The Hilltop Online

December Fashion Show Combines Fantastical and Modern Sensibilities
Story by Miranda Hucks, Photos by Joshua Doby

Kacie Cardwell, bottom left, Alice Ruth Halliday, bottom right, and Tandra Landers, top left, don fashions created by the Fashion Industry Class for the fashion show. The characters that inspired the outfits are shown on a TV positioned behind the models.

Mars Hill's Fashion and Interior Merchandising Department and Fashion Industry class put on the annual Fashion Show on Dec. 3.

The show used heroes, villains and side-kicks for inspiration for the clothes in the production. Characters and movies that provided inspiration included Batman, Catwoman, Hercules, Peter Pan, Snow White, Star Wars, The Wizard of Oz, Toy Story, Beauty and the Beast, Alice in Wonderland and 101 Dalmatians.

The 16 students in the class and the department focused on the fantasy idea because of the growing remakes of characters on television and in the movies. The fashion industry has also picked up on these new, modern styles, which also led to Mars Hill’s adaptations.

Throughout the show, images of the characters were displayed with a PowerPoint presentation, courtesy of Austen Ward and the staging committee, to show the inspiration for each model’s clothes.

Much time was put into the show this year, according to students involved with the production.

“The show was fun,” model René Carr said. “The fashion students were pretty organized, and when the show was about to begin, everyone's hair and makeup was done, which was a surprise to many because there were a lot of us (models).”

Jaime Kuehl, another model, said she met with Abby Lowry, the coordinator, three times prior to the week of the show to work on characters, outfits and the runway walk. Being a model, she said, was not as intense as being a student in the class.

“It was great to see a bunch of people coming together to accomplish a common goal,” said Kuehl. “I also made some new friends. And even though I wasn’t able to see the show, I know the students in the class worked really hard, and I think everything came together perfectly . . . Aside from the Loft being about 50 degrees, it was a fun experience. The other models were lots of fun to hang around, and Abby was really supportive and encouraging.”

The students worked to make everything perfect for the event. Merchandise committee member Allison Curtis said decorating the space itself took many hours.

“It took us probably a good twelve hours to decorate the Loft, but it was split up between two days,” Curtis said. “Everyone has very different schedules in the programs, so it was basically everyone taking what times they didn’t have class to come into the Loft and do small things to get it ready.”

The classes were assigned the fashion show project the first day of class and have been working on it every week since the beginning of the fall semester.

“Once we were all split into our different committees, we started working as much as we could on our individual responsibilities,” Curtis said. “As for the clothes, we got them all from our own closets, and we chose who did what character based on what size the clothes were. It was a little tricky because we had all of the outfits picked out before we assigned the models.”

The crowd seemed pleased with the outcome. During intermission, the audience was entertained by a performance from the Bailey Mountain Cloggers. The show also had a very catchy tune playing throughout the show. All of the music was by DJ Chase Sikorski.

The show offered a glimpse of the talent Mars Hill students will take off campus as up-and-coming designers with the ability to bring any character to life.