Warm-up: acquiring a basic vocabulary
The training unit comprises 40 hours dedicated to creating in the participants the homogeneity of knowledge necessary for the subsequent learning phases. Depending on their backgrounds, the lessons planned allow the students to fill in some basic gaps in management, economics, quantitative methods, sociology and design. Given their different backgrounds, students, in agreement with the Master's Director, may decide to attend all or part of the scheduled lectures. This training unit does not provide for final learning examinations.
Quantitative Tools & Project Tools: developing quantitative and project skills
The teaching plan consists of 20 hours: it includes the use of the Excel, Powerpoint and Canva platforms and is aimed at creating and further developing the quantitative and project tools that are indispensable for tackling the contents of the Master's specialised courses. Lessons are divided into basic and advanced didactics in relation to the individual student's background. Exercises and written tests are scheduled for the students.
Fashion Pillars: getting to know the structure of the fashion sector and working tools
The training unit provides 140 hours dedicated to getting to know the structure of the fashion sector, the companies that characterise it, the different organisational models, business strategies and types of materials and products. It also aims to transfer techniques and operational tools for planning and organising activities and for investigating and processing qualitative and quantitative market data.
In the 140 hours planned in Fashion Pillars we will talk about:
Project Management
The aim of the Project Management for Fashion course is to provide students with the basic methodologies of Activity and Process Management (Planning, Timing, Objectives, Resources, Responsibilities, Output, Cost/Benefit Ratio) applicable to the different types of projects characteristic of the Fashion sector (Brand and Product Area, Retail and Commercial Area, Research and Communication Area). The contents on methodologies and tools will be flanked by organisational contents (characteristics of the project manager, team motivation, project marketing) that allow them to be correctly contextualised in the company.
Fashion Business Models
The course aims to present an overview of the different Business Models within the Fashion and Luxury industries, from a strategic perspective on Luxury Brands, Design Brands, Industrial and Commercial Brands, to the management of positioning in the fashion industry and the different approaches to creativity management, from stylistic identity to different product strategies. The course will focus on the levers that companies can implement differently in terms of communication, image and commercial identity.
Research Methods & Trends
The course aims to offer a broad view of the different research methods and tools useful for investigating fashion markets and consumers. Metaproject research and trend research: the processes, tools and artefacts that characterise fashion design research (blue sky research, visual research, product research). Tools and phases of research: from brainstorming to collection concept. Socio-cultural and scenario research through coolhunting: the methods of socio-cultural investigation (social research, desk research, coolhunting). Tools and phases of the investigation: from brief to report. Actors in trend analysis: fashion companies, research agencies, freelancers. Qualitative and Quantitative Marketing Research: desk and field analysis (focus groups, surveys, customer insights from online communities). Difference between using primary and secondary data. Difference between exploratory and confirmatory marketing research. Then an overview and explanation of the main trends, their dissemination processes, contents and forecasts will be introduced, focusing on both fashion and non-fashion related industries.
The Italian Fashion System
The course aims to provide an initial general overview of the fashion sector (fashion supply chain, key players in the fashion system, seasonal cycles) and of the model-types of behaviour of fashion companies (product, market, production, communication strategies), with particular emphasis on the relationships between creative and managerial processes. In addition, the main operating models of the sector will be examined in depth, also in relation to the different market positioning of the product: the planned model, the ready-to-wear fashion model, the continuous product model, hybrid models. Particular attention will be devoted to the acquisition of an initial vocabulary specific to the sector, characterised by its own terminologies and languages, the mastery of which is fundamental for beginning to acquire knowledge and understanding.
Fashion Marketing & Brand Management
The Fashion Marketing & Brand Management course aims to introduce students to the main marketing techniques in the fashion field and to the framing of the process of formulating, implementing and monitoring brand identity and positioning. This process identifies two different but connected areas of application: the first aims at the knowledge of the structure and guidelines from which 'brand sensitive' operational marketing processes are derived; the second aims at the direct management of brands as intangible strategic resources, which are connected to specific management processes. The course has been formulated within three different but related areas of application: brand management and design as an intangible resource; the structure and guidelines for operational processes; and the sociological perspective of the brand.
Fashion History
From modernism, celebrating art and fashion, to the third millennium, the course aims to provide a historical overview through the main transformations of fashion. Specifically: the "roaring twenties"; art Deco and the aesthetics of the machine; the emergence of "couturier" women: Madeleine Vionnet, Elsa Schiaparelli, Gabrielle "Coco" Chanel; cinema and Hollywood fashion in the 1930s; 1950 and Existentialism; 1960: Optimism, 'pop' art and London street fashion; the 1970s: punk and anti-fashion on the streets of London; the 1980s and fashion pluralism; 1990s; postmodernism, and globalisation in the third millennium.
