Fashion – an essential part of New York City’s culture. Whether you’re roaming the streets of Manhattan, watching an episode of Gossip Girl, or simply attending school, you are always surrounded by fashion. In fact, New York City is known for its annual New York Fashion Week as it continues to unite people from different places to share and celebrate different clothing styles. What is particular is that this year, right after the 2024 New York Fashion Week, students at Francis Lewis High School also hosted their very own fashion show.
MatchWear, founded in 2015, is a student-led virtual company that “specializes in bundles that curate the perfect streetwear and business casual wear.” According to their website, from curating bundles, conducting color analysis to now hosting the school’s second fashion show, the company aims to mold “the fashion industry into a setting where people can express themselves and discover individuality”.
“As a fashion company, one of our main goals was having a fashion show,” said MatchWear’s Chief Executive Officer and senior Sebastian Ospina. “As we ourselves are putting in so much hard work for these bundles, we want to be able to showcase them to people and show what our team of amazing stylists can do. We’re really just trying to get our name out there and present our amazing style.”
Putting their company’s services into action, the fashion show showcased modeler’s best outfits specifically associated with three main styles: Y2K, streetwear, and business attire. Y2K brings a trip down memory lane to the early century, associated with low rise jeans, bright colors, and rhinestones, while streetwear brings a more modern twist of youthful-edgy styles associated with big shoe brands, baggy clothes, and graphic designs. Finally business attire showcases professional, sharp and classy looks, combined with suits and dress shoes, with students’ own personal flares to spice things up.
“The fashion show goes along with the style that we do in our fashion company,” senior Elly Palagashvili and director of the show explained. “We’re fusing business-casual, streetwear and Y2K styles to create a full MatchWear experience. We’re also going into the history behind each style.”
With such immersive styles, students and teachers participating are given a lot of room to experiment with the clothing they have and showcase their unique modeling skills. For example, psychology teacher Mrs. Miller mentioned “I used to model back in my college years, so I just fell back on old procedural memory,” giving her the perfect opportunity to connect her past with the Y2K section of the show.
“Y2K is its own era in itself, the skirts, layers, crop tops, leg warmers, jewels, sun-glasses,” says senior and model Irine Krikheli. “It’s definitely something the teachers really like because it takes them back to their old days, they’re pulling it out from their own archives, their closets.”
In the end, the clothes that the models wore were able to portray a wide variety of different colors, textures, patterns, and accessories from these themes.
“Me and my partner wore identical outfits, green hoodies, blue jeans, and some new balances for streetwear,” model and senior Eric Abramov mentioned. “I had a funky ADIDAS outfit that was a 2-piece dress version of a track suit with a super cropped shrug,” Mrs. Miller added. “I wore bejeweled pink visor glasses, a black leather newsboy hat and white leather chunky heeled Converse Chucks. Can’t leave out the tattoo necklace with a sunflower pendant and giant silver hoop earrings.”
Along with the clothing, the ambiance of the auditorium adds just as much to the experience of the fashion show. The various colors of lights and the genres of music blended together to create the perfect display for each outfit, getting the audience ecstatic. For example, models walked along the beats of California Love by Tupac, Crazy in Love by Beyoncé, Rockin’ by The Weekend and Dance the Night by Dua Lipa.
“We have a different array of lights to go along with the music and then the outfits to pair,” Palagashvili described. “For example, a lot of the Y2K songs have pink, purple, and blue following that kind of color theme.”
During the show, each pair of models walked onto the stage, and held a final pose together at the center. Though it seems simple, as described by Abramov, it takes models a lot of practice to be on beat with the music, build chemistry and coordination with their partners, while also presenting the clothing boldly and naturally.
“Well obviously, I’m practicing my model walk!” Krikheli said. “I am just working on my placement and confidence, how I feel walking on stage. It’s really good to have that aura and movement.”
The audience roared in excitement and support as each pair of models walked onto the stage. Students were able to pay attention to the intricate details and patterns within the different outfits while cheering for their friends and teachers.
“It was such a great vibe,” Mrs. Miller exclaimed. “Also, the loud eruption as Ms. Jaipershad and I walked down the auditorium aisles was wild!”
Through the fashion show, models were able to express themselves in confidence as the audience played a huge role in building motivation. This led to a strong connection between the audience and the people on stage, enhancing the experience of the show further for both parties.
“The walking experience was a lot of fun!” Abramov recalled. “I felt that I was able to actually see everyone’s reaction while on stage. A lot of people got excited, and it made me excited that people were clapping and cheering for us. The whole experience was amazing, it was very energetic. I felt a lot of energy coming towards us, a lot of support, it felt really nice.”
The fashion show not only brought the community together to enjoy a special event, but also brought more awareness to the Virtual Enterprise program and its companies. MatchWear to the VE students is an “educational” project as described by Junior, Alexander Pagonis, director of the fashion show. The fashion show specifically teaches students how to build business reputation and go beyond the “virtual” world.
“For the VE program, it builds awareness of the program, what one of the three companies can do,” VE teacher, Mr. Cotignola explained. “We hope to gain a lot of audience members and also on social media, we hope to gain traction, so that it shows that though we are not a real company, we can still do real events, but also of course, to fundraise for the program.”
On top of getting the word out about the company, the fashion show and the whole program allows students to apply their leadership skills. To have a successful show, the team has to have strong communication and a firm goal to work towards, while building real life experiences for students. For instance, team members reached out to an array of teachers including science teacher Dr. Cohen, gym teacher Mr. Mckay, JROTC Army Instructor Sergeant Dash, Social Studies Mr. Buckley, and even principal Dr. Marmor to participate in the show.
“Through this experience, I’ve developed leadership skills– public speaking is a big part of it,” Palagashvili said. “I think putting yourself outside of the box is really important to get comfortable with yourself and to be able to take on new opportunities in the future.”
The MatchWear fashion show did more than just teach students about what it takes to run a business event and engage with the school. It also allowed VE students to make special memories that will last a lifetime and leave a lasting impression on what the program has to offer to the school.
“People could compare it to the play or Sing, and while those are more teacher-organized with a lot of scripting and practicing going on, we kind of took it [the fashion show] into our own hands,” described Krikheli. “Students are coordinating absolutely everything, from the music, to the lighting, to booking the auditorium, and [inviting] models to walk for the fashion show. It’s something made by the students and is completely different. It’s individual, it’s our own.”
