My name is Karlie and I’m a 17 year old Precollege Program student at FIT. I live in Upstate New York, where subcultures thrive and if you don’t look like an outcast, you probably are one, but I go to public school in Westchester, where the school’s mascot might as well be the Ralph Lauren logo. I became interested in design at a very young age and by the time I was in 5th grade, I knew I found my passion in Fashion Design.

As someone who takes as many opportunities as I can get, I was quick to sign up for a class at FIT as soon as I heard about them as a sophomore in high school. Since this past Summer I’ve been taking the train to Grand Central and then the subways so I could get to FIT.

I started off with the Workshop course, HSX 005 E-portfolio class, where I got to document all of my art work, learn how to retouch my work using Adobe Photoshop, and learned how to best present my portfolio using computer programs and internet websites. Overall, I had a good experience in my first class. Although people were shy at first, they were all friendly and willing to open up and talk and make friends. This really set me at ease because I’m extremely shy and have pretty bad anxiety.

Since then, I’ve taken the HAR 016: Fashion Art for Fashion Designers class, which really shaped my figure-drawing skills and gave me a lot of knowledge of how I should go about creating my portfolio. I’m now enrolled in HAP 026: Basic Sewing and HAR 087: Advanced Fashion Art for Fashion Designers. Every Saturday when I come to FIT, I feel great and totally comfortable in the environment. This isn’t regular schoolwork; it’s the work I wish I could be doing 5 times a week.

Outside of FIT, I’m a big art fanatic. I love everything that has to do with creating art, which would normally be great except for the never-ending list of projects I have to work on. I also take private sewing lessons, I’m a diligent exercise freak, I read Vogue regularly and I participate in 6 clubs at the high school I go to. I use Tumblr to blog, because I love the constant inspiration as well as writing about my life. At the moment I’m also entering a contest that involves creating your own prom dress…wish me luck!

Karlie