Jewels of Winter: Missy’s Solo Fashion Show

Please join Fashion Research Institute student intern Missy Lavecchia at her first solo fashion installation for her fashion label, Bella Fantasique. Missy is a senior at Buffalo State University who is working on her internship in avatar apparel with Fashion Research Institute. Missy has been working hard at developing her most recent collection of romantic gowns, which will be featured on Monday, December 7th at 7 pm ET in the Fashion Research Institute Second Life Shengri La Hope region. To attend this event, please follow this link.

Jewels of Winter Student Intern Fashion Installation in Shengri La SL

Please join Fashion Research Institute student intern Missy Lavecchia at her first solo fashion installation for her fashion label, Bella Fantasique. Missy is a senior at Buffalo State University who is working on her internship in avatar apparel with Fashion Research Institute. Missy has been working hard at developing her most recent collection of romantic gowns, which will be featured on Monday, December 7th at 7 pm ET in the Fashion Research Institute Second Lfie Shengri La Hope region.

A dozen gorgeous ladies and four sizzling gentlemen will model Missy’s romantic gowns in a perfect winter wonderland setting designed by FRI CEO Shenlei Winkler.  The gowns will be shown in movement as well as still so that visitors may see how the gowns flow and the details of Missy’s work.  Please join us for the end of semester showing for Missy Lavecchia.

Threading the Needle Design Conference, All Day in ScienceSim

Please join us in the OpenSim grid Science Sim for a history-making, ground-breaking fashion design conference.  8 globally recognized speakers will share their insights on fashion, the apparel industry, design education, and managing your career and your label in this $1.7 trillion industry.

Registration information is here: http://needlethreading.com/Register_To_Attend.html

8:30-8:50 am	Keynote: Shenlei Winkler, Fashion Research Institute
9:00-9:045 am	Fiona Jenvey, Mudpie
10:00-10:45	Elaine Polvinen, Buffalo State University
11:00-11:45 am	Michiel Thissen, Mythos Consultancy
12:00 noon – 12:45 pm	Suzie Norris-Reeves, Southampton Solent University
1:00 – 1:45 pm	Lynn Furge, Nolcha
2:00 – 2:45 pm	Crosby Noricks, PR Couture & Harper Beresford
3:00-3:45 pm	Beth Harris, MOMA & Steven Zucker, FIT

Jewels of Winter Student Intern Fashion Installation

Please join us in the Fashion Research Institute’s Shengri La Hope region in Second Life on Monday, December 7th from 7-8 pm ET for the student intern fashion installation for Missy Lavecchia, an undergraduate fashion design student at Buffalo State University.

Missy has been interning with us for the past nine months, and we are proud and honored to present her first solo fashion show.  Missy will be showing formal gowns developed in rich jewel tones in honor of the holiday season.  Her gowns, fittingly enough, will be presented in an opulent winter wonderland of snow and ice.  A dozen gorgeous models and 4 handsome gentlemen callers will showcase Missy’s romantic gowns in a tableaux befitting the set.

Please join us on Monday December 7th, at 7 pm ET/4 pm PT in Shengri La Second Life to celebrate the outstanding work of this star performer as her models show her work with aplomb.

Patterning History: Preparing for the First (Ever!) Virtual World-Based Fashion Design Conference

As the conference organizers of the first ever virtual worlds-based conference specifically created just for the apparel industry, one of the interesting things about working on this conference is that everyone involved knows they are making history in presenting at this event.  Not only is this the first ever virtual worlds-based fashion design conference, but we have chosen to present this in OpenSim, which is an extensible virtual world platform.

There are a lot of firsts here:

* Content licensing for the architecture, graciously provided by Jon Brouchard of The Arch Network;

* Organizing 8 world-class, globally recognized speakers from the apparel industry who have agreed to pioneer into this brave new space;

* Completely developing 8 regions of premium content for the Conference

* Leveraging all of the mature Web 2.0 technologies in conjunction with an incredibly powerful emerging technology

* Presenting to a design conference to a global audience, where anyone with the ‘right’ combination of hardware and bandwidth can attend, free of charge to them.  They don’t need to travel or even to leave home!

* Defining the requirements for an event of this scope and developing a superb use case for industry conferences held in virtual worlds.

