Yishu Yan puts Hong Kong in spotlight at 2019 Arts of Fashion Foundation Competition

ITC PhD student Yishu Yan recently had the exciting opportunity to attend the 18^th Arts of Fashion Foundation Competition which was held at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco on 16 December 2019.  This is one of the most fierce design competitions in the world for students. Among the hundreds of applications from 85 schools and universities in 28 countries and regions, Yishu represented Hong Kong as one of the 50 shortlisted finalists who flaunted their skills on the runway, and were judged by some very iconic international fashion designers including Yiqing Yin and Noureddine Amir from the Chambre Syndicale of Haute Couture of Paris, and Jasper Chadprajong-Smith of the Rhode Island School of Design, as well as emerging fashion designers, Alicia Declerck and Brandon Wen.

Mentored by Prof Kinor Jiang and Dr Jinyun Zhou, Yishu transformed her PhD research work into a collection called ‘The Opposites’ to complement this year’s theme - ‘Verticality’.  Inspired by the lyrics of a song in the Audio Architecture exhibition which uses pairs of contradictory words to explore the relationship between sound and architecture, Yishu created a women’s knitwear collection that can be worn in many different ways.  She used flexible knitted fabric to create fashion elements that complement but also contradict each other and successfully highlighted the essence of transitional garments.   

About the Arts of Fashion Foundation Competition

The Arts of Fashion Foundation Competition aims to promote and reward creativity and inventiveness; discover emerging talent and facilitate careers; establish enriching contacts and exchanges between different countries, schools and universities; and foster new relationships between those from different industries and fields.