#1 Dress Designing

What is Fashion Designing

Fashion design is the art of the application of design and aesthetics or natural beauty to clothing and accessories. Fashion design is influenced by cultural and social latitudes, and has varied over time and place. Fashion designers work in a number of ways in designing clothing and accessories. Some work alone or as part of a team. They attempt to satisfy consumer desire for aesthetically designed clothing; and, because of the time required to bring a garment onto the market, must at times anticipate changing consumer tastes.

Prom Design

 

                                           

Fashion design is a form of art dedicated to the creation of clothing and other lifestyle accessories. Modern fashion design is divided into two basic categories: haute couture and ready-to-wear. The haute couture collection is dedicated to certain customers and is custom sized to fit these customers exactly. In order to qualify as a haute couture house, a designer has to be part of the Syndical Chamber for Haute Couture and show a new collection twice a year presenting a minimum of 35 different outfits each time.

Ready-to-wear collections are standard sized, not custom made, so they are more suitable for large production runs. They are also split into two categories: designer/createur and confection collections. Designer collections have a higher quality and finish as well as an unique design. They often represent a certain philosophy and are created to make a statement rather than for sale. Both ready-to-wear and haute-couture collections are presented on international catwalks.

    

Who Invented It?

The first fashion designer who was more than a simple seamster was Charles Frederick Worth, in the 19th century. Before he set up his fashion design house in Paris, clothing was made by anonymous dressmakers and fashion standards were derived from the styles worn by royalty. Worth was the first designer to actually dictate to his customers what to wear rather than following their demands.

His fashion house became so famous that people were able to attach a face and a name to designs when they knew they were from the House of Worth. This was the beginning of the tradition to have a designer of a house not only create clothing, but also represent the symbol of the brand.

What Does It Take To Be A Fashion Designer?

Fashion design is a form of art. To work as a designer, you should have an artistic and creative personality. You also have to be good at drawing and able to express your ideas in sketches. You don't necessarily have to be a great artist, but you must have some special skills for combining colors, tones and shades. You also have to be able to work with fabric and use textiles in a creative and original manner. Fashion designers have a good visual imagination and are able to think in three-dimensions and put their ideas into garments.

Fashion designers have to be aware of the fashion market requirements. They have to be very interested in learning new things and read magazines, journals and books on fashion design history and new trends. They also have to be interested in art, visit art galleries and interact with all kinds of artists whenever they have the opportunity. A designer should also have some knowledge and experience of tailoring (cutting, draping, sewing etc.) and be able to tell the difference between different fabric quality levels.

A good understanding of the audience's lifestyle and customer needs and requirements is also needed in fashion design. Designers should have good communication skills and be able to express their ideas clearly. But most important, they have to be very original and have fresh, innovative ideas.

                                                                             




              








                                                             


Design in India, make for the world
Dr. Darlie Koshy's pioneering contributions to fashion and design education over the last quarter of a century has been well acknowledged by academia, industry and policymakers alike. A Doctorate in Management from IIT Delhi and an MBA from CUSAT, Koshy has been also trained at FIT New York in Fashion Marketing & Merchandising. As Founding Chairperson of Fashion Management Studies at NIFT, New Delhi after the successful stint of a decade as a top manager in the textiles-handloom sector, Koshy built a strong industry interface and thought leadership for NIFT from 1988 till 2000, when he was appointed Director of National Institute of Design (NID), Ahmadabad. As a researcher and academic leader, Koshy's pioneering books on international marketing of apparel are highly regarded by the textiles industry and academia. His 'Indian Design Edge' traces the evolution of Indian design while arguing for a design-enabled India. Here he builds a case for "design in India".
The 'apparel', 'clothing', 'garment', 'fashion' and 'lifestyle' industries have undergone two significant changes since the beginning of the new century. With the dismantling of quotas since 2005, exporters of apparel are free from restrictions of quotas and only competitiveness through 'scale', 'quality' and 'innovation' matter now. The other change that happened around the same time was the rapid growth of the domestic fashion retail industry with recent exponential expansion of e-tailing/m-commerce/omni-channels, etc. Building competitiveness of the apparel industry is the biggest challenge in the context of immense competition from Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Vietnam, etc. The local domestic garment industry has a CAGR of 15-18 per cent per annum and the apparel exports around 8-10 per cent. The fashion/design education curricula, therefore, need to be industry-led and capable of "leading industry" as well.

