ameliamaria59 said:
Does anyone know anything about Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles?
I currently attend Otis and major in fashion design(sophomore). What do you want to know. Otis has one of the best fashion programs in the country if not the best, but it's really not for everyone. Otis pushes more the commercial side of the industry, because in the end Fashion is a business. A lot of students who end up dropping out of the fashion major is because they don't get high enough grades or are discouraged to continue(mainly because they thought the major was going to beeasy, when it really ends up being the most rigorous program in the school). Other kids who dropout or transfer out, didn't really research the school prior to coming, because they think they can just walk in and do whatever they want(fine artists who think fashion is art), when in reality they should be heading to Central St. Martins if they want that kind of liberty.
Otis prepares you in every way, they push Illustration a lot. Even though Illustration isn't even part of a designers job today, one of the reasons they push it is because they believe that in order to be a good designer you have to be able to communicate your ideas clearly, not just by flats, etc, but also being able to illustrate them so that your average joe can understand them. It's also for presentation purposes I guess.
First year is Foundation, and is not major specific, so in general you'll have to take all the regular design classes every freshman has to take(regardless of your prospective Major.
During your sophomore year, you enter your major(fashion) and basically learn all the basics, and prepare you for junior and senior years where basically you'll get the experience of designing for real designers/brands/companies.
During your Junior and Senior Years you get to work with different mentors(designers/brands/companies). These mentors come in and basically tell you to design under a certain direction, as if they were your boss, and they critique your work, and you make the garments, which are then critique and chosen to be put in the annual scholarship benefit fashion show. This year some of the senior student mentors include Armani Exchange, Calvin Klein, BCBG, Behnaz Serafpour, Bob Mackie. the junior student mentors include Betsey Johnson, Billabong, Pattagonia, Juicy Couture and others. Every year they change the designers/mentors. Like last couple of years they have had Cirque de Soliel(sp?), Vera Wang, John Varvatos, Lloyd Klein, Nike, Isabel Toledo, PacSun, James Perse, A&F,Volcom, Nicole Miller, Trina Turk, Sean John, etc.
As good as the school is, it's really not for the faint heart, or for the designer that feels that they can do whatever they want because "fashion is art" to them. And which i think at the same time is the reason why Otis is a great school for fashion.
GOODLUCK!
, it sounds like a really good school. I'm glad that they put emphasis on illustrating because I love drawing.
