How to Create Your Final Collection

Designing a final degree collection is a fashion students first chance to approach the reality of the industry. This handbook provides a step-by-step guide to creating this collection, with each chapter exploring a different step of the project: from understanding the brief and identifying the market to research, development and sampling, through to garment design, range planning, and styling and presentation. Richly illustrated with 350 colour photographs, the book builds on the skills learnt by students during their degree course and throughout the creation of their capsule collection. The accompanying case studies, featuring inspirational work by fashion students from 18 top fashion schools around the world, illustrate every stage of the process and showcase new talent. The book will be accompanied by a CD containing 15 additional student case studies (90 pages, 4,500 words).Introduction 7 How to use this book 8 Your final collection 10 Chapter 1 The different markets for womenswear 14 Five fashion markets 17 Specialist markets 23 Chapter 2 Fashion in time 26 Fashion seasons 29 The design-to-retail cycle 31 Trends in fashion 35 Trend forecasting 42 Finalizing your personal brief 49 Chapter 3 Creative research 50 Finding inspiration 53 Your sketchbook 56 Potential sources of inspiration and influence 58 Finding material 60 Manipulating material 60 Choosing your influences and assembling your theme board 62 Chapter 4 Development and sampling 64 Your strategy for development and sampling 67 Elements of garment design and construction Techniques 68 Development techniques 82 Creative practices 84 Explaining how your collection will work: concept and mood boards 86 Chapter 5 Garment design and range planning 88 Good fashion design 91 Garments: the building blocks of a fashion collection 93 Range planning in the industry 94 Range planning your final collection 95 Garment design 96 Cut, make and trim (CMT) 100 Chapter 6 Styling and presentation 102 Presentation of fashion 104 Presentation of the final collection 106 Fashion styling 107 Styling your final collection 109 Presentation for submission 113 Making the most of the end-of-year show 114 Exercises in professional styling 116 Chapter 7 Diffusing your final collection 120 Why do commercial designers have second lines? 122 Extending your final collection 124 Practical advice 125 Case studies 126