Using fashion and identity to engage future students from diverse backgrounds

Community21 worked with Juliana Sissions as widening participation champion at The University of Brighton to engage young people from diverse backgrounds in a creative process of considering and expressing their identity.

The process was aimed at them experiencing how designers in higher education construct creative projects that are self defined. Equally how contemporary design often considers notion of politics and personal experience and opinion as valid aspects of expressive creative culture valued by fashion culture.

We presented a workshop that explored how fashion brands relate to and exploit notions of 'identity'. Young participants were asked to consider their opinions, their experiences and politics and their identity. They then created clothing looks and ideas for brands and brand identities that represented themselves.

Fashion photographers and the Community21 team helped the the young people to construct a 'look book' that they were able to model in and express their own identities.