All in a days work

I'm wrapping up for the night and getting very ready for my trip to Ecuador tomorrow and I wanted to share my day, and my week. I woke up with a solid idea for the Braciallini competition that I will be participating in this semester (more on that later probably), so I'm very happy that I finally know what I'm going to do. I planned on going to LIC before heading to the studio, but the pattern maker whom I was supposed to meet was running late so I went to the studio first. On the way there I helped a girl chase her runaway puppy and keep him from running into the street, so that was good, and gave me positive energy. Then I saw two girls kissing, that was hot. Then I went to the studio and did some work, went to the garment district for a drop-off, finally went to LIC to pick up from the pattern maker, went back to the studio, did some more work, then back down to the garment district, back up town, back to Union Square, finally, errands, packing, dancing, also finally, and now here I am, summing up a days work :)

P.S. Interning has been awesome so far, I had a great week being there, and I feel like I'm learning about pattern making, especially for gowns and cocktail dresses, super important, and I love doing runs and going on errands because I get to meet people in the industry and learn where everything is located. So over all, it's been great, and I can't wait to go back, and to start classes again.

Learning as I go

We all know that a big, major huge part of learning is hands-on experience. After all, you won't learn everything that you need in a classroom, no matter how insightful the teacher is, or how hands-on the class is. That's why everyone recommends doing an internship, or two or three while in school. I think that this is a great idea - I want to learn as much as I can about daily operations of a fashion business and I want to meet as many people as possible, hear their stories and learn from their experiences.

With that said, I decided to look for an internship for the spring semester. I spent a long time working on my resume, changing it from that of a marketing professional to that of a fashion design student. It was definitely a challenge combining past skills with new ones. But I finally finished it and last week I started sending it out. Craigslist and FreeFashionInternships.com are GREAT resources! I got 3 replies. The first was for a volunteer oportunity at the (capsule) women's trade show. I'm super excited about it, two whole days of meeting and hopefully helping and working with some of the hottest up-and-coming designers. I can't wait. The second two replies were for internship opportunities. Both were young companies, with really great clothes, I was really excited to meet them.

So I got myself ready and pretty and all set to go. And here is where the learning process comes in. These interviews were completely different then the interviews that I'm used to. Same format of course, you sit down and talk, but as I really don't have that much to say about myself yet, I had the opportunity to talk to these designers, and ask them about themselves, their studios and their work. And I blanked. You know that moment in an interview, or any conversation for that matter, when you know that you have to say something, and it really better be something good, and then it turns into just ask a question, and then it turns into just say anything, move your mouth damn it and nothing is coming out and you're sitting there smiling going "ummmm, yea" all in a matter of one minute or so? Yea, it was like that. And that sucked. And of course I got upset aftewards. But that made me think about what I should be asking, and what I would want to be asked about if I was the one interviewing. And although the experience was not the best, it did help me learn about how to prepare for future interviews, which is pretty good. And, even better, I did hear back from one of the interviewers, and he wants me to come in on Monday morning! Fortunately, even fumbling and bumbling can be overlooked when people know that you're just starting out and learning. And I can't wait to start :)

Playing with color

For my color theory final, we were allowed to create our own projects based on what we learned in class. The projects were allowed to be within our major, or based on what we have done in class through out the semester. I recently saw the amazing and incredibly inspiring Georgia O'Keeffe exhibit at the Whitney and decided to do a collection based on her work. I really liked her earlier works, so I decided to focus on the Series I paintings. The colors and the layers are so intense and vivid, it really gave me a lot of inspiration, and a lot of looks to choose from. I also thought about Georgia O'Keeffe herself, her life, where she lived and her style of painting. I wanted to make the collection beautiful, sensual and earthy at the same time. To tie in what we have learned in color theory, I decided to focus on one color, and play around with its shades, hues and tones. I picked the color orange, lightened and darkened it, added gray and mixed it with red. I also used two shades of blue for the shoes to compliment the orange and highlight it even more. I really like how this collection and presentation came out. Here are the results, and more to come soon!

