If you ever spend time around the engineering quad you may see senior Diya Liu walking around. You can’t miss her because she may be one of the best-dressed students on campus. Originally from Urumqi, China, Liu and her family moved to the states when she was eight years old. After spending a few years in Las Cruces, NM, Liu and her family became permanent residents of Texas. After graduating top 5% of her class with a International Baccalaureate degree from Westwood High School in 2007, Liu enrolled at University of Texas at Austin where she ambitiously decided to double major in Chemical Engineering and Biochemistry.
Despite the rigor both curriculums can put on a student, Liu makes time to always “dress to impress.” When asked about sacrificing looks to balance course-work time constraints Liu said this, “I’m a much more social, confident, happy and nice person when I feel like I look presentable… So last semester when I had to balance a full course load, programming, research, tutoring, grading, blogging, modeling, and music events I made sure I looked good every day.” However, dressing nice every day has presented struggles for Liu as well.
Liu has run into situations where people have underestimated her intelligence based on the way she dresses, as if being well-dressed automatically means you’re compensating for a lack of intelligence. When asked about this presumption Liu commented, “I think if I do poorly on an exam more people will speculate that I’m just dumb rather than sick, and when I end up with an A in the course people would assume it was luck. There’s no amount of luck that helps you get an A in Transport Processes or Thermodynamics!”
In January of 2010, Liu translated her unique and intriguing fashion sense into a style blog that has taken Austin by storm. Besides needing a creative outlet and mental distraction from her demanding course work, Liu created In Her Stilettos
Liu plans to continue her education after graduation by enrolling in Law School where she will focus on Patent Law. Liu also has full intentions on continuing In Her Stilettos and being as involved in the fashion world as she possibly can.