Yesterday I got invited to a fashion show for designer Elsa Brodmann’s labels ottilie and Ottilie Broadmann. A fashion show in Nola you may ask, and the answer is yes and there are plenty of them. Granted Nola is not NYC or LA, but there is an emerging fashion scene here that will soon put Nola on the fashion map. This week marks the first annual New Orleans Fashion Week, which is being held at a venue that used to be part of the Eiffel Tower, how appropriate is that? Now I didn’t just happen to stumble upon these events, I found out about them because I’m the President of the Retail & Luxury Goods Association (RLGA). Some b schools have strong retail and luxury goods programs, but Tulane is not one of them. What we do have at the Freeman School are wonderful administrators and professors who have open minds. There had never been an organization like the RLGA on Tulane’s campus, but instead of administrators saying that I couldn’t start the club they asked, what they could do to help.
This year there have been two organizations started by first year students, TWO! Wes Gautreaux started the Energy Club, which has really taken off, and the RLGA isn’t doing too shabby either. We are in the process of bringing in amazing designers like Ms. Brodmann, doing site visits to showrooms, and assisting local designers and retailers with all types of fun projects. A lot of schools talk about personalizing students MBA programs, but at Tulane it’s not just talk. In the words of Ralph Lauren, “The world is open to us, and each day is an occasion to reinvent ourselves.” The Freeman School continues to reinvent itself 94 years later.
Amina