Producing and Directing the first Fashion Show in Saint Anselm College History
During the last semester of my senior year myself and a group of my friends had the wild idea to try and host a fashion show at our school, Saint Anselm College in Manchester, NH. Although Saint Anselm prides itself as a Liberal Arts school, there was a lacking in appreciation for the arts as well as events/resources for the students seeking them. We came to the conclusion that it would need to be us who would put the foot forward to move the school into a different direction.
At first it was just ourselves and a club that a few of us were a part of (Men of Color) that were involved in the production. As production progressed students from a nearby school (Southern New Hampshire University) joined our team and helped us in bringing our big idea to life. After almost four years of feeling isolated and misunderstood at an institution that claimed to be a space for students like myself, I had finally found my community.
In the spring of 2024, my internship in the College Communications and Marketing Office opened an avenue for us kids that we never anticipated. The department arrived with open arms and all-hands-on-deck to provide us with any resources we needed. Paul Pronovost (Vice President of Strategic Marketing, Communications, & Public Relations and Chief Communications Officer President's Office) and Jason Kolnos (Director of Social Media and Digital Content) got us in touch with local news outlets. News and social media coverage helped quickly spread the word across the wider Manchester community.
HOW DID THE SHOW COME TO BE?
When Noah Gutierrez, President of Men of Color, approached me about doing flyer designs for spreading the word about his idea for a show I was all ears. Nothing sounds more fun to a creative than doing something no one else has ever done before. Noah gave me a lot of creative freedom with the designs. He relayed me what kind of information he wanted communicated, sent me some vision boards, and said “go for it!” Through the collaborative process of using vision boards, interviews, meeting the crew and designers that we were displaying, the process was a joy to approach creatively. Close friends, partners, and other students joined in on the fun and soon enough our ideas came into fruition.
Simultaneously I was finishing up my senior thesis exhibition, dissertation, and comprehensive exams. This time period the first that I was able to visually see the wide variety of skills I had the ability to tap into over the span of only a few months. Ranging from creative directory, taking photos, leading a media team, designing flyers, social media management and guerrilla marketing; to miniatures, illustrations, and painting. Creating a consistent collective voice for such a diversely unique community became a priority of mine, and learning how my creations reached out to both students and other adults in my community was a challenging but fulfilling process.
This time period allowed me for the first time to broaden my creative horizons and begin to craft my own creative vision and art style. Before this show I had a limited amount of knowledge and experience in photography, Photoshop, Lightroom, and graphic design. If it weren’t for this big idea my friends and I had, I truly would not be where I am as a professional artist today.
Creating Our Monogram and Visual Branding
I had the opportunity to create my own monogram of all the logos of the brands we worked with. Noah wanted us to somehow implement all of the brand names into one design. This design is inspired by the iconic Louis Vuitton monogram print.
Once the initial aesthetic of the show was created, the flyers seamlessly followed. I wanted to create pieces that were similar in content (date, time, location), but different visually. In an age of mass-consumption, doom-scrolling, and passive media digestion, I wanted to trick our audience in to thinking it was their first time seeing it.
