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Fashion your Future 2021: Bachelor’s degree Fashion Business projects by graduates

We are proud to present “Fashion your Future 2021”, a video by Amsterdam Fashion Academy that celebrates 11 graduates of 2021 from the Bachelor’s degree Fashion Business programme and their final major projects. This video takes you on a journey through the visual outcomes of their fashion business projects: from fashion apps to sustainable fashion, from a Dubai-based brand to ethical jewellery based on Indian designs.

In order of appearance:

Geneviéve Gabriëlla Jimidar: First luxury lifestyle department store in Suriname.
Maxime Suiskens: Genderless brand offering affordable, corporate-responsible and good quality basics with personalisation options.
Amber Wardell: Fashion app specialising in streaming and viewing of fashion shows.
Anika Gorayana: Ethical jewellery brand based on traditional Indian design and craftmanship.
Noemi van ‘t Lam: Artisan candles based on the zodiac signs paired with inspirational card set.
Tutum Horsmans: Sustainable and luxurious womenswear fashion brand inspired by nature.
Heide Julie Halama: First circular lifestyle luxury vintage store in Vienna with limited-edition inventory of luxury brands.
Rekia Moumen: Safe, honest and trustworthy online marketplace dedicated to sneakers with expert authentication service.
Aaliyah Smith: Sustainable and reusable leak-resistant sexy and vibrant period underwear.
Amra Anwar: A girly, fun womenswear brand that is inspired by female empowerment in The United Arab Emirates.
Ida Wiklund: Digital styling service for local shops and brands in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Film direction & photos: Travis Allen, Stefano Sanabria.
Location: The Student Hotel Amsterdam City.

The future of fashion business: interview with Radha Jethu, Associate Head of School

Interview with Radha Jethu, Associate Head of School, about the evolution of the fashion industry and the future of fashion business.

What is your role within the Amsterdam Fashion Academy?

I am part of the management team and I am responsible for the BA (Hons) Fashion Business programme. Regarding the students, I supervise with their dissertations and this year I started teaching the second-year students with future proving fashion business, which is about conducting fashion business on an international level. I wrote a textbook on how to conduct business within the European union, it’s a dutch textbook but the publisher also translated the book to English, it is called International Business.

What interests you most about fashion business?

Well, I think it is a dynamic field and my passion is making the industry more sustainable. Sustainability in the sense of environmental issues. I have to be honest, that’s one of my main focus points, but also human rights and a living wage for workers in production countries. So, my passion about fashion is making it more sustainable in the sense of human rights. I am a lawyer, and my background is based on justice and respecting each other’s human rights. Improving working conditions in production countries such as Asia, Africa, South America and even in the UK. I attended a seminar in the UK based on sustainability and I was really shocked that even on the outsides of London there are areas with factories that have labour conditions that were not up to standard. I know there has been steps taken on a worldwide level to rectify this. I love fashion and I love the process behind fashion, but there still requires more focus on human rights and social responsibility.

Fashion business is ever evolving, especially in recent times. How do you keep the programmes in line with emerging business trends?

We have our Professional Advisory Committee, so they keep us focused on what is currently happening within the fashion industry. We also attend seminars and meetings with relevant institutions, we talk a lot with the industry. They are our resources to keep us up to date with industry movements. It’s important for the students to see what is happening in the professional field. With the help we get from the professional advisory board, students can have a meeting with recruiters that are working in industry with great brands.

Have you seen students showing more interest in online fashion business?

Yes, what we have noticed that not only online business, but social media marketing is obviously a popular topic more recently. Most people think TikTok is only for children but they have a business option, and it is a proven social media marketing tool.

What area in fashion business do you see the most growth?

The future of fashion business is definitely in social media marketing and branding. Covid influenced fashion by implementing a more comfortable style so we see our students having more of a focus on lounge wear. We have seen collaborations in industry between luxury and streetwear brands as a result of this, a great example being LV x SUPREME.

You mentioned working with the students on their dissertations. What do you think makes a great subject matter?

