Cross-cultural Fashion Practices

Turkey and India are developing countries in terms of creating and communicating their global fashion brands. In both countries, contemporary designers seek international exposure through the modern exploitation of their cultural heritage, and rich traditions found in their historical textiles and costumes. Turkey is in a transitional period of developing cultural material into an international design language. In India, with the help of international fashion weeks and efficient institutions, designers are conserving the crafts related to the creation of Indian textiles, in tune with the industrial systems of production and marketing. Essentially, the integration of cultural research into design education in a pedagogical manner provides the backbone for developing a cultural identity in the contemporary fashion arena. This can be achieved by crossing the bridge between generations, recognizing the importance of cultural and historical design sources and re-interpreting their influence on contemporary design practice. In addition, recognition of another culture and the integration of this culture with the native way of life can add a cross-cultural dimension to contemporary design practice.


In this 3 weeks workshop( 13 weekdays) the students from IEU and NIFT, will work together in groups sharing their cultural experiences, understanding each others lifestyles, analysing contemporary design and fashion in order to create a capsule collection related to clothing and accessories.

The aim of this workshop is:

To introduce the students to another culture while creating an awareness to their native culture.
To explore ways of understanding cultural material and to translate findings in to a contemporary design element
To create an international design language by translating cultural material in to modern looking international design solutions

Process and Expectations

Lecture and Presentation on Turkish culture, and Survey of Turkish Fashion Sector
Field Trip-excursion on Indian culture: 3 days
Concept Development (Research analysis, Moodboards): 2 days
Design Development (Sketchbook) 3 days
Prototype (One outfit + accessories) 3 days
Styling and Presentations (Jury + fashion show + exhibition + press meeting) 2 days