外国时尚设计师在北京

By Anastasia Sukhoretskaya 译/季晶晶

外国时尚设计师在北京

Foreign fashion designers in Beijing

By Anastasia Sukhoretskaya 译/季晶晶

卡特琳娜（中）与学生在工作间

老外们带着勇气和决心来到中国，而中国也为他们提供了一个可以发挥创造力和表达自我的平台。两位居住在北京的时尚设计师，来自俄罗斯的斯维特拉娜和来自罗马尼亚的卡特琳娜，完美地演绎了成功的职业女性和独一无二的时尚设计师两种角色。

Many expats ventured into China, and China embraced them by offering a platform for creativity and self-expression. Two accomplished Beijing-based fashion designers, Svetlana Zaytseva-Cheremnykh from Russia and Catalina Calin from Romania pose a perfect example of successful businessladies and fashion design experts that are second to none.

今年44岁的斯维特拉娜15年前跟随她在货运航空公司工作的俄罗斯丈夫移居北京。她曾在澳大利亚和英国学过设计，之后又来到北京进入著名的莱福仕大学继续攻读设计专业的学士学位。莱福仕大学如今被称作莱福仕学院，是一所总部在新加坡的著名服装设计大学。顺利完成学业后，她就留在这所大学里当老师教设计，至今还在这里工作，她经历了大学的转型期。正是在莱福仕，斯维特拉娜认识了首次进入公众视线的时尚设计师卡特琳娜, 北京卡琳时尚学院 (www. catalinacalin.com)的创始人。当时卡特琳娜也是莱福仕学院的教师之一。从孩童时代开始，卡特琳娜就喜欢设计，而她杰出的职业设计师生涯则是从罗马尼亚的一所大学开始的。在那里，她专攻时尚设计并取得了时尚和视觉艺术专业硕士学位。之后，她曾在不同的跨国或本地的公司担任时尚设计师。2009年，应莱福仕学院的邀请，她来到北京担任时尚设计系讲师，那时候她才27岁。在这里，她结识了斯维特拉娜和她未来的丈夫，以及同在这所大学里教室内设计的来自哥伦比亚的教师杰米。在外籍人士的心目中，北京就是一个地球村。人们相遇，成为朋友，甚至恋爱结婚。杰米和卡特琳娜是知名国际交流组织InterNations 在北京的代表。他们负责组织在京的外籍人士参加聚会，让他们的生活变得更加轻松和愉快。杰米和卡特琳娜会找到北京最棒的地方组织聚会活动，每月至少两次。我也经常参与其中，并认为对卡特琳娜来说，这的确是她学校工作之外一个很好的补充。“在这里（北京）的日子很棒。当然，虽然生活有起有落，但总体来说一切都很好。我们热爱北京，也很享受在这里的日子。” 卡特琳娜如此说道。在2014年11月，她成立了以自己名字命名的设计学院卡琳时尚学院后，她与教学的联系更紧密了。在我询问学生情况时，她答说：“我们的第一个学生来自俄罗斯，那是一个非常有才华的女孩。我也有来自波兰的学生。”除了外国学生，也有不少中国学生去她那里学习。现在卡琳时尚学院提供以下课程：时尚插画，主要介绍一些可以用于时尚插画设计的媒体技术；创意立体裁剪和绘图，重点向学生们传授设计创新、时尚工作室、时尚作品集、造型和化妆方面的技巧和方法。课程由卡特琳娜和另两位特约讲师讲授。

Svetlana Zaytseva-Cheremnykh, 44, relocated to Beijing 15 years ago, following her Russian husband who got a position in the cargo airlines company. She studied fashion design in Australia and Great Britain before she enrolled for the designing courses in renowned Raffles University in Beijing, now known as Raffles Academy, a Singapore based fashion design school, to get a bachelor’s degree in design. Having successfully completed her study, the university hired her as a teacher and she is still working there, having survived the times of university revamping and transformation. It was in the Raffles University where Svetlana Zaytseva-Cheremnykh and new-to-the-scene fashion designer Catalina Calin, the founder of “Calin Fashion Academy” (www.catalinacalin. com) of Beijing, first met each other. Catalina was also one of the teachers in Raffles Academy and according to her, she developed a taste in design long ago, in her childhood. Her outstanding career as a fashion designer took off atthe university in Romania, where she had majored in Fashion Design and took her Master in Fashion and Visual Arts. After that, she worked for different multi-national and local companies as a fashion designer. Catalina was only 27 year old when in 2009 she was invited to become a Fashion Design Lecturer in the mentioned Raffles Academy and got acquainted with both Svetlana Zaytseva-Cheremnykh and her future husband, Jamie Daza Medina from Columbia who was teaching interior design there. In our expat’s minds, Beijing is a global village where people meet, become friends or even fall in love and get married. Jamie and Catalina foster the meetings among expats by representing InterNations as ambassadors in Beijing. They are responsible for connecting the global minds in Beijing, and for making the life of expats easier and more enjoyable, organizing the GetTogether events, at least twice per month, in the best venues of Beijing. I also frequent these events, and personally think it serves a fine addition to the work Catalina is doing in her academy. “I had a wonderful experience here. Of course, we had our ups and downs, but still it was very nice. We still like Beijing a lot. We enjoy it.” says Catalina. Since establishing her own design academy under her name“Calin Fashion Academy” in November 2014, she is mostly tangled with teaching. “Our first student was from Russia, a very talented girl. And also from Poland.”adds Catalina to my follow-up question about the academy’s students. Apart from the foreign students, they have students from China as well. Now “Calin Fashion Academy”offers several courses: fashion illustration that introduces different media techniques that can be used for fashion illustration, creative draping and drafting with the focus on providing the students with the skills and techniques of producing creative designs, fashion workshop, fashion portfolio, fashion styling and makeup art with Catalina and two guest lecturers act as course teachers.

