My Teen Vogue Fashion University Experience!

This weekend was an absolute whirlwind.    I'm going to start off by just going through and explaining everything I did! 

Day 1:  Express Kick-Off Party

TVFU started with a party Friday night hosted at the Express location in Times Square! Between the enormous crowds of people, I was able to check out some of the activities they had. I got a flash tattoo, it's one of those temporary gold/silver tattoos that have become pretty popular. But let me tell ya, after taking 2 showers the tatto is still on, so I guess I'll be sporting it for a while. Teen Vogue had a flip book station set up that was super fun! You created a 7 second video and it was turned into a flip book, so cute! There was also an eyelash bar set up where you could get fake eyelashes, but I didn't get a chance to do that. 

The highlight of my night was meeting Elaine Welteroth, the Teen Vogue beauty and health director. She was super nice, stylish and when talking with her, she acted like she'd known you for years. It was great getting to meet so many talented girls with similar interests as me! 

Day 2: Seminar, Seminars, Seminars!

Saturday was a day full of learning from some of the best in the fashion industry! My morning started bright and early with my coffee and umbrella in hand heading over to the Conde Nast office at the World Trade Center.

 After going through security I made my way up to the 34th floor for our first speaker, Vashtie Kola. She is a director, filmmaker, designer and DJ, so basically she does it all! She told us about her journey starting from nothing to moving to NYC, working for Def Jam Records, creating her own line (including her own pair of Jordan's!!) and her most recent project, a collaboration with Puma! 

The second seminar I attended was Jens Grede, he's just one half of the duo that created the London based brand, Frame Denim. He shared with us his amazing insight on the business side of creating your own brand. He also shared his top 10 tips he learned from turning his brand global in just 3 short years! Jens touched on his celebrity experience with Karlie Kloss and how that has helped his brand.

 

The third seminar was the dean speaker for the design and styling major, Rebecca Minkoff! To be honest, before this weekend I've heard of her, but I wasn't super familiar with her work. After this weekend, she's definitely a designer I'm going to keep up with! Rebecca started off by telling us about how she moved to NYC at just 18 years old! She started her brand by reconstructing an I lover NYC tshirt and originally started as an accessories designer. She explained her inspiration for her famous morning after bag and gave her insight into finding patter makers and people to help develop your own brand. She also shares her knowledge on what to wear to internship/job interviews! She was one of my favorites of the day! 

After lunch, the seminars continued with Micaela Erlanger. She's a celebrity stylist most well known for working with Lupita Nyong'o and Jared Leto. I really enjoyed her talk! She talked about attending Parsons and her journey living in NYC and LA throughout her career. Micaela explained the differences between editorial styling, red carpet styling, film styling and advertising styling and her experience with all four kinds! She shared her insight on how to break into the world of styling and what we can do to help our careers, I found this extremely helpful! 

For the next seminar, we had the opportunity to listen to Jodie Snyder talk about how she developed her jewelry brand Dannijo. Her and her sister Danni created and design the brand, however Danni wasn't able to come speak.  Dannijo has lots of fun, unique pieces and they're known for their bib necklaces. She started out by talking about her background and how the brand was created. They started the brand in 2008 during the recession, which to my surprise turned out to be the perfect time for them! Jodie talked about what it was like to have her jewelry get picked up by Bergdorf Goodman and how Beyoncé was one of the first celebrities to by the jewelry at Bergdorfs which really helped the brand gain popularity. She shares her tips for what she believes makes a good intern and that was very useful! 

The last seminar ended with the Teen Bogue editor panel. This was amazing! The panel was made up of Marina Larroude, the TV fashion director, Andrew Bevan, the style director for TV, Jessica Minkoff, the senior fashion market editor, Brandon Maxwell, a stylist who occasionally comes in and works with TF and last but not least, Amy Astley, the TV editor! 

All of the editors told us about their background and how they got to where they are today. It was really inspiring to hear how they all had to work their way up to the jobs they have now and it made me even more excited to move to NYC someday! They gave some of the best advice on breaking into the industry and what we can do to help our careers.

 

After all the seminars finished up there was a mix and mingle event where I had the opportunity to network with other students at TVFU and talk with some of the editors! I got the chance to meet Andrew Bevan here and he is awesome!! 

Day 3: Final Speaker and Graduation!

The day started an hour later this morning (extra hour of sleep. YES.)! We had our final speaker who was the insanely talented Zac Posen! He started by showing the video of his runway show for his most recent line for Fall 2015! Zac talked about his background and how he got into designing. Zac brought 2 gorgeous dresses with him! He showed us the construction of them and explained the importance of it. He also taught us about draping and how he drapes on a mannequin now instead of sketching since the shape and body of a garment is so important to him. Zac Posen was one of my favorite speakers from this weekend and he is honestly full of so much knowledge, he's fantastic! 

The weekend ended with everyone receiving a certificate for graduation! This weekend was everything I hoped for and so much more! I feel so fortunate to have had the opportunity to attend TVFU. It feels so weird talking about it in the past because I've been waiting for this for months! I was able to meet some new friends and learn from incredibly talented people in the fashion industry. This weekend made me want to dive deeper into fashion and do anything I can to make it work!