The curricula for fashion need to turn to focused attention on "fashion business" from just extreme focus only on 'design'. World over the word 'management' is giving way to the more old-fashioned 'business' with focus on individual 'entrepreneurship' made possible through advancement in digital/ sensor technologies. As Western management experts say, everything will revolve around 'algorithm, digitisation, sensors' and 'customer connect through social and other media' with "more one-to-one" than mass-marketing". Fashion is becoming like pizzas with base of fabrics, 3D patterns, silhouettes with select 'topping' of what changes often round the year, colours, styling details, fashion features, etc. The 'Zarafication' of fashion and 'instant gratification' through m-commerce is delivering fashion like pizzas at your doorstep often in less than 6-8 hours. Big data analytics, numeric and fashion need to be now combined in the new age curricula for "business of fashion".

The education system and the loopholes therein

The All-India Council for Technical Education (AICTE)'s pre-conditions and norms for niche institutions in de novo and creativity focused areas like fashion and lifestyle, including for 'design' related programmes, are obsolete and need to be recast. The Ministry of Textiles in its 12th Five Year Plan Sub-Committee report had said that AICTE and the University Grant's Commission (UGC) have not paid any attention to envisage and nurture 'fashion' related education programmes both at UG/ PG levels and, therefore, recommended the setting up of a 'Fashion & Textile Education Council' to take care of all fashion institutes and their programmes. Despite the 12th FYP already being in its last two years, there has been no progress on the part of ministry in this regard.

     



     

e UGC has not cared to even update their obsolete 2003 guidelines for private universities which are really the new engines of growth for skilling and 'Make in India'. For example, as of now according to the UGC, a private university cannot partner with a technical or sectoral institution outside the jurisdiction of the state to offer students better employability. Is it really a tenable guideline as universities have to partner with sectoral institutions which are located in respective geographical clusters wherever they are to increase employability in leather or apparel or jewellery for their rural/mofussil students?

Certainly, the higher and vocational (skill) education need to be given lot more attention to come out with more realistic guidelines by statutory bodies who seem to be in deep slumber in their comfort zones. They need to reinvent themselves in line with the 'Skilling India' motto of our country in the completely changed context. Context is everything for decisions and contemporary law-making. The entire higher education and vocational education is crying for reforms. I do hope the government pays attention. There is not enough effort to converge the 'mainstream' with 'vocational system' through contemporary regulations except paying lip service, even now.

Foreign universities also need to come into India at some point, but before that the widespread usage of 'twinning' programmes, meaningful academic collaborations through dynamic arrangements, need to be absorbed into the system in a more conducive legal and statutory environment by contemporary regulations. The 'validity of degrees', 'equivalence of credits' and course work/research work integration, etc, need to be worked out for creating a more robust system. Just like FDI in the retail sector, FDI through foreign universities need to have a phased entry so that the Indian education system suddenly is not destabilised with core limited faculty resources pulled out by better salaries or higher fees putting upward pressure on fee structure.

It is also imperative that our indigenous institutions' quality of education programmes and research are brought up to a sufficient level to allow a level-playing field. Meanwhile, the educational technology of overseas universities need to be certainly absorbed through quality assurance arrangements as IAM has done with Wolverhampton University and NID, Ahmadabad (where I was director from 2000 to 2009) earlier with BIAD in UK.

Our country needs 'job providers' instead of 'only job seekers'. There is a priority need for promoting entrepreneurship through incubation. I am glad that the Prime Minister has set up a Ministry for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, which is a highly laudable step.

A ten-fold path in this direction

The Apparel Training & Design Centre (ATDC) plans to upgrade all its systems across the country, as in the last five years the Integrated Skill Development Scheme (ISDS) of the Ministry of Textiles and the SMART project of ATDC have created a solid platform and are now launching afresh the long-term programmes of ATDC Vocational Institute (AVI), under the Directorate General of Training, Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship. Thus, at one end we will be providing technically sound shop floor workforce and on the other, shaping technologically sound supervisors and junior managerial cadre.

Creation of an ecosystem is of utmost importance in 'Aspirational India'. The new B.Voc programmes will aim even higher calibre junior managerial and supervisory personnel, thus creating a step ladder ecosystem for vocational training dedicated to the apparel sector. B.Voc plans to bring out 3,000 candidates through ATDC's select 30 centres by 2017. AVI will have the capacity to train 7,500-10,000 individuals per annum through 65 centres. The ATDC-SMART centres (about 125+) will continue to train 40,000 candidates per annum for next two years. All facilities and faculty resources would be upgraded by providing digital content. In addition, ATDC plans to move towards an ISO-9001 certified organisation by 2017. So, (1) scale with quality (2) digitalisation/ digital support for trainers and trainees (3) developing an ecosystem through step-ladder vocational training approach for Aspirational India will be the top three priorities.
India's rapidly growing economy is getting integrated into the global economy; new opportunities emerge every day. However, the students' skills and competencies should match with opportunities. You have to keep the worm warm to catch the fish in cold climes as the story says. Earlier, companies were looking towards having people with 80 per cent knowledge and 20 per cent skills. Now, companies look to have 80 per cent skills and 20 per cent knowledge in the candidates they seek out. Students have to make considerable attitudinal change and actually demonstrate the skills, whether in information technology or in fashion. So the next folds are matching skills and competencies for employability by the youth being the fourth point, and matching opportunities with talent and focusing on demonstrable skills being the fifth and sixth in the to-do list. The ability to accept change as the new normal and embracing new technologies is the seventh, so to say.