Basically, the focus point is on the theoretical part, so we look into contemporary topics. The most popular topic is obviously fast/slow fashion and making the fashion industry more sustainable. So that is the theoretical part, and on the practical side is lots of field research.

There has been a recent focus on learning entrepreneurial skills with Amsterdam Fashion Academy, could you tell us more about the changes?

Yes, we have changed the curriculum and implemented an entrepreneurial side of the fashion business and design programmes. So now we have a shared entrepreneurial course for our business and design students where they can collaborate together as this is what happens once you are in a professional field. You have to work together. So, with this entrepreneurial focus, students learn how to run their own business or have skills they can utilise once hired in industry.

It was very theoretical when I studied at university and there were a lot of students complaining that their knowledge was only based on theory. The Dutch system was changed so we have the theoretical part but also the practical side like internships. They are a very important part to our programme and the students learn a lot from them. The internships within our programmes are mandatory for 4 months. We are looking to maybe add another internship for 6 months as we see such great results. We see students that sometimes struggle with the theoretical parts of the programme do extremely well once within their internships. You really see a difference.

With two publications already do you have plans for anymore?

No, I think it’s time to slow down. I think the adjustment from covid lockdown made us all learn to take the time for ourselves and relax more.

Fashion Business project with CreamPR

Written by the 2nd-year students of the Bachelor’s (Hons) degree Fashion Business.

Brains are buzzing as we prepare for the big event. This semester’s year 2 Bachelor’s degree Fashion Business students were given the opportunity to work alongside CreamPR on a special event coming in January 2020. CreamPR is based in Amsterdam and is a forward-thinking PR agency for both fashion and lifestyle brands. We feel lucky to be given this opportunity to collaborate with such a big agency. There is so much to gain from this assignment including expanding your network and gaining resources from the right people.

During this task we divided into teams allowing us to tap into our strengths and those of others, in order to achieve our goals. Our main goal is to make the event into an experience and involve the visitors, which is why we have a strong team focusing only on the experience from beginning to end. During this whole process there will be ups and down, roadblock and complications but that’s what makes it real and educational. There is no better way to learn than from your own mistakes and we look forward to making and correcting them. The guidance that we have is insightful and always enough that you never feel stuck. Stay on the lookout for updates as we take you on this journey with us.

2019 Fashion Graduates aim to clean up fashion

On Sunday the 30th of June 2019 the Amsterdam Fashion Academy celebrated the graduation of its students from the Bachelor’s (Hons) degree programmes in Fashion Business and Fashion with Textiles Design, at the exclusive Andaz hotel in Amsterdam. The event included an open exhibition of some Final Major Projects of the BA (Hons) Fashion Business graduates and a fashion show presenting the final collections of the 2019 fashion graduates from the BA (Hons) Fashion with Textiles Design.

After an introduction speech by Cristiano Carciani, Head of Academic Affairs, the stage was set for a celebration of sustainable, highly creative and innovative fashion, as design graduates showed their final collections on the catwalk. This, together with the exhibited Final Major Projects of Fashion Business graduates, was the crowning glory of three years hard work, a culmination of skills, knowledge and creativity. Following on from this came the formal ritual of recognition: the graduation ceremony. Where tradition set the tone as student’s clad in caps and gowns came forward to accept their degree from Cristiano Carciani and by doing so accepting the recognition for their endeavours and walking away as graduates. This new generation of 2019 fashion graduates are all determined to make their mark in fashion and change the industry into a more sustainable and humane one. One they can all be proud to be part of. We wish them all the best.

Photo: Ping Huang

“It’s the third year in a row that the Andaz hotel is hosting our Graduation Ceremony. The cosy, elegant and charming spaces perfectly represent the Amsterdam Fashion Academy’s characteristics. It’s the perfect location to celebrate our 2019 graduates who have been personally guided by our international teaching staff during the last 3 years. Finally, each one of them is ready for a bright career in the fashion industry with projects and collections addressing relevant topics in today’s society, from sustainable techniques to Japanese aesthetics and appreciation”, Cristiano Carciani, Head of Academic Affairs.

