FAQ

The University of Fashion is an online library filled with hundreds of well-produced video lessons covering all aspects of fashion design.

Traditional fashion schools charge a pretty hefty tuition payment per semester or even per class. They also make you travel to classes which are often scheduled at inconvenient times.

The University of Fashion is different. We work by subscription. For an amazingly low fee that's literally thousands of dollars less than a quality school's single semester of classes, you will be able to access all of the University of Fashion's many hundreds of lessons, anytime you want, 24/7, on-demand, from anywhere, as many times as you want.

The University of Fashion provides fashion lectures and "how-to" demonstrations that are virtually identical to those offered by best fashion schools in the world. In fact, all of our video lessons are taught by fashion school professors or industry professionals.

Our lessons teach you everything you need to know about fashion design. We offer lessons on draping, pattern making, sewing, fashion art, knits, business, CAD fashion art, CAD pattern making, product development, accessories, lectures and more!

Here's how it works:

• Take a look at our huge list of lessons and pick one that interests you
• Buy the tools & supplies you'll need to complete that lesson. (You will be able to buy most of the tools and materials you'll need from our own, on-site store!)
• Watch the lesson you chose and follow along with what the teacher is doing, making the same project, yourself. If you mess up something, don't worry! Just rewind the lesson video a little bit and start again (You can't do that at typical school!)
• When you're done, marvel at your creation or, even better, wear it, sell it or give it to a friend!

Oh, and yes, you can write us with questions about our lessons all you want.  A professional designer will respond to your questions, usually in about a day.

A University of Fashion subscription gets you unlimited access to all of the video lessons on our website, all of them. At only US$189 per year, we cost many thousands of dollars less than the tuition you'd pay for just about any other source of quality fashion education.

To subscribe:
1. Go to UniversityofFashion.com
2. Click "Sign-up" on the upper right hand side of the page
3. Follow the prompts
4. Start learning immediately!

We've been around for 10 years, so we're really good at what we do. The University of Fashion will give you the highest quality fashion education at the lowest possible cost.

When we asked many of our current subscribers why they subscribe, they provided an amazing variety of reasons.

• Become a fashion designer
• Improve my existing design skills
• Start a new fashion business
• Create my own clothes (for myself or others)
• Create a portfolio to get into a fashion school
• Use your lessons as projects for my Sewing Club
• Use as a training library for my company employees
• Use to decrease student frustration and increase student retention in our school
• Use to teach job skills to our library's patrons
• Use in our library's new fashion makerspace
• Want to become a fashion designer, but
  • Can't afford the tuition at fashion schools
  • Can't travel far away to attend a fashion school
• Use it to help me switch careers (only have time to learn at home after work)

Download a copy of our brochure by clicking the link, below.

Click the "Lessons" menu on the top of any page to discover all of the lessons we offer. They're organized by discipline:

• Draping
• Fashion Art
• CAD Fashion Art
• Pattern Making
• CAD Pattern Making
• Sewing
• Fashion Business
• Menswear
• Childrenswear
• Knits
• Accessories
• Product Development

You'll see that we have hundreds of lessons for beginner, intermediate and advanced students.

All of our "How-to" lessons come with written transcripts enabling you to read , word-for-word, what the professional or professor is saying in each lesson.

In addition, we provide you with a list of the tools you’ll need to follow along and make the garment or project featured in a particular lesson. In fact, we'll help you buy most of those tools or supplies. Just click "Resources" on the top of any screen and then "Fashion Design Tools".

Many of the draping videos on the University of Fashion website come with an associated Lesson Guide. Lesson Guides are step-by-step, instructional aides consisting of pictures and explanatory text, side-by-side.

In addition to How-to lessons, the University of Fashion also provides videos featuring lectures and tours of interesting, fashion-related venues, such as brand name fashion companies, museums, fashion shows and events.

Go to the Lessons menu on the top of each page then choose one of the fashion design discipline, e.g. Draping, Sewing, Pattern Making (etc.). You will be taken to a page with a long list of lessons in the discipline you chose.

Click on a lesson that interests you. You'll be taken to a page where you can learn a tremendous amount about that particular lesson.