The education system is continuously evolving, but the disproportionate emphasis on higher education at the cost of vocational (skill) education from 1947 to 2009 has cost in terms of numerous skills being lost and gaining only diminishing returns for even the higher education, since our higher education institutes and universities do not show up in global lists where Chinese universities dominate from Asia. Therefore, in India there has been heavy dependence on white collar jobs. The skill revolution which we want to usher in should have started long ago - we are at least 20 years late. As soon as economic liberalisation began in 1991, we should have at least started the journey, and 2009 is a little too late to benefit from demographic dividends. The integration of higher and vocational education should be done keeping in mind that we are dealing with aspirational youth in India who are only victims of accidence of birth, and the skill education system should provide ample opportunities for individual growth to result in societal well being, which will be the eighth point.

The community college concept which was introduced by IGNOU in 2009 was laudable. Unfortunately, mindless action by the then Vice-Chancellor destroyed the well intentioned revolutionary approach which could have put IGNOU on a higher plane and given our youth a good deal. We need to go back to the community college system. The ATDC had over 50 community colleges at that point. The spirit of an institution like ATDC need to be based on the community college concept as it links education to holistic local and individual and societal development through training and employment seamlessly.

                                                           

"India requires literacy, numeracy, IT-eracy" as we move towards a Skilled India and Digital India. We require strong primary education and higher enrolment ratio for education in universities as the country moves towards a knowledge and innovation-driven service economy. However, only spread of manufacturing can upgrade the rural economy. Therefore, it is important that India moves forward in imparting skills as in Korea or Germany instead of the current level of 2-3 per cent formally trained workforce. Literacy with domain, life and soft skills will be the new mantra for success as the ninth element. The tenth point will be a community or cluster-driven approach to higher secondary/skill/UG education, to make India succeed in the global market place.

The hierarchy of design in a corporate structure

The words 'design' and 'fashion' are magnetic, and they both bring magic to the products or services which they choose to touch or transform. However, the power of design and fashion has not been used sufficiently in our country which is high on creativity. I had pioneered and formulated the National Design Policy which was approved by the government of India in 2007. However, follow-up action to realise the action plan, including the India Design Council, has not only been tardy but been without passion and drive too. We had coined the slogans 'Design enabled India' and 'Designed in India, Made for the World'. Those have not been carried forward either by the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion or by the institutes.

I had advocated in my book of 1994 that instead of becoming a factory to the world like China, India should become a "creative manufacturer" or "creative supplier of fashion or apparel" to the world. Nobody paid enough attention. The core of a successful brand is design. However, innovation has encroached a lot from the territory of design, being linked to technology and therefore more acceptable to the higher echelons of management. Design is associated with skills and therefore clubbed with lower functional categories. There is a need to change this hierarchy in the corporate structure. The Chief Designer or Chief Emotion (Design) Officer (CEO/CDO) are equally important as CEO or COO. As I had evangelised in my book 'Indian Design Edge' (Roli Books, 2008), India needs to make "Designed in India, Made for the World" a priority along with the 'Make in India' initiative of the Prime Minister to get a well-deserved place for India in the global arena.

Of designers and brands

Administrators in the Ministry of Textiles had a surprisingly wonderful idea in 1985-86 to visit the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT), New York, and to emulate the institute by setting up a fashion school in India in 1986-87. The idea was really ahead of its times. FIT which is a part of New York State University even now has only one campus in one location. Of course, it has set up collaborative ventures in Italy and also initiated the NIFT in New Delhi. The idea was to create world class designers from a specialised high quality campus with high quality faculty members to create Indian fashion brands and designers for the world.

As it happens only in India, the idea was diluted by successive governments from 1994 for the setting up of several NIFTs in the country. Every state wanted one NIFT as it is a feather in their cap, irrespective of whether the state understood the concept or not, or whether the right environment existed there or not.

