Why a Fashion School Portfolio is Essential for Your Success
Are you considering applying to fashion school but unsure about the importance of a fashion portfolio?
We will explore the significance of a fashion school portfolio and why it is crucial for your application.
A strong portfolio can set you apart from other applicants by showcasing your skills, creativity, unique style, and aesthetic.
We will also discuss what should be included in a fashion school portfolio and provide tips on how to create a compelling one.
Let’s dive in!
Key Takeaways:
What Is a Fashion School Portfolio?
A fashion school portfolio is a compiled set of original work that demonstrates your ability to design and create clothing and accessories that convey an aesthetic. Portfolios typically include drawings, paintings, digital art, purchasing records of original clothing and accessories that you have designed, sewed, or styled, photographic examples of your clothing or fashion accessories’ appearance on actual people, physical and digital sketchbooks, mood boards, packages, etc.
The portfolio will be submitted with your fashion school application and as a future student in a fashion school, you will continue to collect and present works quarterly, semesters, or annually as part of the educational process. Developing a personal art or fashion collection is a vital, necessary part of gaining admission to any high-quality fashion program.
Why Do You Need a Fashion School Portfolio?
You may need a fashion school portfolio in order to get access to interviews or in order to meet admission requirements for a vast majority of fashion schools. The purpose of the fashion school portfolio is to provide evidence from your past of your creative and technical skills and demonstrate your potential for future success in the field.
While exact numbers are difficult to ascertain, the FashionUnited website states that there are over 500 institutions worldwide covering numerous disciplines within fashion that students can choose from to obtain a fashion-related education. One of the biggest factors in admission to these programs is the portfolio. In general, both undergraduate and postgraduate students are required to submit a portfolio either directly during the application process either directly with the application, or at a later stage.
The London College of Fashion, Loughborough University, Central Saint Martins, and University of Westminster, among others, all use student portfolios as part of the admission process.
Showcases Your Skills and Creativity
In a portfolio for fashion school, pictures showing your work in sketching, sewing, pattern making, finished garments on models (or on a dress form), along with fabric scanning, manipulation techniques, digital illustration, and Photoshop and CAD representation are used to demonstrate your creative skills and technical expertise. Your skill as a draughtsperson will be assessed.
Dan Sarzynski, a lecturer in fashion at the Indiana University of Pennsylvania, says, “You must demonstrate that you are academically prepared. This is whether you can sketch… how you see as a designer.” Along with the standard photograph format, your creative work may take different approaches such as videos, animations, 2.5D representations, or even on a dress.
Demonstrates Your Understanding of Fashion Principles
You need a portfolio for fashion school because it demonstrates your understanding of fashion principles. These are the basic laws that govern how people and organizations dress and transform simple clothing items into functional, protective, and aesthetic qualities.
These principles are not universal, but they act as very rough touchpoints across countries, industries, and social classes whether applied unconsciously as norms or deliberately as branding strategies. Understanding these principles is important for a fashion student to understand how and why different clothing components are put together.
Over time, fashion design has evolved into a form of art. You demonstrate your understanding of these principles by designing clothing items from scratch. One of the most used elements of design in fashion are the four fashion principles which are used by fashion designers when making artistic design choices. These are as follows according to the blog entry on Online Design Mag entitled SSIP on the Concept of Design Values and Different Types of Fashion.
- ✚Rhythm – Variation through repetition
- ✚Balance – Equilibrium within a design
- ✚Proportion – Relationship within a design
- ✚Emphasis – Drawing the eye to a focal point
Fashion schools look for portfolios with the appropriate understanding of these principles not only as requirements to graduate, but as items to create full entries that revel in the syntax of the four elements.
Highlights Your Unique Style and Aesthetic
Your portfolio for fashion school shows a full design spectrum from sketches to final products, demonstrating the improvement of both your designs and technical skills. This skill improvement can help to highlight your unique style and aesthetic to fashion school admissions professionals. The portfolio will show the development of your unique design style and utilization of quality pieces through numerous examples. If you have more than a handful of pieces to pick from, the progression and variants in your work will strengthen the overall product.
