Fashion Design Graduate gets a Fresh Start

Toronto Designer Alanna Klatt is being given the unique opportunity to take her design process and flip it with the Fresh Start Designer Development Program. In this series of stories and videos, we follow Klatt through the making of her collection.

PART 1

The idea is for an emerging designer to start from scratch, with nothing but a blank sketchbook and create clothing based 100 per cent on what the customer is looking for.

Start is a new initiative by Fresh Collective, a Toronto clothing retailer that supports local designers. The inaugural Fresh Start emerging designer, Klatt, graduated in 2013 from the Fashion Design Diploma program now offered at the Toronto Film School. Since graduating she started her business KLATT and is currently in production of her spring line.

“Laura Jean, the founder of Fresh Collective contacted me and said she had an idea,” Klatt said. “She told me all about the process and how she wanted to bring in an emerging designer and help them build success in their business. From there I was all in.”

During the course of 13 weeks, Klatt will be in the Fresh Collective store on Queen Street West, talking to the customers to find out what they are looking for in clothing. She is conducting surveys in person, as well as online, that looks at things like what customers look for in clothing, whether they prefer quality to cost and what about their personality is reflected in their clothing.

“It gives her an opportunity to try things before investing money into producing a collection,” explained Jane Haselgrove Store Manager and Product Partner Coordinator at Fresh Collective.

Fresh Start, Fresh Collective’s Designer Development Program launched on January 23 when Klatt was on site at Fresh Collective interviewing customers.

“In the sense of process it is totally a flip from how I normally work,” Klatt said. “Designers put a lot of their heart and money into a collection and then show it to stores. This totally flips that around. You are getting to know the customer in depth and producing pieces based on what they said.”

Over 13 weeks Klatt, with the help of the Fresh Collective staff and customers, will work on perfecting three garments to be sold in the Fresh Collective stores.

“We want to be the platform for designers, finishing school, who are serious about starting a business, we want to provide them with guidance,” Haselgrove said.

The goal, Haselgrove said, is that at the end of 13 weeks Klatt will have three pieces that will fly off the shelves at Fresh Collective because they will be exactly what the customer is looking for.

“We really want to get to know the customer, their needs and what they look for in a garment,” Klatt said.

Based entirely on what she learns from the customers, Klatt will design six items, which she will share on social media and collect more feedback on. She will tweak and alter the designs and narrow the pool to three items.

“From there we will go into production and the fun things like fabric sourcing,” Klatt said. “Again, always bringing it back to the customer for more refining… by the end (the garments) will be here in stores.”

Along the way, Klatt will publish weekly updates on the Fresh Collective blog and on social media at #FCfreshstart.

PART 2

In this second video following Alanna Klatt and the #FCfreshstart Designer Development program, we visit the Telio Showroom in downtown Toronto to source fabric.

Click here for more information on the Fashion Design Diploma program at Toronto Film School.