Tanni Xu
San Jose, CA
Womenswear
Designer of the Year Candidate
My F/W 2013 collection was created from the analysis of the culture of collecting, taking inspiration from my personal hobby for collecting as well as from a compulsive hoarder’s point of view. My childhood memory box served as a point of reference during the design process as I examined the process of revealing and retaining past memories. A sense of nostalgia is expressed throughout the collection in various manners, through shape and proportion as well as through color and textiles.
Internships: Suno, TSE Cashmere, Catherine Malandrino
Ashley Riley
Brentwood, TN
Womenswear
My clothing is made up of an eclectic mixture of print, texture, and opacities. It is meant to represent the contained chaos and confusion that happens when one experiences déjà vu. The fabric is cut apart and sewn back together creating multi patterned singular pieces. I draped on the body instead of using patterns to see what happened when the fabric was moved certain ways.
Internships: Henri Bendel, Burberry
Rachel Chiu
Houston, TX
Menswear
The inspiration for this collection comes from the experience of vertigo – the feeling of falling, or from Latin, the feeling of “whirling around.” I studied how the body contorts as it falls through the air, and it was from these images that I drew the inspiration for design details and proportions in the clothes. I then experimented with bringing this sense of movement into the clothes by manipulating the patterns themselves.
Internships: DKNY Menswear, Rag & Bone, Outlier, Elizabeth & James, Alexander McQueen (summer 2012)