斯维特拉娜主要为外籍人士设计婚礼礼服和晚礼服，客户都是一些高阶层人士。有意思的是，卡特琳娜结婚时穿的礼服正是斯维特拉娜设计的。斯维特拉娜很享受在学校里教书，但是她自己也说：“时尚设计是一个迅速变化的产业，为了跟上它的步伐，仅仅做老师是不够的，我还需要成为设计师和生产者。”斯维特拉娜说她有一个遗憾，那就是她无法像期望的那样说上一口流利的中文。但是对于全身心投入设计的她来说，没有时间学中文是完全可以理解的：“因为学院工作繁忙而没有时间学中文让我有一些遗憾，我仍然能感觉到语言障碍的存在。”不过，斯维特拉娜喜欢在北京工作。不考虑语言障碍，她在北京能更容易获得各种各样的面料，选择也更广泛。要知道，在她的祖国90%的面料都是中国制造。基于在北京12年的教学实践和5年的设计经历，斯维特拉娜开办了面向俄语学生的在线课堂（fashionworkshop.ru）。她的学校提供一系列线下课程以及免费的视频课程,也会为完成学业的学生提供证书和文凭。“我将在莱福仕学院的东西与我自己的设计经历相结合，最后在俄语学生授课时做适当的调整，结果令我十分骄傲。” 斯维特拉娜如此总结。“教学方式分为两种——线上和线下，这样学生就能获得及时反馈。”说到在线课程的优势，斯维特拉娜回答道：“在中国办学校实在太困难，不仅受到中国法律的各种限制，语言障碍也是一大问题。此外，资金需求量也很庞大。相比之下，办在线学校要简单得多。”

Svetlana Zaytseva-Cheremnykh’s design focus is wedding and evening dresses, her works are expat-oriented and her clients are people of high status. Interesting enough, Svetlana designed a wedding dress for Catalina Calin when the latter was getting married. Svetlana is fond of teaching in the academy, but according to her words,“fashion design is a rapidly changing industry and in order to keep up with its pace, you need to be not only a teacher, but also a designer and a producer”. Svetlana says, there is one thing she regrets, that is she cannot speak Chinese fluently as she would like to. But due to her being one hundred percent devoted to the design industry it was understandable she did not have enough time for attending Chinese classes. Svetlana says: “I regret a bit that I did not have time to learn Chinese as we were so busy in the Academy, I still feel there is a language barrier. ”However, she likes the experience of working in Beijing as a fashion designer. In spite of the language differences, the access to the material is easier and the choice of fabric is broader than in her Motherland as 90% of all fabric is made in China. Having combined 12 years of teaching experience and 5 years of designing wedding and evening dresses in Beijing, Svetlana opened her own online school for Russian-speaking apprentices, fashionworkshop.ru. Her school offers a wide range of courses as well as free video lessons, and issues certificates and diplomas after the course completion. “I combined what I had learnt and taught in Raffles Academy and my own experience of clothes designing then adapted it to the Russian-speaking audience and came up with something that I am proud of. ”concludes Svetlana. “The teaching will be conducted in two formats - online and offline, so that the students can get a realtime feedback from our teachers and offline video classes”. On my question, what she thought about advantages of opening an online school, she replied:“It takes so much pain to open a school in China, as you need to regulate your work with the Chinese laws, and language barrier plays a part. Moreover, it is rather costly. Online school is easier to operate.”

工作中的斯维特拉娜

关于对中国学生的看法，斯维特拉娜和卡特琳娜都认可中国学生的勤奋和积极。“中国的学生听课很认真，他们渴望知识。老师是他们的向导。他们对时尚有自己的认识，发展潜力巨大。要知道，一旦中国人有了目标，就迟早会去实现它。” 斯维特拉娜如此评论道。这两位职业女性都认为中国的时尚产业正在蓬勃发展。“中国人的设计正在变得更加时尚，更全球化，更流行，更优雅。中国政府花费了大量的时间和金钱在教育和学校上。中国的年轻人也比以前更热衷于时尚。如今有越来越多的中国设计师非常有创意并且热衷学习。他们中的很多人都曾出国留学，因此有了不同文化背景的经历，对世界也有了不一样的认识，他们更加开放。”卡特琳娜补充道。

About the Chinese students, both Svetlana and Catalina agreed that the Chinese students are very diligent and motivated. “The students from China listen to the teacher, they crave for knowledge. The teacher is their guide and master. The Chinese have their own way of seeing fashion, and they have a good potential for development. And if the Chinese people have the goal, they will reach it sooner or later.” commented Svetlana Zaytseva-Cheremnykh. Both ladiesprofessionals agreed that the Chinese fashion industry is developing. “The Chinese design is becoming more fashionably, more globalized, trendier, and more elegant. The Chinese spend a lot of time and money on education and schools. The young Chinese people are more interested in fashion than before. Now there are more and more Chinese designers who are very creative as they are willing to learn. So many of them study abroad, they have different cultural experience and different vision about the world of fashion and the society in general. They are more open.” added Catalina Calin.

两位女士仍在继续发展她们各自的品牌，期望在中国和国际舞台上获得更多关注和认可。为了完美的设计，她们从各处搜集灵感：自然、电影、音乐、历史，甚至在街上找不同国家或文化的人聊天。灵感无处不在。

Both ladies are in the process of developing their brands, making them more recognizable in China and abroad drawing inspiration for their wonderful design collections from everywhere: nature, movies, music, history, in the street, even talking to a person from a different country or culture. Inspiration can be found everywhere.