The institutes have been run mostly by bureaucrats, ensuring that the founding faculty members of NIFT are made to feel uncomfortable and that they leave the Institute, which they did. In a way, the setting up of 17 NIFTs has democratised fashion but as far as creating world class designers is concerned, the effort has fallen way below expectations. Moreover, the Indian domestic apparel industry and the exports industry were not often willing to bet on creativity and design, and chose to focus on manufacturing technology and costs to match customer expectations.

Building a brand is expensive in the short run though it brings in enormous revenue and benefits in the long run. The benefits are in fact disproportionate in the long run. Indian apparel exporters know manufacturing very well, but never understood branding. However, the domestic industry understands branding to some extent, but has never used world class manufacturing for building domestic brands or spent enough on advertising and promotion to build brand while ensuring consistency in quality and delivery on a sustained basis.

When smaller countries create Benetton, Zara, Mango, Uniqlo, etc, India is a long way behind from creation of popular fashion brands known around the world. There has also not been any fashion incubator in the country for fashion designers. I had set up a National Design Business Incubator in NID which was inaugurated by the Prime Minister in 2005 when he was the chief minister of Gujarat. The Fashion Design Council of India (FDCI) and Lakme Fashion Week (LFW) are doing good work for their sponsors like Lakme, Wills or Amazon.

The government has not appreciated enough for the value of creativity, innovation and design towards developing a long-term strategy and therefore there is very little action on the ground. It will take many more years before we see a star brand from designers or otherwise. If India could take world by storm through International Yoga Day on June 21, 2015, the day is not far when an Indian fashion brand will also take the world by storm, if imagination is backed by resources and if mediocrity does not pull down institutions like NIFT and NID

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Decoding the process of trend forecasting in Fashion
"Fashions change like leaves on the bough, some of which go and other come", said Dante, in the Divine Comedy. The four fashion capitals of the world namely New York, Paris, London, and Milan rein the ramp and have a huge influence in setting the upcoming trends. Fashion weeks, celebrities, and fashion designers introduce new trends and set the style for different seasons. Magazines, blogs, and tabloids endorse these latest trends to the masses and retailers.

So how does one decide what will be the next 'it' thing in fashion and what is 'hot' and what is 'not'? And who and how does one come to the conclusion that if 'it' is going to be the most fashionable thing? The answer lies in fashion forecasting. Fashion forecasting, as defined by Chelsea Roussou, in her book Fashion Forward, "is the practice of predicting upcoming trends based on past and present style related information, the interpretation and the motivation behind the trend, and an explanation of why the prediction is about to occur". The ideal forecasting procedure undertakes both scientific skills and creative concepts.

The whimsical consumer preferences and ever differing buying habits make trend forecasting a must for fashion designers and apparel retailers. Studying buying patterns and popular trends helps the retailers deliver the right product at the right time, the right place, the right quantity, the right price to the right consumer. A sound research, updated information, and sensitivity to ever changing desires are necessary for fashion forecasting.

Trend forecasters take the following things into consideration:

1.      Avail knowledge of historical and contemporary fashion and ideas for the future.

2.      Study closely the social and cultural changes in the society

3.      Observing movements and direction of changes

4.      Analyzing past data and consumer sales

Forecasters and fashion analysts determine the future trends and deliver useful insights to industries, manufacturers, and designers, who then provide the final product to the consumers. Trend forecasters are a canny group of individuals who bring their expertise in fashion history, consumer research, industry data, and intuition all together to predict future styles and provide guidance to the producers.

However, besides fashion forecasters, fashion design students, manufacturers, apparel merchandisers, designers, product developers, retail executives, fashion magazine editors, researchers, and consultants also work towards forecasting the nouveau and upcoming trends. Fashion forecasters foresee not just the outfit but also the color, theme, kind of fabric, and the look and feel of the trend.

When it comes to creating a buzz about the latest trends, trendsetters play a significant role to make it popular. Celebrities, artists, stylish designers, socialites, and other public figures make statements with the hippest in fashion and set the trend.

Fashion thrives everywhere, and which is exactly why forecasters keep their eyes open and observe what people are wearing. The society is generally besotted by celebrities and forecasters monitor activities of such iconic individuals, who impact fashion and trends majorly. Fashion shows, fabric fairs, red carpet events, and the streets are common places to spot latest trends. Besides these, a visit to textile museums, a downtown club, fashion galas, and textile work by students of institutes also help figuring out a possible future trend. Collaborating with textile researchers and engineers also give forecasters useful perspectives on prospective fabrics.

