Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Classes In Florence

None of my classes transfered back to UWL, which was a perk of traveling in summer because I didn't fall behind, except for maybe in my finances.  I study fashion illustration and fashion buying concepts and absolutely adored them both.  I am a marketing major with both a Graphic design and cultural anthropology minor; the classes I took were mostly to satisfy my curiosity.  Each class was pretty long, they have to cram a lot into a 4 week class, but I enjoyed both the lecture an homework.  I use the term "homework" loosely because it was really more like fun projects to do on the side.  The class added to my experience, it did not take away from my free time or exploration time.  Fashion illustration cost quiet a bit extra for supplies but it was a good purchase to make.  At the end of class we had successful drawn 2 full lines of clothing, the first wasn't in color and were more like sketches, the second acted as our final and was incredibly detailed.  Skill level didn't matter, it was all about you improving from your first day.  We went to a famous costume museum, the Ferragamo museum and a huge trade show as field trips.  The coolest part was going to the trade show Petti,  it was the Mans show with buyers from all over the world coming to view next seasons lines.  I still have my portfolio from this class!  Fashion buying concepts was more of a business class, which I liked, but we also got to get out of the classroom for field trips often.  We went to a leather craft factory/school to see how leather coats and purses were made,  this is no Ma and Pa store, pictures of Robert Downey Junior and other celebrities that have graced the store were hanging on the wall.  This school has world renowned craftsmen who design leather goods from scratch per customer, it was amazing.   The final for this class was a paper on home of the major fashion houses, we went into the stores and found price points, observed store lay out, and evaluated the service.  My project was on Gorgio Armani, it was like espionage work because the stores didn't like us doing it.  

Although I had a strong passion for the classes I took I left with a long laundry list of classes I wished I had more time to take.  Among the highly reviewed by my friends were: Wine and food pairing, photography, figure drawing, history of the mafia and italian cooking.  

There was no student in my class that spoke italian, our teachers were italian but they spoke english to accommodate us.  So that should not be a concern. You can't really go wrong, the only time intensive classes were the literature classes.  

Anybody wanting to a see a portfolio, let me know! 

Brittany 

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