Southeast Missouri State University senior Jory Rapps plans to turn an evening on the humble streets of Cape Girardeau into a fashionable night out. The fashion student has planned a night of events to feature the fashion industry in Cape Girardeau with live music, hors d'oeuvres as well as designer showcases and sales in some of the trendiest shops downtown.
Rapps is the event director of Fashion Friday and is organizing the event as a part of an independent study for Dr. Erin Fluegge Wolf, an assistant professor of management and the faculty fellow of the Douglas C. Greene Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship.
Some of the stores that are partaking in the May 3 event are Stash, Philanthropy, Pastime Antiques, Somewhere in Time Antiques, Sloan + Themis, C.P. McGinty Jewelers, Annie Laurie's Antiques and Reruns.
Each retail stores each is participating in its own way. The stores are having mini-events such as jewelry design presentations, discounts, local fashion designer showcases, giveaways, photographers shooting a styling competition and live mannequins, according to Fashion Friday's website fashionfridaycape.com.
Rapps said that the store owners were thrilled to be a part of what he was doing and he was well received by all of the businesses.
"Laura McGinty from C.P. McGinty actually said, 'It sounds too good to be true. What's the catch?' There is no catch," Rapps said.
Pastimes Antiques owner Deb Maevers asked fashion merchandising student Pamela Avila to organize live mannequins for Pastimes Antiques' mini event. Avila has modeled for Pastimes Antiques' fashion show Vintage NOW multiple times and is excited to get to be a part of Fashion Friday in this way.
"I am organizing the live mannequin modeling for her store to take some work for her," Avila said. "I'm organizing models, getting them together, scheduling fittings. At Fashion Friday I'll be there at her store [Pastimes Antiques] when she wants the live mannequins."
Rapps got the inspiration for Fashion Friday from an event that he worked at while interning for the high-end fashion label Donna Karan in the summer of 2011. He worked on Fashion's Night Out 2011 in New York City and wanted to bring that focus on fashion and local business to Cape Girardeau.
"We had originally planned to make a Fashion's Night Out because in New York and L.A. and other major cities, Vogue has for the last couple years done a Fashion's Night Out, and I usually go to work at it in New York," Rapps said. "It's a really cool thing where all the stores stay open late and have celebrities just to encourage shopping, so we wanted to do something similar to that. It just kind of organically evolved into a daytime event because it was going to work better for the businesses."
Rapps is majoring in interdisciplinary studies with concentrations in fashion merchandising, interior design and business. He said that he plans to return to New York after graduating and has been applying for jobs left and right.
Lynn Moore is fashion merchandising instructor who has had both Avila and Rapps in many of her classes. She encourages all of her fashion students to go to the events downtown and to support local fashion and businesses. Moore is active in helping her students get internships and experience in the fashion industry and wants to educate people on the fact that fashion is an industry. It is global, it is a business and it is extremely important to society both culturally and economically.
Creating a fashion line, for example, is "more than just putting a logo on a T-shirt," Moore said. "That is branding through screen or digital printing. There is so much more hard work that goes into the entrepreneurship that is involved in creating an actual clothing line."
Moore is an adviser in the fashion merchandising program and helps students find careers that fit their individual interests whether it be in textiles, management, design, modeling, sales, buying or some other area. She always stresses to her students the importance of knowing that there are endless career and job opportunities in the industry.
Avila said that many people also do not know that the shopping downtown consists of more than just antique shops or restaurants. Rapps also said that there are some great new shops with good merchandise that people would not expect.
"I think it's important because I feel like for a lot of people when they think of downtown, they think of the bars, and they don't really realize there are a lot of cool stores down there," Avila said.
Aside from the mini-events promoting shopping in each individual store, there will be a DJ playing music in the streets downtown. Information about the day's events can be found on the Fashion Friday website or on the "Fashion Friday Cape" Facebook page. Rapps said that although this event is called Fashion Friday, anyone should be able to enjoy it.
"It's not made just for people that appreciate fashion," Rapps said. "It's for the masses. Everybody likes discounts. Everybody likes getting their makeup done, so it's something that will appeal to everybody."
