DMACC’s Fashion Show: Luminous Interlude

The DMACC Fashion Institute will host the 11th Annual Fashion Show on April 25 and 26 in the Building 5 Black Box Theatre. This year’s theme is “Luminous Interlude.” Producer and Fashion Design major Nyiel Mayen, from Des Moines, said the theme is inspired by night and day.

Tickets for the show have been sold out for all three time slots on Friday at 7 p.m., along with Saturday at 4 p.m. and 7 p.m.. There are still Live Stream Tickets available, and you can obtain a Live Stream Ticket at dmacc.edu/fashion however, a donation of $5 or more is requested.

Mayen said it is their first year being able to help lead the show. She said she is proud of the name and theme that they came up with this year, and collaboration with other students has been one of her main goals.

Fashion Professor Ann Gadbury said this show is different from previous years:  “There is a different crew each year, and the new crew includes new concepts and themes. The show is run how the crew wants to be, and the trends and styles are ever-evolving. Fashion will always advance based on what designers are looking for in innovation and what might be influencing them.”

Gadbury said her favorite thing about the show is seeing their confidence and assertiveness come through. She said, “[Students] become able to tackle challenges and use their creative thinking. They start to learn what they are capable of and what they might need help with. It’s the learning of the learning process and learning of ourselves and what we are capable of. 

“Fashion is fun, and people need to remember that. It’s art and it doesn’t have to be taken so seriously,” Gadbury added.

Grant Jones, from Virginia Beach, also majoring in Fashion Design, is the show director. He said past shows have struggled with music, but through Mayen and her friend, who produces beats, they can “curate their own music and make stuff specifically for the show and what the students are feeling and vibe with.”

He said the big goal is to make sure to showcase students’ creativity and designs in the show and showcase what they can do. 

He said a big responsibility is communication with each other and working as a team, along with making sure they are getting things done and everyone is doing their roles. He said the past couple of semesters and this show have taught him what it’s like to be a leader and work with peers to create something awesome for the designers in the program, and giving them an opportunity to showcase their creativity.

Jones offered advice for future students: “Our professors are amazing at their jobs and dedicated to students and the program, so I would suggest building a relationship with them so they can get the help they need when they do need it.” He said he wishes he used them more for guidance and went to them when he needed help. 

He said he believes in making sure people feel confident in what they wear and in sustainability. He said a lot of his style inspiration comes from New York City. 

“Luminous means shedding light in a dark space […] We were drawn to the duality of day and night like the contrast the sun and moon have.” He said it is a different theme that had not been seen before in past shows. 

Jones was recently accepted into a New York City school for Fashion Business, and he plans to transfer his DMACC credits into a bachelor’s degree. He said he will be in New York City getting experience with internships and working in the industry.

He said he wants to be a fashion stylist as his end goal. “Finding clients who are everyday people who need styling guidance and don’t have style themselves, and need someone to guide them.” 

Lacie Reitsma, from Ankeny and majoring in Fashion Design, is one of the designers featured in the show. She has been designing for a year and a half since she was a senior in high school. She came to DMACC because she was interested in learning how to sew, but the actual sewing class only ran in the spring semester, so she ‘settled’ with fashion. 

Reitsma said, “I realized that all the things I was drawing and painting were things I did because I liked what they were wearing. I thought it would be cool if I could draw something, but then make it real. That was the first time I realized maybe I want to be in fashion, and I should start taking classes for it.”

Reitsma said the theme is “kind of like a prom theme.” She said the scariest part about the Fashion Show is getting her designs done on time. She said, “You think you have all this time, and then you start sewing and things go wrong, and you have to make sure everything fits. There’s always something, even if you think everything is perfect, there’s always gonna be something.”

Reitsma started working last summer on her designs and has been thinking about them since the show ended last year. She said, “It’s scary and stressful, but then the show comes and you get to see your designs on stage and you’re like yeah I did that!” 

She said her inspiration for her designs is Barbie. She said she has a lot of Barbie dolls in her house that she admires and looks at every day with all their cool outfits, which inspire her and her designs.

She said, “I love Barbie so much and I am an OG Barbie fan, even before the movie.”

She said seeing her designs in the show is a relief, seeing all the hard work she put into it, and seeing others admire it and take pictures. She said people doing this and telling her they love it makes it all worth it. She quoted Lady Gaga’s song “Applause”: “I live for the applause. That’s what plays in my head when people are clapping and they like my design. It is such a good feeling and makes me so happy. It would be a shame if no one got to see all the work you did that you worked so hard on.”

She said she sees a future in fashion and wants to bring it to Iowa. She said a lot of people don’t see Iowa as a center for fashion, but she said they view it in that way because no one is working on it, and there has to be someone to bring the fashion, and that is how you will start the flow of fashion. She said, “I want to try to bring more fashion to Iowa. We need something here.”

Show producer Mayen said she plans to move to New York after DMACC, while also focusing on her clothing brand. She hopes to get an internship, as she said her ultimate goal is to be in couture and avant-garde if it were ever to be available for her. 

Her advice for future producers is to look back on previous things. Look back at Instagram, look back at the archives, look back at the emails, because there’s a platform already ready for you, so you don’t need to come empty-handed and stressed out.