High-octane work placements for Falmouth fashionistas

From cutting-edge London Fashion Week to vintage fashion, and sportswear retail giants to Cornish ethical clothing, University College Falmouth's BA(Hons) Fashion and BA(Hons) Performance Sportswear students will get a taste of the high-octane world of the fashion industry this summer through work placements with major names.

Remaining one of the fastest growing and most desirable industries to work in, with many graduates striving to become the next Stella McCartney or Alexander McQueen, a prestigious work placement can make all the difference to their future careers.

Designer of the Year 2008, Luella Bartley; Founder of Ghost, Tanya Sarne; the rock industry's designer of choice, Todd Lynn; and some of the UK's most prestigious sportswear and ecological fashion houses, Decathlon France whose watersports design head quarters are based in the South of France; Howies based in Wales; and Cornwall's Seasalt and Finisterre have all offered placement's of up to four month's duration.

In June, second-year student, Emily Frost worked with premier London fashion show producer, Lindsey Hunt on Student Fashion Week and will return in September to assist on the Clothes Show Live and London Fashion Week as well as working with another leading fashion show producer, Lesley Goring.

"It's amazing working with such a high profile show producer and learning about what goes into producing some of fashion's biggest events," said Emily. "Studying at Falmouth has given me the confidence to throw myself into my work placement, utilise the skills I have gained on my course, learn as much as possible and realise that there are endless possibilities out there for me following graduation."

Other students heading to London are second-year student, Elle Glen, who won The Most Promising Designer Prize at UCF's recent Fashion Show, will be joining Tanya Sarne, to work on her new label, Handwritten; Laura Leach, who won the Lee Cooper Centenary Jeans Contest 2008 in her first year, joins rock and roll's best kept secret, Todd Lynn whose clients include U2's Bono and Adam Clayton; The Rolling Stones' Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood; Courtney Love and P J Harvey to name but a few.   Fellow students, Sarah Haines, Brooke Hilden and Sarah Parry are all currently working with Luella Bartley, who has recently been appointed Visiting Professor of Fashion at UCF, on her new Spring/ Summer 2010 Collection to be shown at London Fashion Week in September.

"The students we have from UCF are amazing and truly some of the brightest, most hardworking and loveliest interns we have had in a long time at Luella," said Chief Designer, Julie Stokes. "They are an absolute pleasure to have around and we don't want them to leave!"

Three students have travelled further afield to enhance their skills and experience. Nandita Shroff jetted off to Mumbai, to join Indian Elle magazine; Abi Fay will be soaking up the sunshine in the South of France whilst working with sportswear retail giant, Decathlon France designing swimwear and Lilly Rice has secured herself two placements - the first with Howies, the sports brand which uses ethically sourced, high quality materials and gives a percentage of the company's turnover to environmental and social projects and the second with Nomis in Switzerland, the Australian football shoe manufacturer founded by former Adidas senior vice president, Simon Skirrow.

Michelle Gardiner is heading for Kent to join vintage fashion house, Reem, who reconstruct ‘new' one-off designs from vintage clothes and are particularly well-known for draping and the bias cutting of fabric which will give Michelle an invaluable opportunity to learn a variety of specialist techniques.

In Cornwall, Ruth Clarke and Jenny Welwert Gil are looking to gain invaluable experience at The Natural Fibre Company, a knit and spinning company that specialises in ecological luxury yarns; Niki Davidson will be joining Seasalt , the Cornish organic cotton brand that is the first fashion company to have garments certified to Soil Association standards; Lois Warwick and Katie Maddever will be gaining experience at the surf-inspired and environmentally conscious, Finisterre designing specialist clothing for surfers and Jenny Dobson will be working for RELAYS, the Regional Educational Legacy in Arts and Youth Sport.

"Fashion at Falmouth is quickly gaining a reputation for imaginative, talented and hard working students who are able to join these fashion houses and be an asset from the start," said Jane Gottelier, Joint Course Leader on BA(Hons) Fashion Design and BA(Hons) Performance Sportswear Design. "Our students are able to secure such superb placements at high-profile companies because we ensure that our courses meet the demands of the global industry."

For further information about BA(Hons) Fashion and BA(Hons) Performance Sportswear at University College Falmouth, visit www.falmouth.ac.uk/fashion or www.falmouth.ac.uk/performancesportswear, email admissions@falmouth.ac.uk or telephone Admissions on 01326 213852.

University College Falmouth is the only independent Higher Education institution in Cornwall with the powers to award degrees in its own name.  It has two campuses in Cornwall - at Woodlane in Falmouth and Tremough in Penryn (which it owns, and jointly manages with the University of Exeter) - and a third campus at Totnes in Devon, following its merger with Dartington College of Arts in 2008.

This merger created a new institution focusing on the expansion of Falmouth's expertise in Art, Design and Media and Dartington's expertise in Choreography, Music, Theatre, Art and Writing.  The Devon-based courses will relocate to a new, high-specification Performance Centre at Tremough in 2010, paving the way for a new specialist Arts University in Cornwall by 2012/2013 that will be unique to the South West.

The College is a founding partner in the Combined Universities in Cornwall (CUC), a unique initiative to promote regional economic regeneration through Higher Education, funded mainly by the European Union (Objective One), the South West Regional Development Agency, and the Higher Education Funding Council for England, with support from Cornwall Council.

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For further information about University College Falmouth, please contact Jilly Easterby MCIPR, Head of Public Affairs, Telephone: 01326 213792, or email:  jilly.easterby@falmouth.ac.uk

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