Student Fashion Show at Calvin

January 13, 2006 == MEDIA ADVISORY

Student designers will pair creativity with a social conscience for
"What to Wear? A Student Fashion Show," which commences at 8 p.m. on
Saturday, January 21 at the Calvin College Fine Arts Center.

The student-directed fashion show is soliciting a wide range of
entries.

"Our plan is to leave things pretty open so that students can feel free
to create anything that strikes them," says Rachael Koeson, Calvin's
coordinator of student activities and organizations. "We wanted it to be
inviting to as many people as possible."

Helping Koeson with the show is a Fashion Advisory Board (FAB) and
representatives from several student organizations, including members of
Calvin Students for Christian Feminism, the college's Social Justice
Coalition and Students for Compassionate Living, to name a few.

The groups are hopeful that the event will be much more than a fashion
parade.

"This is part of a broader series of programming aimed at sparking
discussion about clothing and fashion," Koeson says.

She hopes the show will provoke conversation about clothing as a means
of personal and artistic expression.

Such conversations are a key reason Ruth Ribeiro, the sophomore who
chairs FAB, is involved in the show. Ribeiro, a studio art major, is
planning a career in fashion design.

"I'm looking at working in the fashion industry but bringing in the
idea of conscious consumerism," she says. "People always talk about
being a good steward, and to me that means not only the way you dress
but the way it was manufactured."

Ribeiro challenges the stereotype that fashion is a frivolous career
for a Christian.

"Ever since I was little I was told that fashion wasn't a viable
profession. I want to make people aware that it is. It would always
frustrate me when people would talk about redemption, but they'd only
talk about it with a few professions - doctors, lawyers. We need a group
of people to come out there and say we're not going to complain about
the way people dress. We're going to encourage the way people dress
and give them a viable resource for redeeming fashion. In the fashion
industry, there's a slow murmur of a want for that, but not as much as
there should be."

Contact Koeson at 616-526-7003
For the full story see
http://www.calvin.edu/news/releases/2005_06/fashion_show.htm

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Received on Fri Jan 13 13:34:46 2006