This weekend I went to the Her Campus College Fashion Week event at the Boston Common Revere Hotel. The event was primarily sponsored by Primark, with their new looks displayed on the runway, with other major sponsors such as Venmo. Walking into the event, I didn’t know what to expect. In line, everyone was dressed up with heels, dresses and full faces of makeup, whereas I had gone for a more casual, grunge outfit of Doc Martin’s, mom jeans and a striped sweater. I guess you live and learn!
Upon walking in and presenting my ticket, we entered a foyer of purple and pink lights and a DJ playing mostly songs from the summer. We did not know that at the check in we were supposed to pick up a goodie bag, as there weren’t any out on the tables. If we had not seen people walking around with bags, we might not have gone back to get one in time! This seemed slightly odd to me that they wouldn’t tell us to wait or come back while they make more goody bags, but all is good; we got our bags and began browsing the foyer. Upon entering, we were given Primark Gift cards, but no one seemed sure of how much money was on the gift card; even the people that were working the event did not know.
But regardless, the first booth I stopped at was for a startup company, Flare Jewelry, in Boston. I was so glad to see a brand represented at the event that was so relevant and important to women in college. Flare designed a bengle-style bracelet that has a secret security device in it to provide an escape for women in uncomfortable situations. The representative explained to me that there’s a small button inside the bracelet. If you press it once, you will automatically get a phone call to your phone “from your roommate who has a problem and needs you back ASAP.” This hopefully will give women an escape from uncomfortable situations such as unwanted conversation, or questionable parties. If this does not work and a woman feels she is in more of a dangerous situation, she can press the button twice and it will automatically send her location to 5 friends. I couldn’t have thought of a better place to advocate this product than college fashion week, so major points to Her Campus for advertising this small company and its important product.
The next booth over was an adorable station where you could “Create your own bouquet box” for free! I have to say, I probably enjoyed this the most out of anything at the event, but that may be me and my love of plants. You could take a little box with fake grass and pebbles and choose from a wide array of fake flowers, leaves and twigs to create a cute little desk decor to take home. I may or may not have made 3 boxes.
Before entering the main room with the runway, there was a little shop with goodies from fanny packs, to hats, to pins. They were all adorable, but they cost money and I am a broke college student, so I stuck with the free things.
We finally entered the massive runway room, and my claustrophobia kicked in. It was PACKED. There were little cocktail tables, and bins with La Croix. We saw lots of people had cupcakes at the tables, so we pushed our way through the room looking for where these cupcakes may be. Unfortunately, by the time we got in the room, about 30 minutes after the doors opened, they were all out of food. This was a big disappointment; those cupcakes looked good. But we carried on and looked at the fun things they had for guests to do. On the back wall there were several beauty stations; a skin care station, a hair station, and a makeup station. If you wanted to wait long enough you could get a full makeover from a hairstylist and makeup artist! I loved this idea, but the lines were long, and the stylists were giving everyone their full attention and time for what they wanted. They also took the time to take photos of you in the ring light. I watched as the girls posed, and the stylists cheered them on. It made me smile to see so much positivity between women.
On the other side of the room there was a T-Shirt stand, where each guest could print a free T-shirt with a design of their choice, out of the five they offered. As a lover of free T-shirts, I was excited about this, and got a cute white tee with a rose on it! Right as I got my T-shirt, the fashion show started. They showed different looks styled by Primark Clothes ranging from athletic styles to 90s grunge looks, all very representative of trendy aesthetics today. The models were adorable; they represented all different body types and ethnicities well, and the atmosphere of the event was self-love and support between women. As the models walked down the runway, they posed and strut to the music, which was still summer 2019 bops, and everyone cheered and whistled for every model. Unfortunately, it was so crowded that I was unable to get the best pictures, but I attempted.
On the way out of the event, we did encounter a problem. One of our friends had bought a ticket but was unable to come to the event, and we wanted to grab her a goodie bag, obviously after showing them her ticket. I learned, however, that they had run out of goodie bags at some point earlier in the night. This to me, felt like a major planning error. If they stopped ticket sales a few days before the event, shouldn’t they have made goodie bags for everyone who bought a ticket? If we hadn’t gone back and asked for a goodie bag, we may not have gotten one if we didn’t ask early enough, and that would be super disappointing.
The goodie bags themselves, however, were full of nice products! Within the goodie bag I got:
- A clear reusable water bottle (points for sustainability)
- A Nair Leg Mask
- A mini Batiste dry shampoo
- A Shea Moisture Daily Hydration leave-in hair treatment
- A Conair True Glow Skinpod (this was super exciting, I tried it last night and my face felt super clean and exfoliated)
- A Mary Kay eye make-up remover
- Two Kind granola bars
- A box of seaweed snacks
- And the canvas tote bag itself, which had a cute floral design and said “College Fashion Week”
My overall thoughts on the event was that I definitely got my money’s worth. The ticket was 20 dollars and the value of the goodies I got definitely valued over 20 dollars. Especially if I had stayed in line to get a makeover, I would have really gotten my money’s worth. It was a cute experience to see a fashion show with real college students like myself, get to go to a luxury fashion week event, and leave with some nice products. My suggestions, however, would be to reduce the number of people. I think it would have been a really enjoyable event if there were 100 or so less people. They ran out of bags, ran out of food, the lines for the makeovers were extremely long, and it was hard to get a good spot to watch the fashion show. I think they could have gotten all the same sponsors and products for the event with a slightly lower amount of tickets sold. And, maybe having goodie bags for everyone who bought a ticket would be a good thing. The vibe was definitely fun and supportive, but it was very clearly a marketing tactic for companies, but as long as you are okay with that, I would recommend going to the event. Just get there on time and make sure to take advantage of all the free stuff!