This flier is the reason I wanted to go to this year’s Portfolio in Motion: All Doll’d Up. I had never been to the school’s annual fashion show, nor had I paid it much attention but this flier (a response to the email below) made me want to go; yay for controversy.
As a friend to a few fashion merch majors, I have respect for the effort that went into organizing the show, as well as the work that went into designing and creating the looks showcased. However, I am a student at Marymount and do not like the fact that this fashion show took precedence over EVERYTHING! A friend of mine who works at the gym says that the fitness center was randomly closed some evenings because the organizers of the fashion show were using it. The entire downstairs rec gym is closed for weeks before the fashion show as the stage is built. On top of that, during the week before finals they closed the parking lot to Marymount students so the school could provide valet parking to all the rich and influential guests of the dinner and special Portfolio in Motion presentation Thursday night (the one where fashion designer Isabel Toledo was honored as Designer of the Year).
In an effort to be fair I decided I wanted to attend the fashion show; that way people couldn’t dismiss this post as the random scribbling of a “hater.” So I found tickets (thanks, Jordana) and I found a date (thanks, Megan) and I found an outfit (all black with pink and black striped thigh high socks; thanks sockdreams). I went to the Friday night show and was impressed. The show was awesome. The music was fun and the models walked fabulously (only one was a little too enthusiastic—probably due to Tyra encouraging women to be “fierce”). The transitions went well and I loved the creepy music that played in between each scene. The makeup was insane: crazy, long fake eyelashes and super bright lipstick and eye shadow.
I was impressed by a lot of the designs. The menswear by Allison Jordan (photo above) was fantastic. The design was great, I loved the colors, and the tailoring looked good from where I was sitting. My favorite design was by Karyn Catania (photo below). Honestly, I would steal all three of those coats and wear them every day. There were a few outfits that reminded me of Lady Gaga (or Alexander McQueen) and a few that looked like they could be found on the racks of your local Forever 21. All in all, I enjoyed the show and everything complemented everything else (stage, makeup, music).
That being said, the show could have been handled so much better. There was no reason to inconvenience the rest of Marymount (especially the week before finals). There are locker rooms right next to the fitness center that the models could have used for changing during practices and meetings could have been held in the rec gym—there is no need to close the fitness center on any nights but the night of the show. The fact that the rec gym is closed for a few weeks is no big deal as long as students are allowed access to the other gym upstairs in the Lee Center. Finally, the parking issue: attention Marymount—the week before finals is the last time we have classes, often times the last day is a review session, which is one of the most important classes of the semester. This means that when you screw with our parking, a lot of students may be unable to get to their last classes. There is no reason to hold the super fancy dinner on Thursday night. Why not move the dinner to Saturday night? There are a lot less cars on campus over the weekend anyway, and you won’t have to stress out students by making them worry about parking.
Hopefully Marymount will wise up about this next year and there will be no complaints about the fashion show. Portfolio in Motion is a great time and there shouldn’t have to be any negative press about it.
ph. Sarah Phillips. Please give credit to me–I strained my neck getting these shots.
Love the photos :D! Annnd, the capes were my favorite too!
Glad you enjoyed the show, despite feeling a bit irked at the whole “closing down” of MU!
Nice pics and post even though i know that it is old….I am an MU alumni and received my BA in Fashion Merch! Keep up the good reporting on the shows as they do take alot of work!
Thanks! I plan to attend the show again this year as well. Look for a post next spring.
– Sarah
[…] my participation online in case I was kicked out of the show (I was so nervous!). If you have read my post about the show last year you may be wondering why I would participate! Honestly, I never thought about trying out for the […]