Representing the creative future

How to apply to CLASS OF 2020VISION

As graduate shows are forced to become digital discovery platforms, here is how you can apply to Class of 2020Vision, a next generation final year show supporting the next generation of fashion brands.

How to apply to Class of 2020VIsion

While the graduate show is built up to be the cap-and-gown crowning moment of any educational experience, COVID-19 has radically redefined this moment for the Class of 2020. 

The final-year show is supposed to provide the physical reveal of years spent in the classroom, allowing them to present their work to friends, family, industry professionals and the general public alike. This year’s graduates have adapted, innovated, reimagined and repositioned for all manner of virtual displays. As democractic discovery platforms, these are powerful tools which hint at a more inclusive showcase future. But however inviting, engaging and richly diverse these experiences have been and will continue to be over the coming weeks, they deprive the graduates of their “moment”.

In response to the cancellation of physical graduate shows, Class of 2020Vision is offering five final-year BA and MA students the opportunity to show their work in an immersive takeover of the old Central Saint Martins building in Holborn that blurs the line between physical and digital in a socially-distanced, multimedia-enhanced exhibition. To help realise their takeover of The Koppel Project Campus, each of the five graduates awarded exhibition space will be connected with potential supporters, including experiential show producers and creative collaborators.

This opportunity is open to any final year BA or MA design student that will be in the UK throughout the summer who daydreams of launching their own conscious and forward thinking fashion brand, while changing the system from the roots up. This isn’t a competition, it’s an invitation to be the change and help define fashion’s new normal post-pandemic. It is one the student-focussed activations of #2020Vision, a reactive initiative that aims to support independent fashion businesses through the COVID-19 crisis, while enabling system change testing. After publishing an evolving white paper, the collective of independent fashion businesses are using a cloud-based sustainable supply chain tool, the XYZ.EXCHANGE, to  connect with supporters to make use of resources shared by institutions, landlords, manufacturers, retailers, media, mentors and more, to enable real and positive change. The resulting partnerships will champion inclusivity, diversity and sustainability as they test change at every stage in the product cycle from design to production, retail to recycling, and education to business management.

For Class of 2020Vision, this means that in the months following the exhibition, the initiative will support two graduates as they develop their own labels. Ultimately, this is a rare opportunity for this year’s graduates to physically present their work, both safely and amplified by resources shared by supporters, followed by an even rarer opportunity to define just how they enter the market responsibly and positively.

 

Apply here via AC.XYZ.EXCHANGE or share your portfolio to connect@xyzexchange by Friday 17 July 2020.