Alivia Erbe, center, ’26 BS Fashion and Retail Studies, themed her design collection The Four Seasons, depicting the seasonal cycle. Erbe served as co-director of Design for the association. Photo by Jeremiah Boateng
From runway to resume: Student gain design, business savvy
Ohio State students who participated in the Fashion Production Association’s recent runway show at the Ohio Union not only put their creativity into practice — they gained professional experience that can benefit them in the workplace, organizers say.
The runway show gives students in the Fashion and Retail Studies program in the College of Education and Human Ecology an opportunity to showcase their abilities in garment design and construction. Students also organized all aspects of the event, from the clothing designs and construction to the behind-the-scenes production to marketing and fundraising.
The students worked under the guidance of the association’s advisor Alex Suer, senior lecturer; co-advisor Nancy A. Rudd, professor emerita; and master’s student Carolyn Ready, construction workshop advisor.
“They do the silent auction. They look for sponsorships,” Suer said of the students. “They run social media. They do all the decor for the day of the event, and they also work with and coordinate with the models.”
FPA Co-Presidents Allie Gumeny and Ellie Michaelis, who both graduated in May as fashion and retail studies majors, said working with their peers to organize the fashion show provided invaluable educational and professional experience.
“This has definitely made the most impact on my college experience, especially for my resume,” Gumeny said. “Not only meeting a lot of talented people that have a lot of the same interests as me, but I’ve also been able to grow within the club and find a lot of opportunities there.”
While some of the students who took part in the fashion show were fashion and retail studies majors, the Fashion Production Association, an Ohio State student organization, is open to students from any major. Members share knowledge that is applicable to a wide range of industries, Michaelis said.
“We offer a lot of different experiences, whether that’s working with local companies through corporate sponsorship and the silent auction or developing harder skills through social media or graphic design,” she said. “As leaders for the past few years, we’ve been able to offer advice to a lot of the … members. Our advisers — Alex and Nancy and Carolyn — have been a great resource for us personally to grow within the organization.”
Participating in such a massive undertaking requires students to hone communication and administrative skills that they can draw on when they enter the workforce, Gumeny said.
“You need to make sure everybody’s on the same page about everything – that’s something I’ve definitely learned,” she said. “After a meeting, there’s probably five people I need to text about what we met about. That’s really important, and flexibility, as well: There are a lot of different schedules that you’re working with and lots of different people that you encounter through this role.”
The FPA members also learn the importance of paying attention to the smallest of details, Michaelis said.
“We were having meetings with our [Ohio] Union coordinator four months out from the show – seating arrangements, catering detail, the room setup,” she said. “During the show, each collection has their own lighting, their own music. We do a designer video where they spend a minute talking about what their collection’s about. We also have a lot of other small technical needs.”
Honing business skills related to industry
Staging the show involves establishing relationships with the business community.
“Our silent auction chair, Anna [Blocker], spent weeks reaching out to different companies trying to get donations and dedicating her own time to putting together baskets” for the silent auction, Michaelis said.
“Another thing was working with our hair and makeup team. We work with Paul Mitchell students, and they come in free of charge. … We had to do a lot of back and forth communication with our program vendor to make sure that we could get [the event’s program] printed in time and that we had all the right information.”
Fashion and retail studies students and the association’s members go on to a variety of careers, including technical design, product development, marketing, event planning, fashion merchandising and buying, Suer said.
“That’s the wonderful thing about this program and the fashion show,” she said, “is that there’s kind of a home for everybody.”
Gumeny and Michaelis encourage students to go out for leadership roles in the Fashion Production Association.
“For me personally, a lot of this leadership has been becoming a jack of all trades and offering guidance or a voice to other people who are still learning,” Michaelis said. “It’s a lot of learning, a lot of helping other people learn.”
