LOCAL Houston | The City Guide JUNE 2015 | Page 26

Local June_FinalEDITED.qxp_002houston 5/21/15 7:24 PM Page 26

OLD SCHOOL MEETS NEW SCHOOL
THE MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS, HOUSTON, and HOUSTON COMMUNITY COLLEGE are partnering to produce FASHION
FUSION: VIENNESE SPLENDOR MEETS HCC COUTURE, a fashion competition inspired by the MFAH exhibition Habsburg Splendor: Masterpieces from Vienna’s Imperial Collections opening June 14.
Young designers in the award-winning Fashion Program at Houston Community College were invited to create original garments as edgy, contemporary responses to the pieces on display in
Habsburg Splendor. Participation was voluntarily but about 50 students participated, resulting in
about 70 garments. Last month the top 20 were selected by a distinguished panel of judges from
the fashion, design and cultural communities of Houston who assessed the students’ work based on
theme, construction and overall presentation. I asked Ken Simmons, professor in the fashion department at HCC, what he thought when the MFAH approached him about a collaboration: “We were
immediately thrilled. Anything that we can do that gets our students out of this building into the
world, but especially with the museum, is what they need. They’ve got the street vibes, they need
the culture. We love doing anything with the museum, but this especially because it’s such a cool
exhibit.”
Caroline Goeser, Director of Learning & Interpretation, came to MFAH about a year ago and “one
of the things I did first was to become familiar with this exhibition and it seemed like it would be a
really fun show to bring to the contemporary moment. It shows a lot of objects that the Habsburg
family would have used. So it seemed like having a fashion show with the exhibition would be a
good way to make it current.” Goeser met with Linda Kuykendall, Director of Special Events, knowing she would be perfect to make this happen since Kuykendall spent over 25 years in fashion
department store retailing, special events and fashio