Photo: Maaike Daatselaar
Model: instagram.com/fridamvdw_
Make-up: Art of Colors makeup school

The 2019 fashion graduates arrived at our international fashion university three years ago full of the desire to learn and now, they are all highly-skilled and knowledgeable, not just in the practical skills they have acquired, but also as confident, self-assured individuals who are aware of how they work and of their own strengths and weaknesses. They have been followed by the teaching staff according to personal approach principle that runs this private fashion university.

Photo: Maaike Daatselaar
Model: instagram.com/happyasasquare
Make-up: instagram.com/super.cala.fragilistic

The Amsterdam Fashion Academy is a private international fashion school situated in the heart of Amsterdam; this state-of the-art academy has become a hub of student-centred learning with a high level of personal attention while also focusing on graduate employability. The Amsterdam Fashion Academy prides itself on being a, small and personal fashion academy putting quality before quantity. In 2017 it moved to its current location in an elegant townhouse in the heart of Amsterdam, which helps create a more friendly and informal atmosphere where students can get to know each other better and inspire each other.

Fashion Business alumna empowers startups to create styling guidelines

Do you have in mind a fashion business project but don’t know how to start your company? That was the problem that fashion business alumna, Marianna had when she first visited the Amsterdam Fashion Academy more than one year ago. She found out that the Fashion Business part-time course would have been the best opportunity for her to turn an idea into a real brand. Marianna completed the short course in Fashion Business in June 2018. This is her story.

I am Marianna Vakalopoulou, 35 years old and I come from Greece. I am a stylist with 17 years of working experience in almost every relevant field (cinema, tv series, catwalks, music clips, ads, personal styling, image branding, fashion start-ups).

After I moved to The Netherlands in 2017, I started to think about my new project and the next step in my career. That was the reason why I registered to the Amsterdam Fashion Academy for the Fashion Business part-time course. My main gaol was to get a better insight into how the business of fashion works and understand better the different sectors of the fashion industry, such as e-commerce, market research and marketing campaigns.

The course at this inspiring international fashion university was really enlightening. The customisation to my needs and the personal attention that I received during the whole programme was the best part of it. The biggest challenge that I had to face was the development of my own strategic and entrepreneurial skills, a challenge that helped me at the same time to find out and set up my new career project called “StylistaaS“.

The idea of StylistaaS came up by the end of the fashion business part-time course, while a friend of mine called and asked for my styling help about her outfit in her new job position. Throughout the styling sessions we had, it was obvious that people are struggling to stay up to date with all the latest trends while at the same time they need to customise their own style to the overall company culture. This case and the experience that I already had, coupled with the knowledge that I just gained from the course were more than enough to trigger me to begin my own company and bring style to the people.

StylistaaS is created by 3 co-founders:

Myself as CEO. I have 17-year experience as personal stylist and co-founder of a pretty successful startup that merged Augmented Reality technologies to physical locations.

Antonis Argyros as Product Owner. Antonis is a senior manager with 20-year experience in creating and growing innovating teams. He was an early adapter of the lean startup methodology that has been implemented successfully in various projects/startups.

Theo Makryniotis as CFO. Theo is a C-level executive that has been active in the retail market for almost 20 years.

Our key goal is to empower startups, innovation teams, freelancers, high-paced professionals, companies and, in general, employees by translating the company’s cultural and brand rules to styling guidelines.

Two are the key differentiation points with our approach: a) unique value proposition. From the research we have done all these months, we haven’t seen any other stylist offering worldwide targeting exclusively to professionals and their companies and b) productive combination of personal styling with AI. Even though the core of our offering is still based on a personalized approach by our talented stylists, we are developing machine intelligence tools that could help us scale our offering when needed.

While Marianna continues to develop her own company and this-year’s Fashion Business part-time course students just completed the programme , it is already time to build up the next (small) group of students. The Fashion Business part-time course will start again on the 4th of October 2019. Applications are open!

