Runway Pictures: Marie Claire x LOFT x Rimmel Front Row Challenge UT Fashion Show, Mohawk Austin Texas

(Photos Courtesy of: JEJ Commercial Photgraphy )

Me with Marie Claire Senior Fashion Editor Zanna Roberts Rassi backstage before the show


FULL runway set + more pictures on my Facebook Page...
Behind-the-scenes summary HERE


As many of you may know, the fashion show I produced finally came and passed on Thursday. I kept meaning to write this post afterwards but felt like there was so much to digest that I didn't want to just crank a post out. My Facebook's Profile Review is frozen due to the 300+ tags I got over 24 hours. I feel like my brain is mirroring that freeze right now as just too much happened in too short a period of time.
My involvement: Styling the outfits (head-to-toe for the last 4, accessorized the first 10), makeup /hair coordination with the help of Laura and Liz, model casting, venue selection, music selection, event promotion, and more. I flew out in September to style these outfits at LOFT's HQ and to start on the makeup looks at Rimmel's HQ. 
There were many different facets that I wanted to point out that made this show particularly meaningful to me...
-The exposure of the Austin talents to the rest of the country. From the beginning of show production I wanted a delicate balance of using the best of the resources/talents I had on hand and yet use LOCAL people to fill those roles. This came in the form of Laura Martinez (did NYFW shows) for makeup, Liz Nevin (hair stylist of the year) for hair, Waytao Shing (did work for WWD, sold images to People's, etc) for photography, Ed Lehmann on video, and a bevy of Wilhemina Brown, The Campbell Agency, Butterfly and Kim Dawson models. The hard work paid off and Marie Claire and LOFT were both very impressed with the professionalism exhibited in the hair, makeup, models, photography and cinematography departments.
-The support of the entire Austin fashion community. From the various mentions, press and help I've gotten from University Fashion Group/Dog and Pony/Pom PR/Austin Fashion Week/Culture Map (1, 2)/The Daily Texan/The Horn (1, 2) to just the sheer amount of local fashion friends that showed up to the show OVERWHELMED me. Mohawk's rooftop was packed to the point that there were guests standing on the staircase trying to get a good view of the show. Not to mention the various fashion friends I've made over the years like J, Cathy, Brittney, Joanna, Indiana, Tiffany and Jen (who drove down from Houston to see the show!) that showed up to support me.
-The support of the UT community. From the feature on the College of Natural Science website thanks to Dr. Iverson, to my research professor Dr. Georgiou's many encouragements and congratulations, to the undergraduate ChE advisor Kelly's time spent comforting my nerves and supporting me, to Dr. Randall showing up to the show, to my research mentor Will rounding up two other engineering grad students from our biotech research lab to attend a fashion show for the first time in their lives, to my chemical engineering classmates (shout out to Erin, Ashley, and Tiffany!) attending the show. Once again, I did NOT expect this much support from my wonderful chemical engineering and biochemistry faculty. When I won this contest, I did not ever expect a single sincere congratulations from my majors' departments and yet everyone has been immensely supportive.
-The support of my family. I have never told my parents about this fashion blog as it's kind of silly to tell your parents that you post outfits to the public on a semi-daily basis. When I was going to be featured on Marie Claire and I knew the extent of the coverage of the show, I knew I had to come clean and finally tell them of my involvement in fashion. I did not expect anything outside a congratulations. Instead, I was once again overwhelmed by my family's support when they showed up with a team of our family friends and my siblings bearing flowers to give to me after the show.
-The support of all my long-time friends. One of my best friends Katie was there the entire day of the show to help me calm my nerves, do last minute styling, and also was present in the preparation dates leading up to the event. Tim was there to keep me sane throughout the entire process and tiredlessly drove me to all the destinations, not to mention take all the photos for this blog pictures that helped me won this challenge in the first place. Jimmy flew down from San Francisco to see my show and drove me back that night to Mohawk when I realized I left my jewelry box there. Liena made it to the show early, a first for her since our running joke is that whatever time she actually arrives is approximately 2 hours behind whenever she said she would. Rachel showed up with her roommate and actually cheered loudly when I took my final walk.
-The massive amount of undeserved help I got along the way from locals, Marie Claire, and LOFT.  Staff at Marie Claire probably received well over 100 emails from me bearing questions and concerns from the show.

Thank you Marie Claire, LOFT, Rimmel and Austin friends/professionals for making this show a success!

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