Romeo & Juliet, Sergei, Max and Joan

Here is the first of my final assignments. This is the final project for Fashion Drawing I class. We were asked to select an art movement from two options - surrealism or pop art - and create a capsule collection of 10 looks based on an inspiration taken from within the selected movement. After thinking about it for a while, I decided to work within the surrealist movement. I thought that it was a better fit for the flowing lines and movement that I am drawn to, and encouraged more playful details and unexpected cuts, volume and silhouettes. As I was doing research, I came across the Ballet Russes company, run by Sergei Diagilev. As a former dancer, I couldn't help but be drawn to it! The ballet company was renown in the 1910 - 1930's Paris for their dramatic stage productions, for the best dancers and composers of the time, and the most prominent artists and designers, who created stunning costumes and stage sets. Among the surrealist artists who worked with the company were Max Ernst and Joan Miro, who created the costumes and stage sets for the production of Romeo & Juliet. My collection is inspired by their designs, the story of Romeo & Juliet, and by the movement, grace and beauty of ballet.

A few months later...

A few months later, and here I am, reading over my last entry. Unfortunately I'm not that great at keeping resolutions and my idea to blog every week about my experience in school didn't go over too well. I'm actually really bummed about it, but the semester turned out to be so busy that the only free time that I had was usually spent on sleeping or trying to maintain a semblance of a relationship with hubby and our friends (I think they still remember my name...I hope). And in the time that I was not writing, I was super busy keeping up with homework and acquiring new skills! And yes, I still love, love, love my hw, there was just a lot, lot, lot of it!

Since I spend so much time working, I decided to post some of my work here on this blog, especially my final projects. I really like how they came out and I'm very proud of myself for all the work that went in them, and the results that came out! I'm still in the process of making all the files blog-friendly (converting the files from PSD to JPEG), so in the meanwhile, here are some pics that my husband took of my final Drawing and Color Theory projects, and of me working :)

Drawing, inspired by Ballet Russes Romeo & Juliet sets, created by Max Ernst and Joan Miro:
Color Theory, inspired by Georgia O'Keeffe's Series I paintings and the color orange:
Me at work :)

So here it is, a glimpse into what I have accomplished this semester. More to come soon :)

week 1

So. I survived the first week. It wasn't too bad actually. I took 8 classes, spent the week running around trying to get supplies, started on a tremendous pile of homework that I think will only keep on growing as the semester goes on, and I keep getting more and more excited every day. I LOVE my homework! How crazy does that sound?! Have you ever heard anybody saying that? That they actually love their homework? Well, here it is, the first time ever - I love my homework, I really do. But let me explain why - I am learning about colors, how we perceive them and the meanings that colors hold for us. I am learning how to draw fashion figures, how to start mood boards and swatch collections that will later serve to inspire my designs. I am designing and drawing my own logo (awesome!), I am learning how to sew, and am analyzing designers, their lines and stores. Did I mention that this is AWESOME! And I have to say, and this will sound cheesy, but I feel like the creative side of me is starting to come out again. Playing with pencils and markers and colors for a week without sitting at a computer unless you want to will kind of do it to anyone I think, but it's pretty exciting, and I'm psyched to see it happening.

I think that's all I have to say so far. Maybe I'll post later, but for now, I think I'm going to go study!!

It's been a while...

It's been a long, long time since my last post, over two years in fact. I didn't mean to stay away for so long, but one thing led to another, and two long years of internet silence resulted. Many things happened. I traveled to Serbia, Montenegro, UK, Morocco, Amsterdam, Jamaica, Florida, California and Nevada. I moved twice, shopped way too much, and wore some amazing outfits. I continued working and then decided that I had enough of it. Most importantly, I got engaged and got married. That was and still is an amazing time, and maybe I'll talk about it some more another time. But right now, I want to talk about my job, deciding that I am not happy with it, and doing something about it!

Sounds pretty boring, right, blogging about work? But it explains how I got to where I am now. I was unhappy, unsatisfied and quite honestly downright miserable. And after many attempts to change my situation while staying in the same career, without any positive results, I decided to change everything. I applied to the AAS program in Fashion Studies at Parsons. And I was accepted.

And now here it is,schooltime. After months and days and hours of waiting and waiting and eagerly counting down the moments until classes would start, here it is, that amazing wonderful moment when the process towards everything I have wanted and dreamed of will begin. I will now not only be eating, living, breathing and talking about fashion, I will also be making it, hopefully. Pretty cool, huh?

So what's the point of yet another long rant on seemingly nothing relevant? Well, I decided that I want to blog about my experience at Parsons, and share with you, the world, everything that I will experience and go through during my time there. Hopefully I'll be able to keep up with this and post at least once a week.

Wish me luck!