Looking for an evening fashion course in trend forecasting?

Would you like to gain knowledge and skills to work on the business side of fashion, but you don’t have time to attend a full-time course during the day? Would you like to have a career in areas like merchandising, buying, sales, production, communications, sourcing and range planning? Then, you should consider our evening fashion course in trend forecasting, marketing & buying.

Our evening course in trend forecasting will start on the 5th of February, from 6:00pm to 9:00pm for 8 Tuesdays. You will study the marketing environment, apply research to inform future probable consumer needs and trends analysis, and will gain an understanding of fashion buying motives. This is the only evening course in fashion forecasting offered in Amsterdam and there is only a limited number of spaces. We like to have small groups of students rather than big classes in our intimate and friendly boutique academy, as we are keen to offer a personalised teaching to the students.

Rosie Martinez-Dekker will be the lecturer of the Fashion Forecasting, Marketing & Buying short course. Rosie is a graphic and textile designer, with 20-year broad international experience gained by working with textile companies and mills in the field of design and with brands in the commercial and manufacturing side. G-Star, Nike and Levi Strauss. are just some of the companies she worked with. Rosie is also lecturer in our Fashion Business (Hons) BA.

The evening course in trend forecasting, fashion marketing and fashion buying covers topics like understanding consumers, consumer profile, trend prediction, buying and target markets, promotion campaigns, sales promotion, fashion PR, fashion marketing & promotion trends, fashion marketing frameworks for research & analysis, fashion market level research.

REGISTRATIONS ARE STILL OPEN!

First 2018 fashion students shortlist: 15 people and 9 nationalities

On the 9th of February we held the first interview day at the Amsterdam Fashion Academy for 2018 intake. It’s a day when we invite a group of potential fashion students to come and work with us. An important day for all concerned. The day is designed to give our team the chance to spend time with potential students of our three fashion programmes validated by Bucks New University (Fashion Business (Hons) BA, Fashion with Textiles Design (Hons) BA, Foundation Diploma) and work with them so they can get a real feel of what it is like at our international fashion academy, meet other would-be students and also see Amsterdam.

Last week our first group of 15 potential fashion students came from all corners of Europe: Netherlands, UK, Italy, Poland, Greece, Switzerland, Luxemburg, Germany and Norway. This to underline once again the international value of our boutique academy. They worked from 10:00m to 4:00pm with our lecturers Laura Malone and Laura Lepre and created mood boards based on their own taste and personality and in the meantime each student had an interview with Cristiano Carciani, Head of school.

We are holding two more interview days: March 23rd and April 26th. So if you missed out on this one but are still interested in studying fashion in Amsterdam, then please contact us as soon as possible. We will more than happy to inform you how to be shortlisted for the next two groups of potential fashion students.

Alumni Story: how did Olga set up a new fashion business?

One of the most frequent questions we hear is “How do I set up a new fashion business”? The answer is complex with many variables which need to be taken into account. This is why we met up with one of our former students who has recently started a new business in the Jordaan. This area was once the underbelly of Amsterdam’s working class but now it is famous for its cosy and unique boutiques, cafés and restaurants.

Olga Salamon, originally from Poland has decided to fly the flag and bring Polish art and design to Amsterdam. In doing so, she is also continuing Amsterdam’s cosmopolitan allure, maintaining its tradition of being an innovative cultural melting-pot. We went along to her Salamon Art & Design store where she shared her experiences with us about her time at our international fashion Academy, how she managed to set up a new fashion business and just how much our course contributed to making this a success.

We are very proud and happy for her and wish her the best. We recommend everyone to go and explore the delights of the Jordaan and of course visit Salamon Art & Design on the Rozengracht 75.

Read another alumni story: Monica is bringing Brazilian colours in Amsterdam.

Fashion brands and more: which three came out on top at the Academy?

Being small and offering personal attention to our students is very important to us. We want to get to know each student personally and make them feel at home during their time at our international fashion academy in Amsterdam. With this in mind, we asked each first-year student to tell us their top three favourite brands, not just in the fashion world but generally, to help us find out more about their tastes and the business models of this generation.