The team working on presenting this conference have been working diligently at preparing the regions and ensuring that everything works smoothly.  Shown here are images from the regions, which are open for visitors, and which will remain open after the conference.  Please remember that if you wish to attend, you must have a Skype account for telephony and a ScienceSim account for the actual conference.  You must also register; we will be processing registrations up till 10 pm on December 2nd.  You will receive a confirmation email with login directions for the audio portion of the conference late on December 2nd.

Please make sure you log in to ScienceSim in advance to acquaint yourself with the conference space, and to take advantage of the opportunity to customize your avatar.  Fashion Research Institute is providing two areas for this purpose.  The Quickstart region in Shengri La Spirit 01 enables visitors to quickly select from choices for both men and women as well as a complete ‘corporate’ avatar look.  The shopping region in Shengri La Spirit 22, where visitors can select from a wider array of clothing and other options in a full region.  Both regions may be easily reached from the initial login site by simply left clicking the touch boards placed at the initial log in site.

Everything in the conference regions are left or right click enabled, and there are ample ‘teleporters’ placed throughout the conference regions to enable easy movement.  There are 9 regions of interest, which include the conference region (Shengri La Thread)with auditorium and exhibits.  these exhibits include a poster session by Professor Suzie Norris of Southampton Solent; business services displays by Nolcha and Mythos Consultancy; and an exhibit by Fashion Research Institute.  Additional regions include shopping (Shengri La Spirit 22), intern work (Shengri La Spirit 21), an industrial design exhibit (Shengri La Pencil), an art region (Shengri La Spirit 00), the FRI virtual campus and library (Shengri La Spirit 01 and 02), and a virtual runway (Shengri La Spirit 10).  The historic large scale build Shengri La Spirit anchors the conference space and may be visited by all.

We would like to thank Mic Bowman and his coworkers at Intel Labs for collaborating with us on this project.  Their work has been instrumental in enabling the presentation of this conference for the benefit of a global audience fo fashion design students, designers, and educators.  We would also like to thank the Intel Corporation for providing hardware, hosting and ensuring visitors have appropriate bandwidth for the conference.

Please remember to register, and we’ll see you there!

Threading the Needle Design Conference, Thursday December 3rd

Threading the Needle: The Future of Fashion Design Conference

Fashion Research Institute  invites you to attend Threading the Needle: The Future of Fashion Design, the first virtual world-based fashion design conference in history.

Please join us on Thursday, December 3rd from 8 am – 5 pm EDT at this free conference for fashion design students and new designers.

Threading the Needle gathers eight fashion industry thought leaders to present their views on a range of topics aimed at a global audience of new  fashion designers and fashion educators. These engaging speakers will be discussing everything form managing your fashion career, to new paradigms in educating design students and designers in innovative ways.  Attendees may attend one or all of the sessions, simply register in advance for the conference to assure your space.

Conference speakers include:

Lynn Furge, Creative Director, Nolcha “Image is Everything“

Fiona Jenvey, CEO, Mudpie
“Consideration: Female S/S 2011 Trend Report“

Beth Harris, Director of Digital Learning, MOMA-NYC and
Steven Zucker, Dean of Graduate Studies, FIT, “The Future of Education: What Will Open, Three-Dimensional Learning Look Like?”

Crosby Noricks, Founder, PR Couture in a conversation with Harper Beresford

Suzie Norris-Reeves, FHEA, Head of School, Southampton Solent University, “Exploring Innovative Pedagogy in a Virtual World“

Elaine Polvinen, Professor & Coordinator – Fashion Textile Technology, Buffalo State University
“Remaining Relevant: Multidimensional Education for Fashion“

Michiel Thissen, Founder, Mythos Consultancy, “Tips for a Successful Fashion Career“

Shenlei Winkler, CEO, Fashion Research Institute
Keynote: “Virtual Worlds and Fashion Design Education“

In addition to the presentation track, additional displays will be available for conference attendees to visit.  These include a virtual fashion installation with fashions created by the Fashion Research Institute’s student interns; booths and displays about programs from other fashion industry organizations; and exhibits about fashion history.

The trendy conference architecture is being provided by The ARCH Techwork. Hosting and hardware for the event are being graciously provided by Intel Corporation with additional support from Intel Labs.  Threading the Needle is a HASTAC@ event. The conference is being presented and sponsored by Fashion Research Institute.

