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| Fashion Business School |
It will put the figures into fashion and develop the next generation of business talent to take the multi-billion-pound style industry by storm.
GCU London has already forged close links with the fashion industry, and has in the past received support from brands including Marks & Spencer, House of Fraser, AllSaints and the Arcadia Group.
It is hoped the GCU British School of Fashion will nurture the next generation of entrepreneurs who will help drive the industry, which is worth £21 billion a year to the UK economy.
The British School of Fashion will focus on executive and post-graduate programmes with fashion management, manufacturing and marketing at the heart of the courses. The school aims to provide students with a thorough business education as well as an understanding of consumer behaviour and financial management. At present, the university is one of only a few worldwide to offer an MBA in luxury brand marketing.
Professor Christopher Moore, assistant vice-principal of GCU and the first director of the British School of Fashion, said: “London is one of the great fashion capitals of the world. So, therefore, there is an inevitability that we need to be there as it is a global hub and it is where the action is.”
Professor Moore added: “The British School of Fashion is focused upon graduate education, so consequently what we find is the students who come to do our post-graduate courses perhaps have started off in a different area.
“It may well be that they trained as accountants or lawyers or statisticians or whatever and then they have realised they have a passion to go into fashion.”
Mr Moore added: “They receive through us a route into that because we can take what they did in their undergraduate degree and give that a fashion business context and enable them to hit the ground running and make an impact within fashion companies.”
Courses will be reviewed regularly to ensure they remain relevant within the fashion world, and students and staff will benefit from close links with fashion industry brands and figureheads.
Mr Moore said: “Having industry support is critical as it makes sure we are constantly relevant.
“We’ve got to have that connection because it is what keeps us on the right track. Having industry with us, in partnership, means they give us the guidance and they give us support.”
GCU has several influential fashion industry figures who serve as honorary professors, including Ray Kelvin of Ted Baker, Ian Grabiner of Arcadia, Belinda Earl of Marks & Spencer and Patrick Grant of Norton and Sons.
Professor Pamela Gillies CBE, principal and vice-chancellor of GCU, said: “These are all major players in one of the world’s most competitive industries and sharing their experiences through GCU master-classes, for example, is just one of the ways they bring immense added value to students and staff alike.”
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