As expected, answers varied greatly, but there was an undisputed winner: Gucci is our students’ top brand. They don’t just love Gucci’s products, but also the branding and marketing strategy; an interesting case study for both Fashion Business BA and Fashion with Textiles Design BA students. Gucci is an Italian luxury brand of fashion and leather goods founded in Florence, Italy, in 1921. According to Forbes, as of May 2017, the brand value was around $12.7 billion.

Second place is shared by Zara and Apple, while third place sees a wide group of labels. The list of favourite brands changes when we separate the outcomes between the Fashion Business BA and the Fashion with Textiles Design BA programmes. While the top-three list of those who study fashion business is again composed of Gucci, Zara and Apple, the Fashion with Textiles Design students have a different taste: Dior, Balmain and Comme de Garçons are their favourite best brands.

Logically, fashion brands dominate the whole list, with some exceptions like Jeep, Tasty or Costa Coffee. It is also interesting to underline that Iris van Herpen was mentioned by many students. And speaking of this innovative Dutch fashion designer, did you see the photo we took at the Johannes Vermeer Prijs 2017?

Elegant up-cycling for our boutique academy’s interior style

On August 1, 2017 we moved to a beautiful townhouse in Amsterdam’s city centre. This is the story about how the new interior style has been conceived.

My name is Sandrine Botilde-Doré, I’ve been living in Amsterdam for 5 years. I’m a traveller at heart, a nomad. I moved here from the South of France, but have also lived in Mali, Guinea, Belgium, Switzerland and France. Before coming to the Amsterdam Fashion Academy, I was already working in the fashion industry, being mainly involved in PR and events. I realised I wanted to learn more about the business side of fashion and so I started studying for a BA in Fashion Business. Then my second child was born and I took a year off. Now I’m back again, this time studying Fashion Design. I decided that studying fashion business was really my comfort zone and that I wanted to explore the process of garment making. I can use my background in fashion marketing to build a brand which will be ready by the end of this year. It’s a big challenge and I am working hard.

I am grateful to the Amsterdam Fashion Academy for giving me the opportunity to decorate the building and design its new interior style. Interior design is something that I have always loved. I adore second-hand furniture. Furniture is timeless: if you buy the right pieces, they can stay with you forever. Most of the pieces I found for the library, for instance the chairs, already have a long history.

We have to learn to be more sustainable in the way we consume. There are so many things which already exist that we can re-use. The bookcase and the 4-meter long table now in the library were found in this way. It took me 6 hours to pick up the table, but I was really motivated to have that piece. I also didn’t know what kind of lamps to put in the library, so I thought “let’s create one”. I decided to use different kinds of lamps to reflect the diversity of the academy. Moreover, I didn’t want to use fixed lamps because I wanted a flexible space: one where the table can be made smaller and moved depending on the situation.

I don’t have a particular style that people can instantly recognise. What I did was mix and match styles. We could have gone for only using modern furniture, with the same colour, but then we would have turned this International Fashion Academy into a showroom. I wanted to give the Academy’s interior style a hotel-feeling. It is a boutique academy where people should not feel like they are at school. I wanted to give them a pleasant atmosphere conducive to developing skills and learning. I wanted personality.

The space that I am most proud of is the basement, the student lobby, even though it is not finished yet. It was a real challenge. The space was limited by its low ceiling, light wooden floor and low lighting. The opposite of all the other floors of the building. I didn’t know what to do with the space, I just knew I wanted to design a space where students could feel good and chill. I am particularly proud of the colourful chairs and poufs. I drove to an antique store at a riding school to pick them up and spent a whole day cleaning them! But now I am more than satisfied since it is these elements with their bright colours which light up the members lobby.

