Word: eleganza
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...While Eleganza seeks to democratize fashion, Project East tries to maintain and celebrate its elusive haute couture nature. The designers are either high-end stars like Derek Lam and Vera Wang or students at the prestigious art colleges Parsons, The New School for Design, or Rhode Island School of Design. These clothes represent avant-garde thesis projects of student designers and the seasonal collections that debut on fashion capital runways...
...Eleganza can lean more on its establishment; it regularly attracts over 1,500 students each year, books stars like Jadakiss and Fabolous, and garners national attention—as the April 2010 issue of Teen Vogue demonstrates. Olamide E. Oladipo, an associate producer for Eleganza who oversees finances, points to their reputation as a draw for potential sponsors. “Companies have either heard of us before when we reached out to them five years ago or have never heard of us before, but trust us and are impressed when they see the long list of our past sponsors...
Unlike the other two shows, Eleganza does not receive funding through their connection with Black C.A.S.T. “They are our formal umbrella, but we don’t really have financial ties to them,” Oladipo says. Still, Eleganza’s multicultural make-up can still attract sponsors. “For companies that are looking for diversity recruiting, they are really interested in our models so we give them resume books with profiles of all our executives and models,” she adds...
...more willing to sign on,” says Farah S. Qadar ’10, the president of the Association of Minority Business Leaders and Entrepreneurs (AMBLE), which recently organized and hosted a conference on the Fashion, Media, and Entertainment Industries. Oladipo also notes the charitable aspect of Eleganza as an advantage in finding funding. “For some, the charity aspect is the reason why they donate to us,” she says...
...profits from Eleganza annually go to the Center for Teen Empowerment, which equips and encourages young adults to enact positive change in their communities in the Boston area. Likewise, this year Identities donated their profits to Artists For Humanity, which seeks to reduce socioeconomic and racial divisions by empowering underprivileged kids with paid employment in the arts in Boston. Project East, however, was the only show of the three to donate directly back to the community which supported them: in 2009, profits went to the China Tomorrow Education Fund to help build a school in rural China...