Fashion students given the full royal treatment
Members of the school council at Birkby Junior School meet Mayor and Mayoress of Kirklees Clr Jim Dodds and wife Carol With Princess Beatrice (centre) and the finished outfits are fashion students Celine Constantinides (left) who designed the costume for Princess Beatrice, and Amy Bean (right) who designed the costume for Princess Eugenie, inset
She contacted the authorities at the Minster, who supplied pictures. When Princess Beatrice saw the designs she immediately recognised the source, commenting: “It’s a phenomenal window!”
Amy, from Halifax, created an outfit for Princess Eugenie. The predominantly dark blue dress and velvet jacket is paired with a skirt featuring Amy’s own designs, inspired by cherry blossom.
When the dresses were unveiled, Beatrice was delighted. “These are fantastic!” she said. “Each dress is unique. This is so cool.”
Beatrice told Amy and Celine that she planned to return to the university with Eugenie to inspect and try on the outfits.
Also at the unveiling were fashion design lecturer Stephanie Price and fashion technicians Kimberley Clarkson and Helen Turner, who helped make up the dresses – selecting the special fabrics for the outfits from a high-end supplier in London.
During her visit, Princess Beatrice was escorted by university vice-chancellor Prof Bob Cryan in his capacity as Deputy Lieutenant of West Yorkshire. The princess’s father, the Duke of York, is chancellor of the university.
Beatrice also met students taking a range of fashion, textile and design courses at the School of Art, Design and Architecture – Emma Lucas, Lorna Hampton-Bowes, Sadie Goode, Gemma Newsome, Lauren Stewart and Emily Muir. Christopher Himlin, who is studying fashion and textile buying management, described his group project on sourcing from Vietnam while fashion communication and promotion student Ana Zuravliova showed a copy of a glossy magazine she and fellow students had created, aimed at career women. Before signing the visitor’s book, she was presented with a sample of the flavoured liqueurs made by former Huddersfield student Stephen Bond, who now runs a business named Panda’s Kitchen. AN artist using dance, music and drama to explore diversity in England today is coming to Huddersfield.
Akeim Toussaint Buck, a graduate of the Northern School of Contemporary Dance, will bring his solo work, Windows of Displacement, to the Pure Heart arts and holistic health centre in Station Street in the town centre.
The session, which will include a performance of parts of the work and a discussion about it, will run from 5pm to 7pm on Saturday.
The performance draws on Akeim’s own experiences of displacement as a Jamaican citizen now living in the UK as well as exploring historical and current political references around imperialism, colonialism and displacement.
The Arts Council-funded project, supported by Yorkshire Dance, has also been taken to audiences at the West Yorkshire Playhouse in Leeds and the Civic Theatre in Barnsley.
Since graduating, Akeim has been involved in a number of projects working with a wide range of artists – combining expressive skills such as dance, writing and poetry, beat-box, singing and acting.
Despina Hafiz, of the Pure Heart Centre, said: “Windows of Displacement is an amazing, strong dance-based theatre performance piece that deserves to be supported as much as possible.”
To attend the free event email despinahafiz@gmail.com