Digital Fashion
The module is oriented toward the content and strategic design of the most innovative communication and distribution web channels, aimed at business-to-business, business-to-consumer, and consumer-to-consumer relations (social networks, e-commerce, social shopping). It also provides knowledge and skills for the use of web 2.0 and 3.0 resources, which make it possible to reorient fashion communication, traditionally operating according to a top-down model, towards the use of bottom-up and peer-to-peer models. Particular emphasis will be placed on innovative tools for the management of online-offline integration.
Fashion Processes: knowing how to manage communication processes
The training unit provides 180 hours dedicated to the main processes of enhancing and promoting the cultural identity of companies and brands, and to the implementation and management of new communication channels and formats.
Brand Communication Strategies
This module offers an overview of the main activities and the most significant professional figures in fashion communication. Today, communication in the fashion industry means knowing how to create and manage an integrated communication strategy, organize an advertising campaign, deal with the media and all the professional figures in the sector; organize events, and fashion shows, and create launch plans for products, designers, or brands. Particular attention will be devoted to Italian brands. Through some focus on fashion marketing, brand management, distribution channels, communication, and advertising strategies, the course will offer a general overview of the main online and offline communication methods.
Fashion Images and Advertising
Through the study of media theories, the course will introduce ways of reading, analyzing, and interpreting fashion images. Editorial products and advertising, as well as the numerous segments of the fashion industry - from luxury to mass market - have different communication needs, which students will learn to identify. Fashion films, advertisements, posters, photos, and media will be further examined. By the end of this course, students will have learned to analyze and interpret the increasing visualization of contemporary culture. They will also have developed specific visual and verbal skills in order to observe, analyze and critically describe the visual imagery of fashion.
Press & PR
The course aims to provide students with the essential skills to interact, within press offices, PR agencies, and corporate communication divisions, with both traditional and new media platforms (magazines, news broadcasting, and the internet). This course will teach the main written communication tools used in public relations. In particular, the course will teach how to write press releases, biographies, captions, editorials, and posts. Through the preparation of kits for the press and press officers, moreover, students will practice the conception and writing of messages and releases aimed at precise target audience segments.
Event Management
This course deals with event management and, more specifically, focuses on the basic skills and methodologies used in the development, production, and management of successful events for the fashion industry. Through the analysis of fashion shows, fashion weeks, and trade fairs, it will provide models and conceptual tools to achieve the communication objectives most frequently used in the industry today.
Social Media Management
This course introduces students to the use of social media in the design and communication processes of fashion products. Students will be offered application tools for the construction of a social media strategy through the monitoring and analysis of online communication flows. By the end of the course, students will be familiar with the most innovative digital tools.
The Fashion Lab
The aim of the workshop is to stimulate reflection on the complexity of the fashion sector, in particular by investigating:
- Managing responsibilities in the textile-clothing supply chain;
- Designing online and offline communication products;
- Identifying new consumer trends;
- During the course, students will also have the opportunity to meet some industry experts, managers, and opinion leaders.
Curiosity
The module will be divided into a series of seminars with the aim of providing a broad view of the socio-cultural evolution of fashion, with some important interdisciplinary insights on the main Italian brands. Particular attention will also be devoted to some significant contemporary phenomena such as the spread of global trends, the hybridisation of styles, the emergence of new forms of production and sustainable consumption styles, and the success of new communication methods linked to new media.
Field Projects
Two projects, each lasting five weeks full-time, coordinated by a multidisciplinary team of lecturers, are planned. Each module consists of the preparation of a project on a real case study provided by leading companies directly involved by the faculty in the teaching experiment. Starting from the project brief provided by the company, the team will work together with the lecturers on the realisation of a proposal that provides feasible answers to the objectives defined by the company. The aim is to arrive at integrated projects that identify brand, product, retail and communication strategies with a high innovation content and adherent to the client company's reality, simulating work processes as close as possible to the reality of professional contexts. The evaluation of this phase takes place at the end of the classroom training course, through the collegial presentation of the work realised. The projects will be discussed by a committee composed of the module lecturers and evaluated in the presence of representatives of the companies involved. The companies will have an early opportunity to select potential interns from among the students for the final phase of the master's course.
Empowerment & Career Management
The module is aimed at providing the necessary skills to deal with company selection processes, both in internship and job market placement contexts. During the module, students will be put in contact both with Head Hunters specialised in the fashion and design sectors, and with the selection managers of the most important and significant companies operating in the fashion sector, in order both to understand the dynamics of selection and to enhance their professional profile.
The Internship
The internship is one of the most qualifying experiences of the Master's course; coordinated by the Director of the Master's course, it consists in experimenting, in a corporate context, the skills learnt during the Master's course, on the basis of a training project collegially agreed upon by Milano Fashion Institute and the host company.
Italian Language
The module is aimed at introducing the Italian language to international students. The teaching objective is the understanding of the most common ways of interaction and communication, both in everyday life and in the professional context. The students will be divided into two parallel courses, after having taken a preliminary assessment test to identify their starting level of knowledge of the language:
Intermediate level Italian B1, designed to provide students with the necessary skills to sustain a job interview in Italian, to introduce the basic vocabulary of the fashion industry and to be able to work correctly in an Italian work environment.
