March 5, 2014

Descience is a newly formed national fashion competition that brings together scientific discovery and fashion inspiration in an innovative runway event. Teams composed of one scientist and one designer are formed based on designer choice. Those teams then collaborate to create garments that represent the scientist’s work and the designer’s vision. The competition culminates with a fashion show featuring the creations at the MIT Media Lab in the fall.

We are proud to announce that five of our current Fashion Design students and three Fashion Design alumni were chosen to participate in the very first Descience Runway 2014 competition, competing with 53 others design teams from around the world. Our Fashion Descience competitors include seniors Amy Stolzsfus and Arielle Gogh, junior Minxo Lu, graduate students Nancy Volpe Berlinger and Evelin Jia-Garduating and alumni Katya Roelse, Rebeca Imperiano Lucena Porto and Bravo TV “Styled to Rock” star Autumn Kietponglert.

The Descience competition is comprised of four phases – inspiration, connection, collaboration and the Runway event. Scientists will provide their fashion design partners with ideas and images of their scientific research, describing what makes them passionate about their work. The designer will then execute the design. Teams will submit photographs of completed looks to the Descience websitem, where they will compete for votes. The design with the most votes will be named “People’s Choice,” featured in the runway show, qualify as a guaranteed finalist, and receive a $500 cash prize. Each member of the winning team at the MIT Media Lab event will receive $1,500.

We wish all of our students and alumni the best of luck! Click here for more information on the competition and the teams.