The fastest and the best way to find anything today is with the help of internet. A peek into social networking sites and fashion blogs gives forecasters a heads up at what is brewing in the fashion scene and the probable forthcoming trends. Interactive platforms like these provide a massive pool of information of what kinds of clothes and looks people are experimenting with.

A survey of retail sites, individually run fashion websites, and magazine sites provides an avenue for fresh ideas, concepts, and insights about certain kinds of fashion. Visiting boutiques in the boulevards of Paris, Milan, New York and London; shopping at emerging couture stores of Mumbai, Dubai, Shanghai, and Moscow; and witnessing the collection of clothes at museums, textile art galleries, and vintage stores help identifying rising trends with a different outlook.

Trend forecasting is generally done for the autumn/winter and spring/summer collections of retailers and designers. Apart from this fashion forecasters also provide views on Long-term forecasting and Short-term forecasting. Short term forecasting is done for two years in advance of the trend and long term is done five to ten years in advance.

Short term forecasting focuses on developing color stories, themes, deciding the silhouettes, and the kind of fabric. It includes details and specific designing features. Short term forecasting is useful to manufacturers to use current information for developing new products. Long term forecasting emphasizes more on the mood or the cultural shift of an era. It does not signify details but marks trends of a historical period. Such information helps retailers and designers position their businesses for long term growth.

The process of forecasting has five major stages:

Research: Carrying out a fishing expedition and investigating from different sources and places, to come up with fresh findings, better ideas, and recognizing potential trends.

Sort: Editing and filtering the collected information is the next step. Determining design and patterns from accumulated data, samples, and images follows further.

Analyzing: Interpreting and scrutinizing the causes, key factors, and possible results of upcoming trends. Considering what, why, and how a certain trend is catching up and how will it manifest.

Predicting: Forecasting possible trends and justifying it with available sources, data, and facts.

Communicating: Delivering the outputs, thoughts, and ideas behind the predictions through illustrations, storyboards, and presentations.

Forecasting fashion and trends today is an organized process and is beyond just intuition and a guessing game. In an industry that is ever evolving, forecasting helps provide a farsighted view and prepares retailers and designers to stock up with trendy clothes for their customers. This has made fashion forecasting carve a niche market and increased its importance in the apparel and retailing industry. Fashion forecasting helps clear the clouds of ever-changing trends and styles and provides a smooth flight of growth to retailers by predicting prospective trends.

What is Fashion?

Many of us think that fashion applies just the clothes we wear, but in actual fact it can be applied to almost anything we do. Fashion is used to describe a means of expression. The terms "fashionable" and "unfashionable" are used to describe something that does or does not tally with the current popular mode of expression. Fashions can apply to many fields of human activity and thinking, including those such as architecture, music, speech, pastimes, etiquette, politics, and technology, to name but a few.

The broad use of the term fashion when applied to clothes was used in the past as a means of people showing solidarity with other people by their choice of clothes. However, in more realistic terms, today Modern Westerners have a wide choice of clothes available to them, and wearing what is currently in fashion is unlikely to be exactly the same as someone else. Nowadays what a person wears is more likely to be a reflection of their personal tastes and character, than wanting to imitate somebody else. However, when celebrities or people in the public eye start to wear new or different clothes, people tend to copy them and a new fashion develops, therefore the original term may still apply today.

Fashion is something that varies tremendously, not just in different eras, but also in the same generation but between different ages, social classes, professions and by location. The term "fashionista" has developed in the 21st century as a way of describing someone who is dedicated to fashion, and the development of this term is indicative of the role fashion and trends play in the contemporary age.

Fashion by its very nature, is something that is continually changing, and when applied to clothes this happens even more quickly than in other areas of social behaviour. What is an interesting phenomenon in regards to clothing fashions is that whilst something quickly becomes out of fashion, it can become fashionable again at a later date when these clothes come back into fashion again. This is something that is seen predominantly only with clothes, and not with other areas of design or human actions.

Every part of ones appearance is subject to fashion, from makeup, hair, length of skirts, and accessories, nothing is left untouched. Fashion houses and their fashion designers, as well as their celebrity clients are key in determining how clothes fashions change and how quickly. They are also the main force behind determining if something is in or out of fashion and if to bring something back in to fashion. An important part of fashion is fashion journalism, and this can be found in every magazine, newspaper, and television article around, as well as in fashion websites and blogs.

This is demonstrated by the fact that Vogue, founded in the US in 1902, is now one of the longest-lasting and most popular magazines in the world, and has spurned international editions around the globe. Despite the advent of television and widespread internet coverage, press coverage is still seen by the fashion industry as the most important form of publicity in conveying the new fashion trends to society.

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