract, a painting, a certain colour, a thought, a gesture, a smell, a flower, anything really. What matters to me is the journey from the first flash of inspiration to the final destination, the individual garments, the collection.” The remaining rooms proceeded to show this journey.

Inspiration Wall

This was clever concept, because it gave you a behind the scenes look of Noten’s fashion mastermind. For example, Dries Van Noten was inspired by the vivid colour and weightlessness of butterflies; specifically he was obsessed by the disturbingly potent appeal of a butterfly as well as its fleeting existence and hint of ambiguous allure of adolescence. Included in this section of the exhibit was a dress by Elsa Schiaparelli’s ensemble du soir printemps-ete 1937, it was a butterfly printed maxi length dress with a twill black robe covering it. Then in the background a kaleidoscope graphic butterfly circular piece of art called Rapture by Damien Hirst was inserted behind the dress.

It took a fashion legend from the 1930s and a modern contemporary artist to convey what possessed him to create the Collection Homme in 2000. These types of examples carried you throughout the exhibit, and showed his multifaceted way of becoming inspired.

Overall, the exhibition was a true reflection of Dries Van Noten’s mind, it is the type of exhibition where you could visit numerous times, but still discover and learn something new about both Noten and his work. All of his inspirations showed you a private view into the life and work of this fashion designer; it satisfied the viewer, and most importantly created a dialogue with his collections. Targeted towards a curious audience, this exhibition is both fulfilling and stimulating to the mind, if given the opportunity to visit it is a must-see!  

City of Crepes a.k.a. Paris

At The London College of Fashion orientation we were given a schedule of our classes and a booklet that explained our upcoming trip to Paris. Having only been to Paris once for a layover flight, I was beyond excited about this journey. A little hesitant about the experience, given that we were going with a group of 30 people, but nevertheless I was very eager to embark. Two weeks of classes had to go by before we went on this trip and the time flew. Our first week of classes at LCF (London College of Fashion) were very interesting because we spent a majority of our class time listening to our tutor's (English way of saying professor) experiences in the fashion and design industries. For example, one tutor named Alison runs her own Public Relations firm in London that supports up and coming fashion designers. She always had the best stories to tell, one Monday after the weekend had past she told us she lost her voice because she was at Glastonbury (Summer Music Festival) with Dolly Parton. I of course being the curious person I am, stayed after class to ask her why she was with Dolly Parton all weekend. She told me the story about how when she was younger she was a backup singer and one of the first tours she went on was with Dolly Parton. Through that experience she became very close with her and twenty years later is still in touch. It is those types of inspirational stories that made the program at LCF so unique. Not only did we get a rigorous course load that taught us about the inner workings of the fashion business, but we were lucky enough to have valuable and insightful tutors that taught us.

Lourve

Anyway, back to Paris... It was a dream come true. The first night I arrived my friends and I went  to the Eiffel Tower and brought a bottle of rosé with us. On the way we stopped for crêpes that were so good I had to get two. That night I truly experienced the Parisian magic. We were sitting in front of the tower in the grass enjoying the magnificent glistening view when I checked my phone to receive an email from Anne saying congrats. I had applied for the Ray Greenly Scholarship a few months back and she was congratulating me on becoming one of semi-finalists. I screamed of joy as I didn't think life could actually get any better than my first time sitting under the Eiffel Tower. It really made me believe that I was on the right path in my career and it reassured me that hard-work pays off! 

Eiffel Tower

It was those types of instances that made my time in Paris very special. Another was when I went to the famous lock bridge, my friend had reminded me of the tale that started it. Basically, it is a Serbian tale of two lovers, the man went off to war and ended up finding another love, while the woman stayed at home and was devastated because of this. Afterwards all the women in the Serbian village put locks on bridges to lockdown their love and protect it from any wrong happenings. This inspired me to put a lock on the bridge for my family. My parents are from Serbia and it made the experience of being the first person in my family ever to put a lock on the bridge in Paris an incredible feeling. I am truly grateful for every single experience I have had in not only Paris but in life and it is these types of reminders that make life worth living.

Lock Bridge