Students from the department of Textiles, Merchandising and Fashion Design sent their work down the runway Friday at the department’s Biennial Student Runway show.
The name of the show–“Fusion Fashion”–reflects a broad array of design inspirations. Designers showed a wide range of designs in the following categories: “Blue”, Collections”, “Structure and Details”, “All Eyes on Me”, “Recycled”, “Experimental”, and “Fashion Meets Culture”, which included Japanese and African influences.
A panel of jurors external to the TMFD program selected all work in the show. Michael James, chair of the department, said about 150 garments were submitted to the selections jury panel. Approximately 70% of the designs were accepted for the show, James said.
Textiles, merchandising and fashion design alumnae JLynn Hausmann and Amanda Valentine served as this year’s guest judges, and were given the task of deciding the winners of the Mary Mitchell Fashion Excellence Awards.
JLynn Hausmann is the designer behind the Los Angeles based denim brand JHaus. Amanda Valentine is a stylist and designer of the ready to wear line VALENTINE VALENTINE. Amanda was also a competitor on the eleventh season of Project Runway. In addition to deciding the recipients of the Mary Mitchell Fashion Excellence Awards, Hausmann and Valentine each showed a collection from their own lines.
Kaitlyn Coufal’s garment, called “Assembled Origami”, won best in show. Liz Chu’s “Modern Geisha” and Sophie Hine’s “Velvet Revolution” won honorable mentions, and Hannah Flores received an award of distinction for her garment, “Guarded Chaos”.