Students on the ‘Fashion Illustration and Communication 1’ elective at Edinburgh College of Art (ECA) have presented their final work, which was inspired by Museum collections, to curatorial staff from National Museums Scotland as part of their assessment. 

The popular elective is open to all students from the University’s College of Arts, Humanities and Social Science (CAHSS).

The group showed their zines and fashion illustrations to the panel that comprised Georgina Ripley (Principal Curator, Modern & Contemporary Design), Lisa Mason (Assistant Curator, Modern and Contemporary Design) and Katie Braid (Fashion Illustration and Portfolio Teaching Fellow at ECA). 

The panel selected six finalists that show the diversity of the students’ approaches. 

Fashion illustration 

• Kate Fowle (Year 1, History of Art)  
• Charlotte Wadsworth (Year 2, Fine Art) 
• Sam Bayley (Year 1, Fashion) 

Zines 

• Francesca Calderwood (Year 1, Fashion) 
• Elina Solovjova (Year 1, Fashion) 
• Sam Bayley (Year 1, Fashion)

Learning through teaching, research and independent study 

At the start of the elective in September 2025, the students visited the Fashion and Style Gallery at National Museums Scotland’s Chambers Street site, which is only a five-minute walk away from ECA’s Lauriston Campus.  

Their research trip was facilitated by the National Museums Scotland Engagement and Learning team. 

The students were tasked with responding to their favourite garments and accessories in the NMS collection over the course of semester 1, through further independent visits to the gallery and creative fashion drawing workshops.  

These workshops helped the students develop their skills in traditional and fashion-styled life drawing, and sketching fabrics to show their tactility and touch. They also experimented with runway sketching, zine making and even tried streetstyle sketching en plein air. 

Katie said projects like this are important to a student’s learning experience: “Working with National Museums Scotland provided a unique opportunity for our students to work to a live brief with the client in mind early in their academic career.” 

“This project provided rare access for our students to work with the National Museums Scotland curatorial professionals and to experience the wealth of their fashion and textile objects in person. We are incredibly proud with the diversity of creative approaches from our finalists this year, with students using their visual responses to question what a fashion illustration can be, the problems associated with historic body ideals, and zines to act as a gallery space companion.”