If you don’t yet have enough time to create portfolio pieces from scratch, look for opportunities to showcase concepts. It is a good way to apply a beautiful aesthetic concept that you might use for a project. For a document with a high number of sections, add a small visual element to each section to make it stand out. If you want to connect your portfolio to a design brand or business, add logos and banners to make your portfolio seem more professional. Elements of branding can be added in every section and in small subtle elements on every page of the document. Amrit Bath is a fashion student with versatile work that shows off his mastery of fashion styles. In this purple polo shirt, wide-leg pants, and white boots, he captures the essence of gentrification of the Georgian to the Victorian era with a self-designed and sewn shirt with tailored slacks. A series of pictures from the early and mid-2000s shows the inspiration for the look, as well as what his previous day to day attire was.
Sets You Apart from Other Applicants
A portfolio sets you apart from other applicants as it is a uniquely comprehensive representation of your background, motivations, skills, and personality. Factors such as attention to detail, energy level, intellect, organization, confidence, and creativity cannot fully be captured even in a formal interview. These intangibles, nonetheless, significantly influence admissions decisions and are frequently evident in the portfolio and missing from a formal resume. Moreover, the College of Fashion and Design states to explain your reasons for applying. The only place where your application and portfolio requirements may allow for detailed background, motivation, personality, and other factors pertinent to an application is the portfolio. For these reasons, the College of Fashion and Design recommends using your portfolio to differentiate your application and explain the value you would add to the program. Failure to use the portfolio to express educational goals and include personal details is at best a missed opportunity and at worst a practical detriment to the applicant’s chances.
What Should Be Included in a Fashion School Portfolio?
A fashion school portfolio should include pieces an applicant believes best represent their material, design, technical, and personal skills. The following is a list of items that should be included in a fashion school portfolio:
- Resume or CV: Highlight any on-topic work, internships, or education from secondary or tertiary institutions, and any awards or accolades.
- Cover letter: One page discussing your motivations for applying to this school and this specific program and your experience with fashion design and interest.
- Statement of interest: A short paragraph discussing your reasons for wanting to enroll in this specific program
- Research and mood boards: Your inspirations for collection design and material choices.
- Sketchbook pages and fashion illustrations: Different drawings will convey different styles, try and display as many as possible.
- Prototype clothing, accessories, or jewelry pieces: A 3D representation of your skills may be the most important piece of a portfolio.
- Product development pieces: Samples of CAD, pattern, or technical flat sketches.
- CAD/tech packs: For pieces you would normally send to a manufacturer (tech pack is a piece of materials that includes every item the manufacturer needs to produce the garment).
- Moodboards: Specific formulas and piece types for specific occasions or styles.
- Personal work: Stop-motion animation, photography design, poems, or other work you believe demonstrates design sensibility even if not strictly fashion related.
- Media and branding: Business plans and branding materials for a self-owned business.
- Others: Book reviews or responses, writing samples, look books, marketing materials and websites, visual portfolios, or anything else you believe would help make the case for your acceptance to fashion school.
Sketches and Design Work
Sketches and design work are the most crucial components of any fashion school portfolio. It is the ability to sketch out your designs in detail that allows one to express their unique aesthetic and design sensibilities. Sketching in a fashion school context usually signifies both technical drawings of fashion designs and more general drawings of figures with which one expects their designs to be seen.
In your fashion school portfolio, pick a selection of your best sketches, some of which may be figures and settings only, some of which may be outfit designs made on top of these figures. If you are applying to an undergraduate degree and do not have technical drawings or prototypes, additional sketches can make up for this lack.
Jenny is a new applicant and amateur fashion student. Uma is an experienced fashion student who has a diploma in the field. Jenny does not have a portfolio to refer to, but she does at least regularly keep a sketchbook where she practices her designs. Uma also has clearly marked date, time, and sketch school guidelines for ‘drawing in 30 minutes during the evening about any topic to free up their design mind’. Jenny’s weak sketches are improved by time until she gets admitted, while Uma’s stronger designs for a portfolio should be improved even more so as to demonstrate she deserves a scholarship to bypass the first sample check.
Sewing and Construction Projects
This section of a portfolio relates directly to the requirements of apparel design which usually includes textile science as part of its curriculum areas. Schools need to see examples of sewing and construction projects in a portfolio so they can gauge your expertise. Include examples of finished pieces which demonstrate basic sewing skills such as knowledge of fabric, utilization of patterns, and sewing machine operation as well as hand-stitching like hemming or beading. Furthermore, examples showing a more sophisticated understanding of construction including such things as added stretch, decorative seams, and body-shaping techniques will underline a strong foundation in clothing science required for an apparel designer.