For example, you can watch a video preview of that lesson. You can learn about the person who teaches the lesson, i.e. their education, background and interests. You'll be given a list of the tools and supplies used in that lesson (and how to buy most of them directly from our site). Finally, you'll see excerpts from the lesson's table of contents and written transcript.

You can learn a lot about each and every one of our lessons, without paying us anything.

However, when you subscribe to the University of Fashion, you'll be able to watch all of our video lessons from start to finish as many times as you want. You'll get a "live" table of contents with links that enable you to jump quickly from section to section in a lesson. And, finally, you'll gain access to every lesson, complete written transcript.

Some of our lessons are only five minutes long.

Other lessons last for almost an hour and a half!

Our average lesson, runs thirty to forty minutes.

Once you've selected a lesson from our "Lessons" menu, you'll see a large rectangular video screen at the top of the page.

If you're familiar with most online video players, you'll have no problem controlling this one.

But, if you're new to watching videos online, please click and download our brief tutorial at

Just go to our website and scroll down the page. You will see a heading labeled "Free Lessons". Underneath that heading, you'll see the three lessons you can watch, from start to finish, for free!

Enjoy!

The best way to learn from the University of Fashion is to:

1. Pick an appropriate lesson for your skill level,
2. Buy the tools, fabrics and supplies used in that lesson
3. Follow along with what the instructor is doing in that lesson
4. Finish the project the instructor is demonstrating, yourself.

Every one of our how-to lessons includes a list of all the supplies you'll need to complete that lesson. In fact, you can buy most of these supplies directly from our site.

Learning from one of our video lessons is often much easier than learning from a teacher demonstrating the same lessons in a classroom. Why? Because all of our lessons are taught from the designer’s perspective, i.e. looking down at your work much as you would do when creating something, yourself. This is much better than watching a typical classroom demonstration, where you can only see what the teacher is doing from a backwards or “flipped” perspective. Also, with video lessons, you can rewind any lesson, any time. If you have trouble mastering a particular step on your first try, you can watch it again, then do it again. You can do this as many times as you need to, until you finally get it right!

There's another benefit to doing our lessons yourself. You'll walk away with many actual, three-dimensional samples of your work. You'll have usable patterns, fabric sleeves, fabric collars, multiple drawings and, maybe, even a beautiful fully wearable dress. Whatever it is, you'll now have a way of demonstrating your new found fashion design skills to your friends, your clients, your current employer, a fashion school admissions officer, a prospective employer and, maybe most important, to yourself.

You can learn just about anything you need to know about fashion design from us. Here’s how we guide students who ask, “Where do I begin?”

To become a good designer, you need to have a solid foundation in the disciplines of Draping, Pattern making, Sewing and Fashion Art. Only by learning these skills can you become a truly versatile, hands-on designer.

Our lessons are designed to teach exactly what you'd learn at a top fashion school. To get the most from our lessons, follow along with the teacher in each lesson, doing exactly what they're doing, using your own tools and materials, e.g. fabrics, sewing machine, etc. When you're done with each lesson, you'll be able to show people the many wonderful garments or other projects you've made.

Our subscribers love being able to rewind our lessons and replay the more difficult techniques we teach. This is what makes our approach to teaching better than classroom learning. You simply can't ask a live teacher to repeat what they just demonstrated over and over again. But, with us, you can watch and re-watch, everything we teach as many times as you want...until you can finally do it yourself! Oh, and because all our lessons are professionally filmed, we edit out all the teacher digressions, mistakes, long pauses, dropped scissors and do-overs. As a result, our lessons take 75% less time to watch than in-class lessons.

Sewing, draping, pattern making and fashion drawing are the key technical skills you need to know to become a well-rounded, competent, hands-on fashion designer. Some designers prefer to express their initial ideas graphically, by sketching them onto a piece of paper or onto a computer screen. Other designers prefer to start the design process three-dimensionally by pinning fabric onto a dress form, i.e. by draping. And yet others like to express their initial ideas in the form of flat paper patterns. While there’s no one "right way" to express your ideas, all designers need to know how they're going to sew everything together to create their final product. At the University of Fashion, our goal is to teach you how to become a well-rounded designer, capable of executing in all four of the above fashion disciplines, from concept to wearable, finished garment.

