Breaking the asian stereotype through fashion

At the end of 9th grade, I started thinking about what I'm going todo for my personal project in 10th grade. Many ideas popped into my head, though there’s only one that I'm interested in. Being able to break the Asian Stereotype has always been a dream of mine, however I couldn’t find a way to do so. What I noticed most unique about our culture is our fashion. Each countries, cities have their own fashion cultures. Even though we have many cultures, we still didn’t stand a chance against the Western fashion culture. That’s when I found out that I could be breaking the Asian Stereotype through fashion.

Making a fashion brand has always been a dream of mine since I was little. Luckily, my skills in art aren't that bad so, making a few sketches for designing clothes is not a problem for me, hence why I decided to make and design the clothes first to give myself a vision. The outfits would be between Indonesia, Japanese, and Korean culture.

The development of the Asian Fashion has gotten bigger and it is crazy. I grew up listening to BTS, and back then they were still bullied and were not acknowledged for many reasons, one of which was the Asian prejudice and stereotypes. However, as they start getting bigger, they start to represent the Asian community and culture. BTS was able to break the prejudice and stereotypes and represented the Asian community globally. I’d say that what they did is something that everyone should learn and take note of. Especially to me, BTS inspired me to embrace my own culture. The way BTS did it was through singing and dancing, the way I will do it is through making a fashion brand.

From this experience, I get to learn and explore our culture. I feel like it is so important for me to be aware of our culture. As a kid who grew up with the Western Culture,

I never used to find the Asian Culture ‘Good’. I was brainwashed into thinking that our culture is not beautiful. Therefore, I hope by doing this project I’d get to correct my mistakes. Everytime I found the Asian Culture beautiful, I would always keep my thoughts in my head because I was insecure to share. By doing this project I’d also hope that my drawing or sketching skills will get slightly better from before because as a person who loves art, I sure do need a lot of improvements. I feel like this gives me the opportunity to make myself responsible because I would always make sure to satisfy my customers so then, I’d learn how to make everything as perfect as I can be.

Product Goal

As it was mentioned before, my product is Breaking The Asian Stereotype through Fashion. In this project I will be making my own fashion brand so I could embrace our culture as Asians. I have always been very fascinated by fashion and I figured that the Asian Culture is underrated and someone needs to step up.

Reflection

About a year before the personal project starts, I have planned on what I’m going to do for it. The thought of making a brand is incredibly breathtaking but also intimidating. The creativity of designing clothes is what attracted me in the first place. Knowing that I have given the opportunity to create something I have been wanting to do for so long is extremely mind blowing. However, I did not know that this would be a long and hard process.

Before starting the brand, there had to be a lot of research, inspirations, etc. Many problems came out throughout the process but that is the beauty of making a brand. The things that are supposed to be a problem in fact made it fascinating. The problem started out with me being insecure of making a brand, to designing the outfits. It gets harder as time passes by.

This allowed me to learn the processes a lot more and it made me realize what i should look out for. If anything I learned that each part of this lengthy process is another process. What I mean by that is that for example when I had to design and sketch the outfits, that of itself took a lengthy amount of time. In the end though, I would definitely say that this is why I love it. The thrill and the challenge is why i’m so passionate about it in the first place. Ever since I started entering middle school. My interest in fashion grew. Every Friday morning, I would wake up early to choose an outfit for school.Since then, i began to get quite many compliments about my style.

Each individual is unique and all have their own special meanings. When thinking of their designs, i dig deep into my thoughts and let my creativity spark. I could write a whole novel if I was to completely tell the story on how exactly I got the idea. I can learn from this process, and I definitely have.

Designing the product has got to be the hardest part of the process. Sometimes what you designed doesn't exactly look as expected in real life. It took my consultant and I four times to get it correct. Even so, when we looked for the actual materials, the colors don't match as we expected them to be, or the material we’re looking for is out of stock or is out of our budget. Thus, we always had to make adjustments to our design which further elongates this process, until eventually a design where everything is available and everything is according to budget is finally created.

Final product would actually finish. One thing I definitely learned is that we shouldn't rely on people. The tailor was inconsistent and did not say what she would do. She suddenly had a new years break from the 3rd to the the 10th of January.

When clothes were ready, I asked m aunt who happens to be a photographer to help me photoshoot my clothes. It was a long process, although i admit it was the most fun. It took the whole day to finished the photoshoot and it took 5 days to finished the editing. After that, I made the Instgram where I could sell my clothes

I have learned a lot from making this project. The best thing I learned is to be as patient as possible. Not everything turned out the way you wanted it but that is okay. The mistakes I made in this project is what made this project the best project anyone could possibly get.

Product Evaluation

In order for me to evaluate my product, I had to make a short google form so that I can ask for my family and my friends' opinion about my product. In the form, it contained my product video and also questions regarding the video. Most of the questions are just me asking to rate it. It was quite hard for them to understand the process of my product despite having to explain it over and over. However, after a period of time, finally they understood and finally filled out the form correctly.

For my final evaluation, I would definitely say that all the hard works and money was well spent. I’m quite proud of my product however, I could definitely see that this could be a lot better If I had started the product faster. I couldn’t have done it without the help of my friends, family, my consultant, photographers, and my teachers. What I’m most proud of is my designs. I think they all look fabulous in their own ways.