Last week I went up to visit the costume construction course at South Essex university centre..
When we first arrived at the centre I saw the Royal Opera House Costume department store, which is unique to South Essex uni who's costume course runs in collaboration with the Royal Opera House, which actually, for me, was the main selling point of the course.
When I first met with the tutors they gave us a tour around the class workrooms and their Royal Opera House work room, which all feature industrial machines and overlockers. The ROH workroom provided access to archive, what they call, costume bibles for previous productions at the opera house and said that, in the past, students have been able to choose their own design from these and, using the instructions provided, create those pieces, which I think is quite exciting.
The work rooms were well laid out with wide spread tables for drafting and cutting and the classroom also provided lots of fabric stock available to students, which is always a big help.
We then had a tour of some of the students' work as well as looking around the ROH costume store, which was a really exciting opportunity. The tutors did also mention that there is one more work room in another part of the campus, about ten minutes by train and apart of more of the main uni building, which features a textiles room, with acces to things like dyeing and screen printing facilities.
I absolutely loved the tour of the costume store, where the students also undertake their costume conservation unit. Unfortunately I was told not to share any of the photos online, however it was a really insightful experience and also particularly beneficial for FMP research as I was able to look at some archive ROH tutus really up-close and see and learn about their construction first hand! The store featured a real range of things.. from underpinnings to props, accessories, outerwear and more. We even got to look around the shoes and wigs sections which was quite exciting.
As I said, I love how collaborative the course are with the ROH and they even said that students make work that will sometimes be used in the actual productions which I think must be an incredible experience and motivation. A lot of the students also end up doing work placements at ROH and even going on to get jobs there after graduating and with this in mind as one of my end goals, it very much entices me to want to study at uni South Essex.
I thought the staff and current students were very helpful and polite, they seemed to be very in tune with their students and were also interested in the work I am currently doing so it felt like they were very genuine and I could see myself enjoying studying at the uni.
Class sizes are also often kept to a smaller size of about fifteen which I too think is really important in terms of being able to get a good quality of learning and get the support from tutors that is needed.
But on the whole, I really enjoyed the visit; getting to look around the Royal Opera House store, meet the tutors, explore the facilities and speak to current students. Again, I really thought the uni was somewhere I could see myself enjoy studying. The tutuors also talked about how they go on many trips on the course as well as having visiter speakers from industry come in to talk to students which is really important. Recent trips they have been on include going to a dress rehearsal at the ROH to see even some of the work they have produced, in action!
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