Runway Of Dreams for AOD Graduating Fashion Students at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week 2024
View(s):- It’s runway time and more as AOD’s award-winning fashion department preps for Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Sri Lanka 2024.
AOD’s Journey in Creating an International Fashion Runway
The Academy of Design (AOD), the world class design education institute in Sri Lanka, organised and conceptualised Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Sri Lanka (MBFWSL), the country’s premier fashion event with an international flair. Powered by DIMO, MBFWSL provides a platform for emerging fashion designers to make their debut and for the country’s most renowned designers to showcase their collections. With over a decade of experience in design education, AOD’s award-winning departments, Fashion Design and Textile, and Fashion Design and Marketing, have consistently taken the initiative to create global platforms for students, alumni, and other leading Sri Lankan designers to display their talent. This vision continues with MBFWSL, now in its 8th year, celebrating fashion excellence in 2024.
For AOD students, MBFWSL represents the culmination of years of dedication, hard work, and passion. These young creatives, from the Fashion Design & Textile and Fashion Design & Marketing departments, spend three years honing their craft to create stunning final collections that embody their unique visions. AOD’s strong commitment to its students goes beyond the classroom, offering exposure to industry projects, internships, and local and international competitions.
With an international faculty bringing both global perspectives and local insights, students are encouraged to push boundaries and integrate concepts like sustainability, environmental consciousness, and heritage crafts into their designs. Partnerships with industry leaders further enrich the learning experience, with brands like MAS Holdings, Brandix Lanka Limited, Aitken Spence Apparels, Star Garment Group, Emjay International (Pvt) Ltd and many more collaborating with students to ensure their collections are runway-ready.
AOD Faculty: The Backbone of Success
AOD’s faculty, with their rich backgrounds and international expertise, play a vital role in guiding students toward success.
“The Academy of Design is once again preparing to reveal its new and diverse breadth of creative design graduate fashion talent at this year’s 2024 MBFWSL. AOD thrives on its quality teaching, pedagogical studio practice, strong industry collaborations, strategically aligned artisanal heritage crafts, and international partnerships – all contributing to underpin its relevance to the industry, and global perspective. It provides its emerging design student talent with the unique experiential learning, enabling them to advance their knowledge and skills, with access to industry specialists, excellent opportunities to develop themselves, as practitioners through to showcasing on a global platform to playing a pivotal role in shaping fashion futures.
Using the power of creativity through contemporary design, artistic, and intellectual experimentation. This year’s exciting MBFWSL showcase is one that encourages its graduates to think intelligently, environmentally, and sustainably. It will feature a diverse range of collections that highlight heritage and artisanal craft – amongst others, innovative processes, techniques, and forward-thinking design concepts, – and in turn, we trust will add significant value, and influence to the course of contemporary South Asian creativity, new market need, the global economy, and impact the world more consciously.
Overall, we look forward to the students making significant impact, bringing with them their unique set of skills, fresh perspectives, and diverse breadth of talent to the showcase – and in turn we trust this is the platform that enables them to fulfil their dreams, realise their full potential in producing, and realising a forward-thinking collection for the creative sector.” – Professor Thomass Atkinson
Professor Thomas Atkinson, Principal Lecturer at AOD brings over 26 years of experience in art and design education. A graduate of St. Martin’s School of Art, London, with an MA in Fashion from the Royal College of Art, he combines his vast international consulting experience with hands-on industry knowledge to inspire and support students throughout their academic journey.
“It has been such a pleasure to work with FDM’s graduating class of 2024 for the past 2 years, I am immensely proud of the high level of commitment and dedication they have shown to their art. I have seen them grow into confident, and accomplished designers in their own right, equipped with the skills to enter the fashion industry, and be confident in a room full of professionals. My job has been to challenge them, to ensure their creative and professional practice prepares them to be the future of sustainability within the fashion industry, and as the next generation of creatives and image makers, embracing and modernising the traditional crafts of the island, seen within the canon of fashion. Our students here at AOD are exposed to a holistic education, balancing creativity to be situated in context, criticality and sustainability. The Mercedes Benz Fashion Show is a perfect vehicle to launch their careers on an internationally recognised platform, and truly inspirational for those wishing to follow in their footsteps.” – Lesley de Freitas
Lesley de Freitas, Programme Lead/Senior Fashion Lecturer, Fashion Design & Marketing, is a Central Saint Martins graduate with an illustrious career in both the fashion industry and education for over 16 years. Recognised by Vogue Italia for her talent, Lesley has garnered international recognition for her work and brings this wealth of experience to AOD’s students.
As same as the lectures, the final product of MBFWSL 2024 is the heart and soul of the students of Fashion Design and Textile Department as well as the Fashion Desing and Marketing Department.
“As a final-year Fashion Design & Textile student at AOD, my journey has been an incredible blend of growth, creativity, and discovery. Although I started out pursuing a degree in IT, fashion was always my true passion. After finishing my IT degree, I realised I needed to follow my heart. I did my research and found that AOD was the perfect place to explore my creative side and turn my dream into reality.
In the past three years, AOD has become my creative home. One of the most memorable moments was showcasing my first-year denim project at the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week (MBFW) in 2022 as part of a collaborative initiative. That experience was truly eye-opening—it made me realise that I wanted to take my designs to international runways and participate in global fashion competitions. It was a turning point that gave me the confidence to break into the global fashion scene.
The academic structure at AOD has been key to shaping my journey. Every year brought new projects that challenged me, pushing me to refine my skills and expand my creativity. I couldn’t have done it without the guidance and support of the Fashion & Textile Department lecturers, who have been such an important part of my growth as a designer. Their mentorship has made all the difference.
Now, as I prepare to showcase my final-year collection at MBFW 2024, I feel a mix of excitement and determination. This milestone is more than just a showcase; it’s the result of hard work, passion, and the education I received at AOD. I can’t wait to take this next step in my career and see where this journey leads me.” -Luckshanya Kirupanithy – Fashion Design and Textile Department
The Runway of Dreams
MBFWSL is more than just a fashion show; it is a celebration of the dreams and aspirations of Sri Lanka’s future fashion leaders. Powered by DIMO and supported by KESS, the official hair and makeup partner, MBFWSL 2024 will showcase the incredible work of AOD’s graduating students. It is their moment to shine, taking a bow for three years of dedication, passion, and hard work.
As AOD prepares for this grand event, they invite the next generation of fashion enthusiasts to join their creative community. AOD is now accepting applications for the September 2024 intake for its diverse range of programs, including BA (Hons) degrees in Fashion & Textile Design, Fashion Design & Marketing, Interior Design, Graphic & Visual Communication Design, and Motion Graphics & Animation Design.
For more information, contact AOD at 0775727772 or via email at info@aod.lk. You can also visit the AOD campus at Colombo Innovation Tower, No. 477, R A De Mel Mawatha, Colombo 04, from Monday to Friday, 9 am to 5 pm. Learn more at www.aod.lk.
HitAd.lk is the best and biggest mobile phone market in Sri Lanka, and we guarantee you will find what you need here from our extensive listing of mobile phones for sale in Sri Lanka. Whether it’s a budget-priced smartphone for communication, or higher end features with advanced connectivity, there are many different options from which to choose from on our site!