The conference is free for all attendees; registration closes at midnight ET on December 2nd.  To register, please visit the conference web site.  For more information, please email admin @ fashionresearchinstitute.com or visit the conference web site, needlethreading.com.

Virtual Fashion Internships for Winter 2010

Virtual apparel is a burgeoning market.  In 2007, more than $2.6 billion dollars of virtual goods were sold in virtual worlds, games, and immersive spaces.  This figure is expected to double in 2010. Avatar apparel – clothing, accessories, and footwear worn by avatars – is a huge part of these sales.  Until now, there have been no programs specifically intended to help new designers become established in this area.

After more than 3 years of development, the Fashion Research Institute is pleased to announce 5 avatar apparel design internships to be conducted wholly in the immersive workspaces it maintains in OpenSim and Second Life.

The focus of the internship is to develop skills for virtual goods development, specifically apparel with a lesser focus on accessories and footwear.  The intent of the internship is to assist interns to develop private design practices where they can create and sell their virtual goods. Interns are provided with classroom space and creation space in FRI’s OpenSim regions, and store front space on the heavily trafficked Shengri La regions in Second Life.  Interns are taught using the patent-pending design methodology created by Fashion Research Institute, which is applicable to both avatar apparel and to their work developing physical apparel.

These internships will begin January 25th and run until April 30.  Interns are expected to commit a minimum of 6-8 hours a week to the internship, with formal training sessions provided on Monday evenings from 6-9 pm ET.  Interns must commit to being present at these training sessions.  Instruction is provided only in English.

At the end of their internships, interns’ work will be presented in a virtual fashion runway show, with live models which the interns will style from hair to shoes.  All interns will complete their internship with Fashion Research Institute with a completed collection of avatar apparel including concept boards to product ads, which may be added to their portfolio. A final presentation of their work will be created.  Our Summer interns’ runway show can be viewed here.

Requirements:

Interns must provide their own Internet access and computer hardware and software sufficient to allow them access to the Institute’s classroom and facilities in the immersive OpenSim and Second Life regions of Shengri La.  Interns must have experience with and access to Photoshop (not provided). Interns must have a Second Life avatar account (available free), and are solely responsible for any fees related to their Second Life account.   Interns must also have a Skype account (free) with access to it during training periods.

Interns who successfully complete the 12 week long program will receive a certificate of completion and may be eligible for admission into the Fashion Research Institute incubation program.

Applicants may be currently enrolled in design school or recent graduates. Some design experience and background is required; these internships are not suitable for freshmen.  Internships begin January 25th.

To apply, send your resume with 1-2 fashion images you have sketched or illustrated along with contact information to admin @ fashionresearchinstitute.com.  Deadline for application is January 15th.

Views of Fernland on ScienceSim

We were honored recently when we were asked by the team at Intel Labs to develop 16 landscaped and terraformed regions for use in Aaron Duffey’s Fernland regions, which were recently seen as part of Intel CTO Justin Rattner’s keynote at Supercomputing 09.  The Fernland regions include a dozen outer regions developed for visual appeal, and four central regions which contained Aaron’s actual data visualization of his fern genome simulations.

The regions include about 100,000 life forms which include spores, gametophytes, and sporophytes.  (The gametophytes are the small flat green things, the sporophytes are the more fernlike objects).  We shot these images last Saturday, just before Fernland’s servers were taken offline to take over to the Supercomputing 09 site, but we held off showing them till after the keynote.  Here is Fernland on the ScienceSim grid, in all of its glory, ferns and all.

Remember, you can visit Fernland in ScienceSim – just make an avatar or Hypergrid over and then locate Fernland on the world map and teleport over.

Land in the outer apron regions – you’ll be rerouted because they are one megaregion, but once there, you will be able to see the entire sweeping set of regions.

Thanks again to the team for inviting the Fashion Research Institute to contribute to this effort for Aaron’s ferns.

Shenlei Winkler, CEO, Fashion Research Institute, Speaking at Supercomputing 09

Shenlei Winkler, CEO, Fashion Research Institute, will be joining Intel CTO Justin Rattner on stage at his keynote speech at Supercomputing 09 to discuss how high performance computing coupled with virtual world technology such as OpenSim can help the apparel industry design its product faster, better, and with less waste.  This keynote will be streamed over the web on the Supercomputing 09 website on Tuesday, at 11:30 am ET/8:30 am PT.

