It’s show time for costume and fashion students at the University of Huddersfield, as they prepare to unveil their spectacular designs on the catwalk.
Every summer graduating students showcase often-extravagant and highly-creative work in a series of fast-paced fashion shows at the Lawrence Batley Theatre. The shows are open to the public and offer a glimpse into a fantasy world of fabulous cutting-edge fashion and dramatic costumes.
Among the theatrical designs on show this year will be everything from a gown with dissolving stitches, which falls apart before the audience’s eyes, to elegant outfits inspired by the Great Gatsby.
The shows, on June 12 and 14, will feature work by nearly 100 students and are more than just an end-of-year celebration. Traditionally, the shows attract representatives from industry seeking out the talented designers of the future.
Huddersfield is unique in offering a course in costume and textile design and has 45 graduates this year. It is, says course leader Dr Bruce Carnie, the reason why students travel from all over the world to study here. He explained: “It is a unique course and combines costume with something that is firmly part of Huddersfield’s history, textiles. We have students from Germany, Spain, Canada and America. By including textiles in the course it means that our students can look at a diversity of jobs. We’ve got students going on to work with Northern Ballet, as a music video stylist, conservation assistant in Somerset and to the Bavarian State Opera and Ballet.”
With Brexit on the horizon, however, Dr Carnie says he’s unsure how many EU students will continue to be attracted to the course – and the university.
One of this year’s graduates, 24-year-old Theresa Lingg, from Munich in Germany, came to Huddersfield because it offered the course she wanted, but feels that the ‘atmosphere has changed’ since the Brexit vote. She explained: “Costume with textiles is only here in Huddersfield. I looked all over Europe and it was the only course. Education would have been free in Germany but I chose to come here because of the incredible facilities. But I think Brexit will affect the appeal.” After graduation she will be returning to Germany to take up a job with the Bavarian State Opera and Ballet.
Theresa’s final project for her degree was based on the novel Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, a 1985 historical fantasy novel by German writer Patrick Süskind, which used 50 metres of smocked chiffon to create a gown that sheds its layers like petals. In order to create the illusion, she fitted a water pump into an inner dress, which is activated by breathing, and used soluble thread to hold the outer dress together. “I’ll have to stitch it back together in between shows,” she said. (See a video of the dress in action on our website).
Another costume student, Beth Pirie, also based her final piece on a fantasy novel, Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor, for which she created elaborate sets of wings. She’s hoping to find work in a theatre, after spending a placement year at the Royal Exchange in Manchester, Scottish Opera in Glasgow and with CBeebies in Manchester.
The fashion collections and costumes in the show, which can also be seen in a static exhibition at the university’s Arts Building from today (June 8) until June 22 (weekdays only), represent hours of painstaking work for the young designers. Costume students chose a variety of themes - from Shakespearean characters and Beatrix Potter to the Hunchback of Notre Dame. Fashion students were inspired by everything from environmental issues and British wool to novels and natural phenomena.
Debbie Moorhouse, course leader for the BA in fashion design, says graduates are now chasing up job offers and are showcasing their work at the London-based Graduate Fashion Week (June 3 to 6). The fashion department has a number of students nominated for awards at Graduate Fashion Week and puts some of its success down to the fact that students gain valuable work experience by taking a year out on industry placement.
For 21-year-old Emma Hardy, a fashion design with textiles graduate, a placement at a nightwear company in Salford allowed her to discover the direction that she’d like to go in. “I got to work in a lot of areas and I’m now interested in being a garment technologist,” she explained. Her final year collection, based on the forms of jellyfish and corals, is an autumn/winter collection of garments featuring ruffles and pleats.
The Graduate Fashion Show is at the Lawrence Batley Theatre on Tuesday, June 12, at 5pm and 7pm. The Graduate Costume Show is at the theatre on Friday, June 15, at 5pm and 7pm. Tickets are £8 from thelbt.org.uk or 01484 430528.
* It’s a week of fashion at the theatre, as Huddersfield New College students are also showcasing their work in a catwalk show on Wednesday, June 13, at 8pm. Tickets are £6.
