My experience as a fashion student in HFFA in Milan contrary to Ghana where there are defined structures to learn was step to the real world. Studying fashion entails tons of homework ranging from all aspect of fashion within a week. The African fashion system is quite unique in its own way while the Italian fashion system is structured that it’s not easy to invade. As a fashion student, there is a need to know your strength and weakness to enable one to fit in, this enlightened my horizon. Italian fashion education spans across history, business events, photography and etc.
After learning from books, we were always split into groups to learn from the real world. My first time learning from the high brand boutiques, I used the scenography to inform me about the collection in the stores. Learning from the boutiques of popular brands such as Dior, Versace, Chanel, and retail shops. Focused areas included trends, how to predict, touring the top brands and fashion runways, applying for an internship. Learning how important olfactory and sound is very crucial in fashion event and visiting museums and art exhibition revealed how these real time experiences influence our design process.
I was thought that fashion is not just about joining fabrics but a true state of art and how important to use clothes to solve problems be it societal or personal and business aspect of it. After going through of this we graduated with a collection presented at Monte Carlo in France. My knowledge about fashion change drastically after school because I learnt that fashion trade fairs, fashion shows, thread, food, objects, history, art, sculpture, silhouettes etc plays important to forecast the next season tends
My Experience at the private showcase of Yoji Yama Moto was one I very well enjoyed. I used the opportunity to network with some gurus in the fashion industry. The perks on studying in Milan include an internship with brands that provides real-world training sessions in the fashion creative and business development. The power of collaboration is more useful than anything than being alone on a project. A lot of competition which gives millions of euros to designers to start their brand under the wing of camera Della moda di Italian which has the biggest communication power in the fashion world.
I had my job as fashion designer months before the COVID-19 lockdown which made work difficult. Progress on my first commercial collection grinded to a halt. I had to work from home with our pattern maker to finish with the patterns and samples for production. During this lockdown I worked closely with my boss at his residence where we had to use our phones to shoot our product, posted on the website and engage our customers. The interesting part of my job is the travel opportunities that come along with it. Also, I have the opportunity to build my own team to work with. Currently, I am looking forward to working with some creatives in Ghana especially to collaborate on creating campaigns and some editorials.
We had collaborations with a creative who works with red Valentino and Valentino and a trends magazine organization here in Bologna which was an eye opener. I love the fact that this brand gives me the opportunity for my creative directions from 360 work point of view which is incredible.
