Fashion students gain real world experience in visual merchandising lab
The Visual Merchandising Lab in Wightman Hall Room (number) is lined with windows designed by Central Michigan University fashion students to resemble storefront fashion and clothing displays.
Dr. Michael Mamp teaches a visual merchandising class in the lab, and one more class will be taught there in the spring 2016 semester. After the first semester the $425,000 lab has been in use, students shared their experience using the lab.
“(Dr. Mamp) took a huge part in creating and designing the space,” said fashion student Emily Ribant, a senior from Flushing.
Lansing senior Alexis Quinney is also a student in Dr. Mamp’s visual merchandising course.
“We used the classroom to complete wall merchandising assignments,” Quinney said.
Grand Rapids junior Shardae Jefferson said the lab contains expensive material and an attendant must be present at all times during lab hours. She said that the lab was built so students could get the feeling of working in a store to give them a real-world experience.
Instead of sitting through long lectures, fashion students got to experience firsthand what it is like to create their own store window display. The lab contains merchandisable walls, four store front windows displays, lighting panels that allow students to learn about warm and cool lighting, a nested table set for floor merchandising and pinup boards for displays.
“Dr. Mamp treats us like employees, which is important for the real world,” Jefferson said. “The revamping of the lab adds to that feeling because we are using things we would use in a real store and we are experiencing what it is like to create a full, large window display.”
The window displays have existed since Dr. Mamp attended CMU, but the lab recently underwent a complete remodeling.
“(Dr. Mamp) said that when he was asked to work here, the only way he would was if the lab was rebuilt,” Jefferson said.