Fashion Research Institute is a NYC-based company working in the areas of OpenSim-based technology applications for the apparel industry.  FRI has been leading the industry in innovative design concepts using virtual worlds to cut costs, cut design and development time, and reduce the industry’s carbon footprint – in some cases by as much as 65%.

Shenlei Winkler (Shenlei Flasheart in SL) is a 30 year veteran of the fashion industry. Her work spans both couture and mass market design and development for the real life apparel industry. A successful designer, her lifetime sales of her real life apparel designs have now reached more than $70 million USD, with more than 25 million-dollar styles in her portfolio. Her couture work has appeared extensively on stage and movie screen.

Winkler has also enjoyed success in Second Life, where she has designed fashion since 2005, with three popular brands including Prim & Proper (one of the top Second Life earners in 2006), Flash & Trash, and Debutante. Her educational background includes three design degrees, including two from the prestigious Fashion Institute of Technology.

She has also been instrumental in developing large-scale creative installations in OpenSim-based worlds, most notably Shengri La Spirit, previously hosted by IBM, and Shengri La Gallery, both of which may currently be visited as publicly accessible regions hosted by Intel Corporation on the ScienceSim grid.

Founder of the Fashion Research Foundation, a nonprofit organization focused on helping designers achieve their dreams with dignity, integrity and respect, she is currently the CEO of the Fashion Research Institute which is focused on researching and developing virtualization technologies with particular emphasis for the apparel industry. She is an adjunct professor at FIT and Buffalo State University. Her research areas include content licensing for virtual goods, apparel industry virtualization in immersive workspaces, OpenSim enterprise application development, and user immersion in virtual worlds. Her most recent publications include Designing Dreams: The Art & Business of Avatar Apparel Design & Development, and Shengri La Spirit: A Designer’s Perspective of the Making of OpenSim, both available on Amazon.  Her newest book, Scouts, Pioneers, and Settlers: Virtualizing Business will be available on Amazon in January 2010.

Winkler may often be found in the Fashion Research Institute Shengri La regions in Second Life, where her innovative fashion events may be experienced first hand.

For more information about the Fashion Research Institute, please visit our web site or our regions on the ScienceSim, vBusiness or Second Life grids.

Transformation – the Delicate Jewelry of Cocoon

Fashion Research Institute “Transformation”
Jewelry Installation for Designers in the Emerging Avatar Apparel Design Program

Saturday, 7 am PDT, in the scenic Shengri La  estate in Second Life.

A baker’s dozen of lovely ladies bedecked with opulent jewels and a couple of haute men in a romantic garden set showcase the exceptional work of Fashion Research Institute Marketplace designer Yoona Mayo (cocoon).  The quality of this designer’s work is belied by her fairly recent entrance into the jewelry making community.  Prepare to be romanced by the delicate elegance of these gorgeous pieces daintily draped around throats  and dangling from the ears of our lovely models, who will each display one set of Yoona’s work.  Please join us for this unique fashion-meets-art installation of fashion displayed artistically.

Yoona’s designer statement:

Cocoon Fine Jewelry.

SL is the world where the thing that I want to make can be made. I can make imaginary shape in SL, although there is a little restriction. I want to design a unique, beautiful shape and make accessories that actually exist.  I want to be always original…I am bearing it in mind although it is the most difficult to do, an original design.

I think that it is important to add individuality from the hint to the design because the hint  is received from various information.  I am delighted when my friend is pleased when accessories are presented.  Friend’s impression and opinion of accessories become hints of the following work.  The hint is very important for me.  My enjoyment in SL  is to make accessories. Prim’s transformation is difficult, and it is difficult to reflect my idea in accessories when there is upper limit of the number of Prim.  However, I get excited very much when my image was able to be reflected in  accessories under such situations.  Another enjoyment is a conversation with my friends. I often obtain  ideas and hints of the following work from the conversation with my friends.

The jewelry shown today is the culmination of a nine-month mentorship at the Fashion Research Institute.  Each piece is lovingly created from many tiny prims.

Please visit my main shop for many other wonderful items.

Transformation  is hosted and sponsored by the Fashion Research Institute, Inc.  FRI is committed to assisting emerging avatar apparel designers to bring their brand to the next level.