Students in spotlight at Shanghai Fashion Week

International exposure is an essential element in the education of China's homegrown designers, said experts and industry insiders on the sidelines of the 2018 Fall/Winter Shanghai Fashion Week, which concluded on April 10.

The biannual fashion event has served not only as a stage for established and rising designers from across the world, but also for promising talent, especially students from the city's major design institutes, such as the Shanghai Institute of Visual Art (SIVA), Donghua University and Raffles Design Institute.

During this month's event, students showcased their projects, many of which contained elements inspired by Chinese culture, such as hand-drawn illustrations of "The Sea Map" from the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), a design that juxtaposed Chinese yin and yang with carved motifs of Terracotta Warriors on leather outerwear.

Some of the creations won high praise from industry experts.

"This graduation series illustrates how creative the students are when it comes to the design process, style development and production," said Willie Walters, the former director of the fashion program at Central Saint Martins, a prestigious art and design college in London.

"Their work is comparable to those by undergraduate students at Saint Martins."

Li Keling, dean of the Fashion Design Institute at SIVA, said such positive feedback represented a nod to China's recent efforts to improve fashion design education by fostering greater international collaboration. In line with this government objective, SIVA set up an advanced program with DeTao Masters Academy in 2014 that aims to cultivate innovative talent with a global perspective. The institute also regularly invites foreign designers to give lectures. During this year's Shanghai event, 55 SIVA students showcased 100 creations.

"While we encourage our students to observe how the big international fashion brands work, we also urge them to look into our own culture for design inspiration," she said.

Li pointed out that she was particularly impressed by the collection featuring Terracotta Warriors carved on leather outwear.

"Confidence and acceptance of our own culture are important in creating a true Chinese brand," she said.

Zhang Yu, a 22-year-old student from SIVA who impressed the audience with her cheese-inspired collection, said the fashion week was a rare chance for her to learn from international counterparts.

"I think the most obvious characteristic of a foreign designer is his or her bold use of colors. This is something Chinese designers can do more," she said. Zhang considered it a blessing to be able to study fashion in Shanghai, a city she said "has great potential to become the trendsetter in China".

Patrick Gottelier, a professor who teaches in the SIVA-DeTao program, agreed with this sentiment, saying the city serves as a great platform for students to learn from world leaders in fashion, textile and apparel design and manufacturing.