On a sunny Friday in May 2018, music and the chatter of conversation spilled out of SHOP657 onto Sutter Street as School of Fashion students hosted the concept store’s first ever Spring Social event.
Visitors enjoyed macaroons, kombucha and club tunes from DJ BabyJ of Manics while they shopped and mingled among the racks of student, alumni and faculty collections.
The event was organized in conjunction with fashion marketing instructor Gabriel Gima’s special events and promotion senior marketing class, which is the first class to be launched since fashion marketing received its accreditation.
Students worked with Chau Bui, SHOP657 manager at the time, and fashion merchandising alumna, to discuss Chau’s vision and needs for the shop to create a unique retail experience around Malus Marcoo, a San Francisco brand by alumni Lancy Ma, Ares Hoang and Mavis Lu.
“We wanted to create this shop as the environment for up and coming creatives to come in, to network and talk to each other,” said Hayden Bui, event team leader, who is actually the current manager at SHOP657. “Then from there, we have to come up with what color scheme do we want, what food do we like, what drinks do we want, what gifts do we want to have. It has to be cohesive.”
Soft pink, mauve and an icy blue were the colors of choice; guests were gifted with a light bulb goodie box with M&Ms of the same color. Mannequins perched on bright pink palette beds in the window display fit the mood.
“They wanted to do an event that’s youthful, up-and-coming as a theme,” Chau said. “Mavis’ brand is very contemporary, very current and just so happened to have a collection coming out this season, so it was kind of perfect.”
