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Thursday, 5 January 2006 | senay
Teen Fashion Innovators Search
From Flipping Through Fashion Magazines to Seeing Her Name in One, Florida Girl Wins First Ever Teen Fashion Innovator Search
High school senior Elana Bloom spent many happy hours pouring over fashion magazines as she was growing up, never dreaming that some day her own design would be featured in one.
But that is exactly what will happen because Bloom has just been named the grand prize winner for fashion design in The Art Institutes Teen Fashion Innovators Search, a national competition created to recognize and encourage budding fashion design and marketing talent at the high school level.
This is the first year for the event which was co-sponsored by ELLEgirl magazine.
Bloom, a senior at Alexander W. Dreyfoos Jr. School of the Arts in West Palm Beach, Florida, will receive a full scholarship worth approximately $70,000 to study fashion design at The Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale. A native of Boca Raton, Bloom's winning design will be featured in the pages of ELLEgirl magazine and she will enjoy an all-expense paid trip to New York to attend Fashion Week.
Bloom created a tunic-length top in brown silk with sleeves lined in contrasting purple silk. In her rationale for the design, Bloom said "I wanted to create a chic, modern design that would work well for a woman's busy lifestyle. The silk allows movement, and the rich brown color can go easily from day to evening."
According to Bruce E. Dempsey, Assistant Vice President of Academic Affairs for The Art Institutes and a competition judge, Bloom's first place winning design was "wearable, elegant and flattering."
In the fashion marketing & merchandising category, the first place prize went to Karlee Smith for her "HEY GIRL" retail design approach.
Smith's "HEY GIRL" concept offers up and coming designers promotional assistance using a four-part promotional package for a flat fee, including a preferred customer card, planner, invitation and fashion show. Smith, a senior at South Forsyth High School and a native of Cumming, Georgia, will receive a full tuition scholarship to study fashion marketing & merchandising at The Art Institutes California Design College in Los Angeles, CA.
Dempsey said the judges were impressed with the level of sophistication among the entries and most surprisingly, "for high school students, we saw a real vision in what these students felt fashion could communicate. For them, fashion was obviously not just about something to wear or market, but about how it can positively impact the world around us."
In addition to Dempsey, the judging panel included ELLEgirl editors, Laurie Trott, ELLEgirl's Fashion Director, Linnea Olson Schwartz, ELLEgirl's Market Director for Fashion, Princess Warren, a fashion design/fashion marketing alum from The Art Institute of Philadelphia and runner-up on the Tommy Hilfiger reality show "The Cut," Stacey Monsen, Men's Wear Designer for Macys Corporation and Patty Hughes, director of volunteers for New York "Fashion Week."
For more information on the competition, visit http://www.artinstitutes.edu/teenfashion
The full competition results are as follows:
First place full tuition scholarship winners:
Fashion Design: Elana Bloom - The Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale
Fashion Marketing & Merchandising: Karlee Smith - California Design College
Second place half tuition scholarship winners:
Fashion Design: Susanna Burke - The Art Institute of Dallas (Photo left)
Fashion Marketing & Merchandising: Leah Aqua - The Art Institute of Seattle (Photo right)
Third place one-third tuition scholarship winners:
Fashion Design: Anastasiya Koretska - The Art Institute of Toronto (Photo left)
Fashion Marketing & Merchandising: Christy Meisner - The Art Institute of California -San Francisco (Photo right)
About The Art Institutes
The Art Institutes system of 31 education institutions ( http://www.artinstitutes.edu/teenfashion ) located throughout North America provides an important source for design, media arts, fashion and culinary professionals. The Art Institutes system of schools has provided career-oriented education programs for more than 40 years.
About ELLEgirl
ELLEgirl, the international style bible for girls who "dare to be different," is published by Hachette Filipacchi Media U.S., Inc., and is accessible on the web at http://www.ELLEgirl.com. ELLEgirl ranked in Adweek's 2005 The Hot List, 10 under 50, and was recently listed in Media Metrix as one of the top ten teen sites. International editions include ELLEgirl United Kingdom, ELLEgirl South Korea, ELLEgirl Holland, ELLEgirl Quebec, ELLEgirl Taiwan, ELLEgirl Japan, ELLEgirl Russia, ELLEgirl France, ELLEgirl Germany and ELLEgirl China.
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