Photography and Styling
Photography and styling are two fashion-specific skills that are often included in a fashion designer’s portfolio. At several top fashion design universities, they are part of the curriculum in one form or another.
Examples from their students’ shown are two degree programs by the London College of Fashion. The Integrated Foundation in Photography (IFP) and MA in Strategic Fashion Marketing. The IFP covers basic aspects such as shooting and retouching, basic body language, movement, styling, and developing a concept for brands. The MA examines real-world aspects of developing and selling a fashion line and uses visual expression to show creativity.
Photography and styling form the framework for visually presenting the artistic vision and functioning appeal of the student’s own designs. They can be done in three ways as stand-alone sections within a portfolio, integrated into existing designs, or presented as an executive-level summary of fashion looks.
The following portfolio examples find good alternatives throughout the portfolio for photographers and stylists. Alina’s vision board includes both colors, fabrics, and a professional-grade sketch. Big Five’s entire portfolio shows design in action from runway through to sales.
Research and Inspiration
Portfolios are useful collections of work that demonstrate ideas, materials, and techniques. They are a highly efficient way of showing research and inspiration. In this case, inspiration refers to the blending of research into a creative process. In portfolios for fashion school, students regularly choose an artist or designer whose work they admire. Then they analyze and record the design process, experiments, and final outcomes in the material. This process will help future designers and artists refine and expand their portfolio research materials, helping to influence their own work in exciting new ways.
Research for projects can greatly influence fashion and style. The many Fashion Researchers registered with the Professional Designers and Planners Community in Korea have contributed to the evolution of Korean design by filtering through data such as consumer preferences and regional markets, analysis of domestic/foreign trends and design techniques, checking design patents and infringement cases, advertising and branding strategies, and benchmarking against fashion goods from various countries. Prague College emphasizes the importance of research in the development of brand identities, colors, and textures. Portfolios allow this research to be easily communicated and shared.
How to Create a Strong Fashion School Portfolio?
To create a strong fashion school portfolio, follow these steps:
- Choose the right school. Understand what the requirements are for the school’s fashion program you are applying to.
- Conduct research. Look at different fashion school curriculums and talk to professionals to get a sense of what you should include in your portfolio.
- Differentiate your portfolio. Since you are an emerging designer with no professional experience, distinguish yourself from other applicants with the uniqueness of your work.
- Categorize your work. Separate your work into categories such as colour theory, garment design, object design, etc.
Start Early and Plan Ahead
If you are hoping to gain entrance based on a portfolio, it is advantageous to start early and plan ahead. Applicants to bachelors and master’s programs typically start working on their portfolio between seventeen and twenty-one years old, so even early as the latter years of high school, the early years of university, or during a gap year are not too soon to begin thinking about and creating a portfolio. In some cases, applicants to high-level courses at pre-college summer programs may need a portfolio just a few years after starting secondary school.
If you leave it until the last minute, you may end up cramming and delivering a less than perfect portfolio. Sketchbook Magazine advises that last spring CEOs of admissions offices were hearing the most common answer to “When did you start your Fashion portfolio?” as “Two weeks ago”. If possible, consider pre-college summer course places such as those at FIDM, which can be an excellent environment to build a portfolio months or years in advance of needing it.
Showcase a Variety of Skills and Techniques
Yes, you need a portfolio for fashion school to showcase various skills and techniques. Preparing a versatile fashion school portfolio gives the assessors a more comprehensive indication of an applicant’s qualifications. Here is how a portfolio can showcase various skills and techniques:
- Concept Development and Research: Storyboards in the form of tear sheets, mood boards, magazine clippings, illustrations, and pattern specs completed by hand.
- Computer Skills: CAD drawings, PDM designs, illustration, tech packs, digital renderings of design ideas, and 3D imaging of designs for various fashion and clothing software programs.
- Problem-solving Applications: Samples which indicate the application of creative problem-solving skills in designing a garment or accessory that is in some way innovative.
- Technical Drawing: Illustrations in various styles, such as the historical illustrative style of Charles Dana Gibson, as well as more realistic prosaic designs, such as those done by Gladys Perint Palmer which illustrates a variety of fabric textures including silk, fur, leather, and knits.
