Friday, November 06, 2009 | MANILA, PHILIPPINES

Focus

BY JOHANNA D. POBLETE, Reporter

Purveyors of style

In a lecture hall with a projector screen and white board, the professor gives out assignments to students, who wheedle for an extension of the deadline -- pretty much the same scenario you’ll find in any school. But the mood boards, dolls in period costumes and desks flipped to sewing machines would tell you this isn’t an ordinary school, if the creative clothes the students are wearing haven’t clued you in yet. Fashion and design thrive here.

Not too long ago, aspiring dressmakers and tailors would have only two schools to choose from -- the Matute Fashion School in Pasay City and Slims (named after founder Salvacion Lim Higgins) Fashion and Art School in Makati, the latter until now patronized by such big names as Ben Farrales, who periodically sends promising scholars to the school (his dedication to raising the money for such sponsorships explains in part why he’s "the Dean" of Philippine fashion).

These days, one can choose from university-based programs that offer degrees in fashion design and merchandising as part of their portfolio, and stand-alone fashion schools whose main focus is really to foster technical skills and fashion know-how, along with sound business skills. Fashion now qualifies as another avenue for entrepreneurship, which is why designer Rajo Laurel was cited in the Small Business Entrepreneur category in the 2007 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Awards.

STUDENTS at work at the
LaSalle College International -- JONATHAN L. CELLONA

The notion that only creative people have a place in fashion is a misconception that fashion schools are now trying to correct, said bag designer and founder of the School of Fashion and the Arts (SoFA) Amina Aranaz-Alunan. "People used to think, ‘Oh, I can’t draw, so I can’t work in the fashion industry. I can’t sew, so I can’t work there.’ That’s the difference today, that’s why our main mission is to arrive at a balance between the creative and the business world, because those are the two elements that are really needed in fashion," Ms. Aranaz-Alunan told BusinessWorld.

Why not fashion?

SoFA offers a four-year bachelor’s degree in fashion design and marketing, a Commission on Higher Education (CHED)-accredited program offered with partner-institution The One School and affiliated with Instituto Marangoni in Milan (where Ms. Aranaz studied). SoFA has been highly visible in the fashion scene, partly because barely a year after its October 2007 opening, it became the workroom venue for the popular reality TV show Project Runway Philippines, and faculty member Jojie Lloren mentored participants in the show.

SoFA employs 15 fashion professionals as faculty and has a student population of over a hundred -- 70% of whom are enrolled in the long programs (six-month certificate courses, a two-year associate’s degree and a four-year bachelor’s degree in fashion design and marketing) rather than the short programs (one-month to three-month diploma courses). The mix of students consists of high school as well as college graduates.

Initially, administrators thought they would be catering more to a demand for workshops, however, the students that enroll in the long program -- at P65,000 each term -- prove most serious about pursuing a career in fashion and require the most attention. The certificate courses are useful not just as exploratory courses, but as additional learning for practitioners (e.g. the owner of a manufacturing company studying creative design or a designer enrolled in a business course).

Similarly, LaSalle College International (LCI) -- a branch of Montreal-headquartered LaSalle College Group (not to be confused with De La Salle-College of St. Benilde’s School of Design & Arts, which offers its own fashion degree program) -- has two-year diploma programs on fashion design and fashion marketing, as well as one-year certificate courses, and six-month continuing technical education (CTE) courses. Since 1999, LCI has also seen a more diversified student population -- teenagers fresh out of high school (age 16 or 17), college graduates out for a second degree (age 23 or 24), and mature folk.

STUDENTS of LaSalle College International at a pattern-making class.

Most fashion students are based in Manila, with a few students coming in from the provinces. But of late, LCI marketing and communications manager Cielo R. Marquez noted that around 30%-35% are international students from South Africa, Australia, Germany, Canada and Indonesia, who expressly come to the Philippines to study at their school. (A value-added service is looking for condo units for these students.) The rationale is that education is cheaper here -- if you consider P55,000 per term and P14,500 per CTE course affordable -- and LCI is part of a network of schools in 18 countries with the same curriculum.

Conversely, if Filipino students fear that they will be lost in a sea of graduates, the school can always bring them outside of the Philippines, as the LCI head office accepts students who want to undergo practicum anywhere in the network.

"With the number of fashion schools that have cropped up, it’s so easy to claim that you’re a fashion designer [if] you just get a six-month course and get your certificate. But it’s not like that; it entails a lot of experience and hard work. You have to prove something," said Ms. Marquez.