I am also proud of the library, although it was the most challenging space. It was extremely difficult to find the right bookcase for the 5-meter wall. I wanted one to fill the wall completely, with no spaces and, of course, it had to have a style which fitted with the rest of the library. An elegant mahogany table full of poise and purpose really needs an accompanying mahogany bookcase. We were really focused on this, as it was to be the central piece for the most central space of the Amsterdam Fashion Academy. And I can proudly say that the bookcase I found is perfect!

How would I describe the interior style of the Academy? First, with the word “second-life”, because I wanted to give antique but precious pieces a new use; then with cosy and sophisticated hotel-vibe, and finally I would describe it as a timeless style. One word that I didn’t have in mind was school. I wanted and went for quality.

Alumni Monica Fuentes brings Brazilian colours in Amsterdam

Hello, my name is Monica Fuentes, I was born in Costa Rica and studied in the United States & Brazil. I have been living in The Netherlands for almost four years. I am a wife, mother and owner and founder of Femiwear.

I graduated in Business Management in Brazil and wanted to bring a bit of the colour and vibrancy of beautiful Brazil to Europe. Therefore, I created my activewear line. Femiwear provides colourful, comfortable and different activewear that is made in a sustainable way by women for women. I have created the collections and have a team of three seamstresses that make the garments in Brazil. Our Fabric Supplier is in Brazil and follows sustainable practices in the process of making the fabric. In this way, when you buy a piece from our collection, you know exactly where it is coming from and how it was made. You should check the tall, regular fit and maternity collections at www.femiwear.com

How did this all come about? When I was 4 years old I made my first trip to Italy. I think that is when I began observing the beauty of clothing and fashion. My grandma sewed and my great-uncle was a tailor making suits. I grew up wearing and observing the making of beautiful handmade tailored garments. My mother was always very creative when dressing, she always taught me that it is not the label in your clothes that makes the clothing special, but how you wear it. As a teenager, I did some modelling, so I was surrounded by great creative designers and was always interested in one day owning a fashion business. In 2015, I studied the “Fashion forecasting, marketing and buying” short course at the Amsterdam Fashion Academy, which represented an essential step in the creation of my fashion business.

I am a big fan of the Amsterdam Fashion Academy MeetUps because of the great atmosphere at the academy where you truly feel welcomed. The lectures are very informative, the teachers and speakers are very knowledgeable and they always give you the chance to put into practice what you have learned. The meetups are very useful for my business because they are a way of staying up to date with trends, plus they inspire me and it is a great opportunity to brainstorm with people that share your fashion interests.

In my opinion, elegance is a mind-set, it is having confidence in yourself and the strong presence a person brings with him/her when they enter a room. It is a quality that a person can have. The label on a lady’s clothes does not make her elegant, her presence does. As Yves Saint Laurent once said: ‘Without elegance of the heart, there is no elegance.’

Internship story: Lexie returns from the City of Angels

Our 3rd year Fashion Business student Lexie Hingsen did her internship in Los Angeles last year at Lunya Co., top-end specialists in luxury sleepwear. Ashley Merrill launched Lunya in 2014 with a clear conviction that the time was ripe to give women’s sleepwear a long-overdue fresh, modern perspective. We had the pleasure of meeting up with Alexandra and finding out how she got on at Lunya Co. and living and working in Los Angeles.

“My name is Lexie Hingsen, I am a 3rd Year Fashion Business student. I am half German, half American and I went to Los Angeles, California, for my internship. The company is called Lunya, a southern Californian based sleepwear company for the “modern woman”. My role at the company was to cover all digital media and e-commerce work. I worked closely with their Instagram and Facebook platforms to ensure that the right brand message got across to Lunya consumers. Some of my tasks included collecting quantitative and qualitative data from marketing campaigns, performing market analysis and researching competitors, supporting the marketing team in their daily administrative tasks.

I learned many lessons and was able to apply these in a professional environment. It is important to always have a positive attitude and work on personal development. Constructive criticism really helped me evaluate myself in such a professional setting. I definitely feel like I have grown, developing my skills and knowledge whilst working with such positive, inspirational woman who really pushed me to my full ability. I look forward to staying in contact with the entire Lunya team and possibly returning in the future.”

