Performance Sportswear produces swimwear for Celia Birtwell
When Swimathon, the world's largest swimming fundraising event, needed swimwear designs produced against incredibly tight margins and deadlines UCF’s Performance Sportswear course jumped at the opportunity.
Simon Heap, creative director of Cornwall based Design for Sport explains how an existing relationship with course leaders Patrick and Jane Gottelier led to their course coming to the rescue ofthe charity Swimathon.
“When Design for Sport was first commissionedby swimathon to produce a swimsuit for this charity event, created by acclaimed textile designer Celia Birtwell, the client was in a state of panic. They had tried the Far East, Europe and the UK but had not found anyone that could produce a prototype and short production run within an extremely short timescale.
“With our relationship with University College Falmouth in mind, weimmediatelycontacted Performance Sportswear course leader Patrick Gottelier and tried to establish a viable timescale. Even with the Christmas holiday period falling within the schedule Falmouth came up with the goods, ahead of the deadline.”
While discussing the benefit of having local performance sportswear manufacturing and production expertise, Simon said: “Design for Sport is constantly pushing the boundaries of sports design and with anacademicpartner like UniversityCollege Falmouthwe look forward to working together on even more exciting projects. "
This is Swimathon's 22nd year and our target is to raise £1.8million for Marie Curie Cancer Care and The Swimathon Foundation. Between 15,000 and 20,000 people take part every year across the UK setting themselves and their teams' various Distance Challenges.
For further information about BA(Hons) Performance Sportswear Design at University College Falmouth, please visit:
www.falmouth.ac.uk/performancesportswear, email admissions@falmouth.ac.uk or telephone Admissions on 01326 213852.
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