Hard work, not a hobby

The rigors of fashion school prioritize technical subjects such as fashion illustration (sketching or drafting), computer-aided design (usually CAD Adobe Photoshop and CAD Adobe Illustrator), sewing, pattern-making, draping, apparel production/construction (and for those so inclined, accessories, bag and shoe design). Theoretical subjects include color theory and design, fashion history, and fashion trends, whereas practical subjects are fashion retailing, fashion buying, fashion brand management, fashion promotion, and fashion styling. Given the business slant, classes on accounting, management, taxation, business communication, business law, and entrepreneurship are also provided.

"We get a lot of people that fail their classes... because these students are not really serious, they think that being in fashion is about having fun, just attending parties, attending fashion shows. And when they’re here, they’re surprised that they’re piled up with all that work, because the nature of the course is very practical, is very hands-on, so most of the subjects are really project-based," said Ms. Aranaz-Alunan.

Students of SoFA have six classes per term on a full program, with three classes each day, and each class taking three hours. Time at school is extended, however, as students work on technical projects for all of those classes -- hence the bargaining during midterms and finals, when the projects pile up and students complain of going without sleep for three days straight.

The average class size for lectures can go up to 30, while skill-based classes such as sewing or pattern-making are kept at 15 maximum, to ensure quality of instruction. The school intends to keep the total population small to better enable professors to mentor a maximum of three students -- encourage them when needed, push them when necessary, and generally guide them to make their time at the school count with a view to a specific career path.

LCI keeps a smaller class size of 10 students at most per instructor, and one to two subjects each day -- technical subjects take up a half day’s worth of time. Presently, LCI has around 80 students in fashion design and 40 students taking up fashion marketing. On average, 20-25 students graduate annually; since it opened, the school has tallied 500-600 graduates of fashion design, and half that number of graduates of fashion marketing. Most graduates open their own boutiques, others become brand managers or assistants to designers (case in point, one graduate landed a job with New York-based Filipina designer Josie Natori), and a few go abroad for further studies.

Early exposure

Opportunities can be had while still in school, as the more advanced students of LCI mount fashion shows with their own collections, and are encouraged to join fashion competitions. Sometimes these result in commercial projects.

"We would like them to get the feel of the industry early on. When we introduce them to the public, it’s our way of setting up their name in the industry. And it’s teaching them the reality of the experience; it’s hard if all they do is study and then they’re surprised at the reality of it all," Ms. Marquez told BusinessWorld, adding that rousing the competitive spirit of the students is also important, because unlike those who have grown up in poverty and are driven to succeed, their students need to be challenged.

Similarly, SoFA encourages its students to volunteer in, say, fashion magazines, even Philippine Fashion Week (as ushers, dressers and stylists), and also to join fashion competitions. The latter gives them a chance to test their mettle and see how their products will fare in the outside world. Previously, the school devoted space to a Retail Lab, where students would market their own creations. The project had a shop at Rockwell Powerplant, which extended its Christmas season stay from the agreed-upon month to almost half a year, at the mall’s request.

"We had the Retail Lab because we wanted them to get their feet wet in terms of running their own fashion businesses and their own collections. Honestly, we had to temporarily close it because of lack of space in the school... We still plan to relaunch it, [and] we’re refining all the details," said Ms. Aranaz-Alunan.

Fashion schools are also consciously calling attention to the Philippine context, with SoFA especially exposing its students to Filipino culture, Filipino design heritage, and the use of Filipino materials. In fact, both SoFA and LCI recently participated in Eco-Pinoy Fashion Design Competition at the 50th Manila F.A.M.E., with SoFA student Mark Archibald Tamayo winning first prize, SoFA student Vania Romoff coming in second, and LCI student Engie Garcia bagging third place.

"The Internet has aroused an interest in fashion. Because when I was in high school, even my sense of fashion was so different from the high school kids today. I think now more people really give importance to fashion, they see how fashion affects society; it can also affect the economy. Now you see there are so many budding designer brands, everyone has this big fashion idea. You go to bazaars, and there are all these young people interested in making a mark in the industry," said Ms. Aranaz-Alunan.

Immersion activities, coupled with classroom instruction, is creating a generation of fashion students presumably far better equipped than their forbears, and even -- as Ms. Alunan-Aranaz termed it -- "fashion intellectuals," including would-be fashion journalists or critics.

The dream, she said, is for the school to be part of forming designers who would put the Philippines on the international fashion map, and that in 20 years perhaps Manila would become one of the fashion capitals of the world. Again, why not?

LaSalle College International -- Manila is located at the Penthouse, G.C. Corporate Plaza, # 150 Legazpi St., Legaspi Village, Makati. For more information, visit www.lasallecollege.com.ph.
The School of Fashion and the Arts is located at 55 Paseo de Roxas Ave., Makati. For queries, visit www.sofamanila.com.
sponsorships explains in part why he’s "the Dean" of Philippine fashion).

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