Crysalis ‘Lace Effects’ Exhibition

  • Gemma Walsh
This was a freelance project I was chosen to represent my university for at La Cité internationale de la Dentelle et de la Mode de (The City of Lace Museum) in Calais, France.
I was appointed Event Manager to organise a one day launch event on Saturday 5th October 2013 in conjunction with the launch of the new static Crysalis ‘Lace Effects’ Exhibition. The exhibition consists of 40 artists work, 20 of those are UCA staff and students from my university. For more information of the Crysalis Project please visit the website www.crysalis-network.eu
The event provided a platform for 15 graduate designers from UCA Rochester and gave them an opportunity to showcase their work to an international audience. There were 5 collections chosen from each design course, Fashion Textiles: Print, Fashion Design and Fashion Atelier. It was a great opportunity to see work by professional, academic and student designers exhibited side by side.
The show provided a platform for many aspiring young creative’s from the hair and make up artists to the models and dressers where all sourced from local collages and all made up an enthusiastic team who worked together perfectly on the day. Amongst the ammeter models were 3 French TV Presenters Sandra Lou, Karima Charni & Laurie Cholewa who all done a fantastic job and bought a celebrity following with them to the show. Live music on the day came from London DJ, Kyle Michael, who regularly plays in London superclubs like Egg, Pacha & Ministry of Sound which added to the shows electric atmosphere.
The event consisted of 2 catwalk shows which were filmed by the museum & streamed live throughout the museum and on the website. The catwalk show was open to public viewing and was also attended by Leading Calais dignitaries including the Mayor of the City of Calais and the Head of the Fine Arts Museum. The catwalk event was also covered by both local and national press in France and was also filmed for French National TV.