Newsletter 2014.06

From Designer to lecturer Mr. Calvin tiu

After finishing the one-year certificate at the Lai King training centre, Calvin worked in the fashion business for a few years. He then realized his own weaknesses, so he went on to study fashion design at Nottingham Trent University in the UK.

“The teaching mode is relatively open and less constraints to students from lecturers,” said Calvin, and he had a very different learning experience during those five years he was in the UK. “There are a lot of museums and historical buildings in the city and the cultural atmosphere inspired design thinking and broadened my horizon.”

After coming back to Hong Kong, Calvin worked as a fashion designer. How did he become a lecturer in the end? “I sent out a lot of resume at that time, including an application for a position of teaching assistant at Institute of Textile and Clothing of Hong Kong Polytechnic University (HKPU). I thought that the application was failed since I didn’t receive any response. But finally, they called me to interview after 3 months and hired me within a short period of time,” said Calvin, and when we asked him whether he loved to be a designer or lecturer more, he claimed that teaching is not his ideal career but it seems quite suitable to him Sometime he met his old student in the street and the student greeted him friendly with his name, making him very happy. Calvin also shared another interesting experience, “once there was a student who became my senior when I studied the master course after a while, and then he became my colleague when I worked at another institute.”

Calvin has worked for different companies and institutes after he left HKPU. Now, he is back to CITA again to teach programmes related to knitwear and styling. The target audiences of the programmes include young people and professionals. Although he is an experienced lecturer, he may also encounter difficulties sometimes. For instance, he found it difficult to be the lecturer of the Suit Advisor Training Programme for Marks & Spencer lately, as he loves to wear casually and hasn’t worn formal suit for quite a while. But the target audience of this training was the front-line salespersons of suit. After finishing this training, the frontline staff could be promoted as a professional suit advisor and they had to learn all the knowledge about suit, namely pattern and making of suit, mix and match technique, and marketing strategies, etc.

Therefore, Calvin spent 2-week time to do research and compile the information, and became a master of suit, “this was a very interesting course, I’ve learnt a lot when I was teaching the others,” he smiled. In fact, this was a very demanding course and the clients appreciated him very much. After this training, the sales volume of suit has increased, and a sale could be closed faster than before as salespersons could provide professional advice to customers. Most importantly, and the total sales of related products have also increased as they introduced the matching style to the customers.

Calvin is getting busy recently as he will conduct a new summer fashion technology programme on knitwear design. Students will learn about the basic knowledge of knitwear and how to use computer to assist design. Each student will make a sweater from their own design during this 10-sessions course. Interested about this course? Learn more from our part-time programme prospectus or go to our website: http://www.cita.org.hk.

www . c i t a . o r g . h kMeeting the Lecturer

Calvin has started his relationship with the Authority since he was young. He knew that he was not good at academic performance, so he endeavoured to learn some practical skills. Having learnt from newspaper advertisement that CITA organized a certif icate on Knitwear and Merchandising, Calvin started his fashion journey by studying this programme.

Combining economic growth with environmental protection has become a common and recurring theme in all industrial sectors. For new development models being defined in the textile and fashion sector, manufacturing processes are crucial towards generating products that are not only cost effective, flexible, reliable and safe, but sustainable as well.

Italy is the acknowledged world leader in the sector of the production of machinery and equipment for professional dyeing and printing. Italian textile machineries are currently at the forefront in providing cutting edge eco-sustainable technology that exploits resources while minimizing the use of energy and raw materials.

Towards this end, Clothing Industry Training Authority (CITA) together with Hong Kong Institution of Textile and Apparel (HKITA), Australia Wool Innovation Limited (AWI) and the Association of Italian Textile Machinery Manufacturers (ACIMIT) jointly organized a training programme to Italy from 20 to 25 October 2013, on the topic of “New Eco-Sustainable Technology Development for Dyeing, Printing and Finishing”.

Through this five-day overseas training, participants attended lectures as well as visited factories to learn about the latest green technological development for printing, dyeing, spinning and finishing in Italian Textile Industry. They were impressed by how those machines could save the environment and manpower. They also visited the Polytechnic the younger generation are being educated for the new technology.

The organizers hope that participants can apply what they have learnt to their job and help Hong Kong Textiles and Clothing Industry to conform their production systems by combining quality and efficiency while respecting the environment.