- Template Creation: Sketches and templates colored manually using pastels, colored pencils, acrylic washes, pen and ink, and watercolor.
- Print Design: Designs printed on fabric for clothing or textiles and prints for paper products including greeting cards, scarves, and decorative handkerchiefs and pillows containing similar coordinated design elements.
- Fabric Manipulation: Examples of fabric manipulations, such as smocking, appliqué, piecing, quilting, and trapunto, illustrated with samples of origami, pleating, crinoline, and various types of drapery and folds.
The portfolio below created by ZSO features a wide variety of skills and techniques in preparing a portfolio for application to The Parsons School of Design in New York City. Though the visuals are simple black on white silhouettes and in earthy colors, this portfolio extensively showcases a wide array of techniques and skills.
Tailor Your Portfolio to the Specific School or Program
Most schools are willing to consider non-traditional portfolios if they show the creative and technical skills the school is looking for. If you are applying to more than one school, then tailor your portfolio to show the specific skills and interests that schools look for. Institute Marangoni values both creativity and business acumen, which shows the end-to-end knowledge of what it takes to design and produce a product such as an item of fashion clothing. Meanwhile, at Polimoda, the leatherbound paper sketchbook steals the show again.
Get Feedback and Make Revisions
If you were asked by a university art or design class to change or add examples to your portfolio, you would likely rush to comply. The same consideration should be applied to one for a fashion school. Get feedback and make revisions regularly.
Once drafts of your portfolio are done, get feedback from peers, teachers, and professionals. Not only would they be able to provide valuable suggestions on what to improve, but they could also assist in pointing out things that should not even be in the portfolio. If you are having trouble creating a portfolio, remember that tutors are available to help guide you through the process during their spare time if they are notified early on. Reach out to peers who may also be struggling with the portfolio.
You could provide them some suggestions, get some from them in return, or just work together to motivate each other. As professionals or teachers, Peers and collaborators are good places to get honest feedback. You should ask them the following questions:
- does your portfolio come off as arrogant or humble?
- does it come across as cohesive or collections are disjointed?
- What items work well and what should you consider changing?
- Is there anything important that you may be forgetting?
Conclusion: Is a Fashion School Portfolio Necessary?
It depends on the school and the program department’s requirements. While most fashion schools require a portfolio to evaluate a prospective student’s potential in the industry, there are 2-year degrees and some 3-year or 4-year degree programs that do not. Programs that do not require a portfolio are often overwhelmingly theory and research-based, whereas courses with practical skills training and hands-on experience do.
Whether a portfolio is necessary or not, students can improve their chances of acceptance to a fashion school with an acceptable design portfolio by seeking out internships, participating in community service projects, and aligning class assignments with career goals. It takes a bit of additional work and creativity, but most students will have very little difficulty putting together the components of a design portfolio that satisfies admissions requirements.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do you really need a portfolio for fashion school?
Yes, a portfolio is an essential part of applying for fashion school. It showcases your creativity, skills, and potential as a fashion design student. Admissions committees often use portfolios to evaluate applicants and determine their suitability for the program.
What should be included in a fashion school portfolio?
A fashion school portfolio should include a variety of work that demonstrates your design skills, such as sketches, illustrations, photographs of garments you have created, and any other fashion-related projects or assignments. It should also showcase your unique style and aesthetic.
Can I use old artwork or designs in my fashion school portfolio?
Yes, you can use old artwork or designs in your fashion school portfolio. However, make sure they are relevant and demonstrate your current skills and creative abilities. It’s also important to show a variety of work and not rely solely on old pieces.
Do fashion schools have specific requirements for portfolios?
Yes, each fashion school may have different requirements for portfolios. Some may have specific guidelines on the number of pieces to include, format, and presentation. It’s important to carefully read and follow the requirements of each school you are applying to.
Can I include non-fashion related work in my fashion school portfolio?
Yes, you can include non-fashion related work in your fashion school portfolio, especially if it showcases your creativity and design skills. However, make sure to also include a significant amount of fashion-related work to demonstrate your interest and experience in the field.
Can I submit a digital portfolio for fashion school?
Yes, many fashion schools now accept digital portfolios. However, it’s important to follow the specific guidelines and requirements for digital submissions, such as file formats and size limitations. Make sure to also include high-quality images that accurately represent your work.
