Fashion and Photography, together for the Klopman calendar.

Work uniforms seen through the eyes of creative young designers. Reinterpreting them: students from the Accademia Italiana, the international university-level institute for fashion, design and photography. The project was developed together with Klopman, leader in high quality technical fabrics for the past 40 years, and involved the Accademia’s Fashion Design and Photography and New Media students. Twenty-nine Fashion Design students from the Accademia Italiana’s Florence and Rome schools, using over 100 meters of Klopman’s environmentally and ethically certified cotton in colors chosen by the company, have produced 39 original uniform designs for a new promotional campaign for the technical fabric industry. An irreverent, provocative collection that nonetheless draws inspiration from the technical clothing market, the designs will soon be presented at Frosinone in the company’s hangar, whose giant machinery is perfect for a photo shoot. The Photography students will take pictures and create a video to be used in the company’s media campaigns, including exhibits, industry fairs and Klopman’s 2015 calendar. The lively collection will be on display at the Obihall Theater on April 17, during the Accademia Italiana’s year-end event to celebrate its 30th anniversary. The Accademia Italiana’s creative young students will show inspired designs for work uniforms in almost 40 categories: from fireman to flight attendant, chef to beekeeper, mailman to police officer. There are inevitably some provocative pieces in the collection, such as the police officer’s uniform that leaves the navel exposed, or the road worker’s reflective vest and miniskirt. The innovative project was developed from the ideas of the Accademia Italiana’s President Vincenzo Giubba and Klopman’s CEO Alfonso Marra and not only offers a great opportunity for the future designers but also for the Photography students who have been asked to create Klopman’s 2015 calendar using their photographs of their peers’ creations. But who is Klopman? Near the end of the 1960s the American textile industrialist Bill Klopman founded the company that was the first in the world to create fabric that could withstand industrial work conditions. Enthusiastically welcomed by the US Laundry Association, Klopman’s fabric arrived in Europe and after several proprietary passages made its way to Frosinone in the Lazio region, where the large factory was built and now creates thousands of kilometers of material a week, enough to span the distance from Milan to Reggio Calabria. This is an occasion for the Accademia Italiana’s students to gain experience in the working world, to see their visions turn into reality and above all to have the opportunity to create images for a real publicity campaign for a great multinational company.