Overseas Training Programme“New Eco-Sustainable Technology Development for Dyeing, Printing and Finishing” to Italy

A Seminar on Cotton – Global Market and Sourcing Trends was held on 6 March 2014 in the lecture hall of CITA. This was co-organized by The HK Cotton Spinners’ Association and The HK Association of Textile Bleachers, Dyers, Printers and Finishers and The Sustainable Fashion Business Consortium.The three speakers: Ms. Karin Malmstrom, China Director of Cotton Council International; Mr. Pat-Nie Woo, director of Central Textiles (HK) Ltd, chairman of The Hong Kong Cotton Spinners Association and Sustainable Fashion Business Consortium; and Mr. Robert Sinclair, chairman of GAFTI (Global Apparel, Footwear and Textile Initiative) have shared their views of the future direction of cotton prices and retail outlook. They also updated the latest market trend and global sourcing pattern with the participants.By analyzing the figures of world cotton consumption, production and balance sheet, the speakers agreed that the consumption of cotton is getting stable over the past few years while the ending stock is still increasing, with about 2/3 of stock in China. This is because China’s internal policy is to stock pile cotton in a huge

reserve. Although China is going to change the reserve policy gradually with direct subsidy, the market may take several years to digest the pile stock to an acceptable level, leading to a forecast of continuation of range-bound cotton prices for Q2/Q3 and a reduction in Q3/Q4 this year. Other than price, the global sourcing pattern could be affected by other variables, for instance, religious stability, economic stability, factors that affect the production cost, etc. However, it could be predicted that China will become the largest cotton market as 50% of world apparel growth is driven by China, and it is necessary to explore the sourcing & production footprint other than the traditional market.The seminar came to an end after the 3 speakers had finished the panel discussion session with the participants on the latest issues of the cotton industry. The organizer said the seminar will be held regularly on a 6 to 12 months basis, in order to provide a platform for the industrialists to receive an update of the latest issue on the industry.

A s a g l o b a l l e a d e r i n C o m m e r c i a l L a u n d r y Equipments, Electrolux Pro fe s s i o n a l d e ve l o p s i n n o v a t i v e a n d environmental fr iendly s o l u t i o n s t h a t m e e t consumer needs. How can CITA help a global Laundry Professional manufacturer? C I TA h a s w o r k e d w i t h Electrolux Professional in developing a texti le materials course specifically

for laundry professionals from all around the Asia Pacific region.

In the 2-day training on 18 and 19 February 2014, the participants learnt the general knowledge of textile materials, from classification, features and charac ter ist ics of common tex t i le f ibres, to manufacturing and finishing process of textile fabric and garment,

especially in relation to after care. The training also covered the testing standards and regulations of textile quality, dimensional stability test and color fastness tests, and methods of identifying fibres and their properties in relation to performance of textile materials. By acquiring such knowledge, the laundry professionals of Electrolux can have better understanding of the materials that made up the clothing products, helping them to develop innovative ways by using their Electrolux Professional Lagoon® Woolmark equipments & Lagoon® Woolmark chemicals and thus, provide cleaner, fresher washing result as well as softer finishing quality.

After the success of this tailor-made training programme for Electrolux, CITA is going to organize a new short course for laundry professionals. This course provides a basis for laundry professionals in understanding the reasons behind the laundry problems, customer expectation and ways to better care the clothing products. It eventually helps laundry professionals to process customer requests more efficiently and effectively. For more information about the course, please visit our website: http://www.cita.org.hk/pt or contact us at 2263 6300.

Customized Training Programme for Electrolux Professional : Knowledge of Textile Materials for Laundry Professionals

A Seminar on CottonGlobal Market and Sourcing Trends

Industrial Support

http://www.cita.org.hk/en/student/career-opportunity/job-vacancy/( Password : vacancy )

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The WorldSkills Hong Kong Competition is a biennial event organized since 1996 to provide a platform for young people aged 21 or below to excel in their professional skills. Clothing Industry Training Authority is the organizer of Fashion Technology skill. On 29 March 2014, a briefing cum screening session was held. 15 participants have passed the design skill screening and sewing skill screening on that day and entered to the final competition.

The final competition will be on the topic of “Princess Diaries”; each competitor will receive a ‘mystery box’ containing a selection of identical fabric and trimmings or accessories. The competitors must design and create a lady dress or gown with the materials provided during the 2-day competition in mid-June. Winner may have a chance to represent Hong Kong in the WorlldSkills Competition in Brazil in August 2015. Don’t miss the competition report in the next issue of newsletter.

Fashion Design Competition 2014 Prizing Ceremony cum Information Day

Upcoming EventsWorldSkills Hong Kong Competition 2014

Activities Highlight

Fashion Academy has organized the Fashion Design Competition for secondary school students to develop their interest in fashion design and showcase their creativity again this year. The theme of this year is “Uniform”. Participants either have to re-design their present summer school uniform or to design their ideal uniform with illustration. With the support of Education Bureau, there are a broken record of over 350 students from more than 40 secondary schools participated in the 2 parts of competition in total.

The prizing ceremony was held on 24 May at the Authority, which also showcased the creations from 15 finalists of the re-design category who took part in a workshop on 17 April 2014 to create their designed uniform, as well as the creations of winners from the illustration design category. The winners from the re-design category also shared their design ideas with the participants.

After the ceremony, the Authority introduced the full-time programmes to teachers and students; they also visited the facilities of the Authority.