Catch a glimpse of Induction week

Induction week was truly an inspiring, exciting and fun time with new students and staff all getting to know each other. Students were totally immersed in the culture and creativity of Amsterdam. Sharing ideas and appreciation of the finer things in life, drawing inspiration from the masters to the modern, enough food for thought to spark off lots of creative ideas for the coming year.

Watch the full video:

Why all eyes are on our 3rd year Fashion Business student, Noortje

Our third year Fashion Business student Noortje is already working wonders in marketing and she was happy to tell us more about her new job and why she is looking forward to her final year at the academy. We were curious to find out more…

Hello, Noortje. Would you please introduce yourself?

Hello, my name is Noortje van Warmerdam. I’m 21 years old and a third-year Fashion Business student at the Amsterdam Fashion Academy. I come from Lisse in The Netherlands, a nice town south-west of Amsterdam.

Would you tell us about your experience at the Amsterdam Fashion Academy?

I am grateful to the Amsterdam Fashion Academy for all the countless experiences I have had during the last two years, I can now really start a career in the fashion business. Above all, the internship I did at Loes Vrij during my second year represented a big step forward for me, because I could practice what I had learnt in the class about branding and marketing. Thanks to the curriculum vitae I built up while studying Fashion Business at the Academy, I am already working in marketing.

This is great news! Can you please tell us something about your job?

I am working for a company called Eyes on Media and I take care of online marketing inside the Sales Department. I am really enjoying this job, especially because we have recently worked with advertisements for Chanel and Hugo Boss.

Congratulations then. Let’s talk about your last two years at the Amsterdam Fashion Academy. Which was your favourite course and which was the hardest one?

I really loved the Fashion Communication course, because I had to write a script for a new advertisement of MiuMiu. It was fun and fascinating studying the brand and creating a promotional strategy from scratch. On the other side, the Historical and Contextual studies course was the hardest, although interesting.

What are you working on today and which are your plans for next year?

As a third year Fashion Business student, I am now starting to work on my final project which will be the creation of an online platform dedicated to new designers who need to meet each other, to exchange advice and share ideas. It will be basically a social networking platform for designers. Next year, I am planning to study for a Master’s degree in Marketing Management.

One last question. Which is the company you admire the most in terms of branding or marketing strategy?

That’s a difficult question! I love Chloé’s style, but I think that Gucci did a great job in changing its brand image. It represents a really interesting case-study to analyse and to take inspiration from.

Fashion Buyer: “This is how you will dress this season”

Do you know that each dress, pair of shoes, bathing suit or bracelet you bought has been selected with great care among thousands of alternative pieces? And do you know who the person is who decides that this season’s colour trend is red or green?

The fashion chain is very long and complex, but there is an expert who selects the products that stores sell: the fashion buyer. Buyers are not only purchasing agents, but also analysers, negotiators and deal-makers. They research, evaluate and buy products for companies to either resell to customers or use in their everyday operations.

Buyers occupy a specific key role in the fashion industry: they are the people who determine which products reach store shelves, appear in catalogues and online. They do the footwork, the research and make the deals to buy large quantities of products for their companies, who then sell them to customers, or use them to create new materials that they then sell to customers. Undoubtedly, the fashion buyer needs to know how the market and the selling process work, and always stay up-to-date on what it is happening in their specific sector. To do this, they constantly visit expos and fairs all over the world to understand the “moods” and forecast the next trends.

This academic year our teaching staff includes a 10-year experienced buyer, Gina Shanks, who will reveal the secrets of being a successful buyer during our next Meetup on Tuesday, October 3 at 6:30 pm. “The buyer is not a professional role exclusive for the fashion industry, of course, but it is an essential figure for each kind of market, from electronics to food, from toys to furniture”, Gina explains. “During the Meetup, I will speak about a buyer’s day-to-day tasks and the personal skills one needs to have to be a great buyer”.

The Meetup is free and everyone is invited! You can find more details and confirm your participation here.

Tag: fashion business