The 26th annual “Campus Couture Fashion Show” will take place inside the Carpenter Performing Arts Center Friday, and a great deal of the show’s success can be traced back to one woman.
Suzanne Marshall, director and faculty adviser of Cal State Long Beach’s fashion merchandising and design program, is in her 27th year as a member of the CSULB community and her hard work and dedication have elevated the program from a small and obscure one to the largest student-led fashion event on the West Coast.
“When we first started, our design program was really small, and so we just had a small show up in our conference room,” she said. “We had a few students try on some garments, and a few faculty, maybe 10, watched. It was really tiny.”
She credits CSULB alumnus and designer Peter Shen with helping get the show off the ground.
“Peter [Shen] took over the fashion show and was the first coordinator,” she said. “He was working for an independent fashion show consultant at the time and made the show much more professional.”
Shen coordinated the show for two years, and gradually, the show began to grow. It moved from the conference room, to the University Student Union, and finally the Carpenter Performing Arts Center. Marshall said she still remembers the anticipation.
“I still remember that first year of going out into the lobby at [the Carpenter Center] and seeing all the people outside the door waiting to get in,” she said. “It was really exciting.”
While the fashion show is one of her most significant contributions to CSULB, Marshall said, seeing students develop has been the most rewarding part of her career.
“Seeing students recognize what they’re good at and what they can offer the world when they graduate is extremely exciting,” she said. “It’s really fun to see them go out and get internships with some of the companies they’ve read about their whole lives. We want them to succeed and find that their education was valuable in that success.”
Marshall said that because the fashion industry is a very tough to break into, she encourages students to think outside the classroom if they want to stand out.
“Having a high GPA certainly isn’t enough anymore, and employers look for students that have had a variety of experiences and have taken advantage of the four years that they’ve been in school,” she said. “I tell them to start building their resume from the time they get into our program, and to start really thinking about the future.
The department partners with Mod’Spe, a fashion school in Paris, to offer a two-week course every June in one of the world’s most fashion-forward cities.
“We do fashion seminars, go on field trips, and work on projects,” she said. “We go to exhibits all over Paris, and learn about the luxury industry.”
Even with all her success and years in the business, Marshall said she has no plans of slowing down.
“I can’t imagine doing anything else, and I can’t imagine leaving Long Beach because I really love it, and it would take me forever to rebuild a program somewhere else,” she said. “I don’t think people realize how much work [building a program] is until they have to go somewhere else and start from scratch.”
The 26th annual Campus Couture Fashion Show will take place on Friday at 7 p.m. in the Carpenter Performing Arts Center. Tickets are $20. Those interested in attending the event should send an email to [email protected].