The first skill you need to master is sewing. Go to our site at https://www.UniversityofFashion.com. Click on our Lessons menu and then click on Sewing. Our sewing page provides you with a recommended lesson order. Our beginner lessons are designed to teach you sewing fundamentals: hand-sewing, machine sewing and how to sew various types seams, pockets, zippers and details on different types of fabrics. Once you have mastered our beginner sewing techniques, move on to our fashion art, draping and patternmaking lessons, discussed next. You can always come back to sewing on occasion, in between learning the other disciplines by watching our intermediate and advanced sewing lessons.
 
Once you have some decent sewing skills, move to fashion art by clicking on our Lessons menu, and then clicking on Fashion Art. Our fashion art page provides you with a recommended lesson order but, like with sewing, you don’t need to be an expert artist at this early stage in your education. Just learn enough to feel comfortable drawing a fashion figure or croquis in different poses. Once you have mastered a few, different fashion poses, learn how to draw design details and to render your ideas in color. By viewing our series on "Finding your Sketching Voice," discover your own unique sketching style, one that reflects your own personal design vision.

Once you're comfortable with two-dimensional fashion drawing, move on to three-dimensional designing, i.e. "draping". Draping is about designing directly on a dress form using a basic cloth called muslin.  Draping is, in our opinion, the center of the fashion education universe. Go to our site, click on our Lessons menu, and then click Draping. Our first draping lesson explains dress forms. Buy a good one. Don't buy the cheapest one you can find. And for heaven's sake, don't buy a "store mannequin." You need a dress form that can handle years of direct pinning. At the top of our Draping page we provide a recommended lesson order. Make sure that you proceed in that order. Our "Bodice Sloper" lesson is where the real learning begins. You can feel confident that you've mastered Draping's basics after you've finished all our beginner draping lessons.  You can always come back to our more advanced draping lessons once you have learned the fundamentals of pattern making, the next and last discipline you simply must know to be truly well-rounded.

But, first, a little story. Our founder, Francesca Sterlacci, owned a successful Seventh Avenue fashion label for many years in New York City. She sold to Saks, Barney’s, Nordstrom's and countless "high end" retail boutiques all around the world. While she had decent art skills, most of the garments she created and then manufactured for the five to six lines she marketed every year were first created using draping. Why? Because no other method of designing shows you exactly what a design will look like in its final fabric form like draping can.

Once you've achieved some basic draping skills, you can then move into pattern making. Click on our Lessons menu, then click on Pattern Making. Our pattern making page provides you with a recommended lesson order. You can feel confident that you've mastered the basics of Pattern Making after you have created a complete set of blocks or slopers: straight sleeve, shoulder dart bodice, torso sloper, straight skirt and pants. Once your sloper library is complete, learn how to draft various types of sleeves, skirts and collars.

To round out your fashion education, go to our site, click on our Lessons menu, and then click on Fashion Lectures. Here, we offer what are known in fashion colleges as "electives", e.g. lessons on costume history, color theory, trend forecasting, textiles and leather, bodyscanning, fashion licensing, marketing and branding, fashion law, plus size fashion and a series of lectures from famous people in the fashion industry.

Once you have mastered the above disciplines, ask yourself "What discipline do I enjoy doing the most?" That’s your cue to check out our intermediate or advanced lessons in that discipline. Or, feel free to try out one of our other disciplines, e.g. childrenswear, knits, product development, menswear or accessories design. If you're computer savvy, don't pass up the opportunity to learn what you can do with CAD pattern making and CAD fashion art! And, if you are a bit of an entrepreneur, watch our lectures on "Fashion startup 101" (Parts 1-3) in Fashion Business. This series will help you to get the 'full picture' of the fashion industry and may inspire you to start your own fashion business!

Remember, if you ever have trouble doing a particularly complex step in one of our lessons, read the free lesson transcript which accompanies most of our lessons and use the rewind button on our website to rewind that lesson so that you can re-watch, then re-do that step, yourself, using your own materials. Repeat this over and over until you finally master that tricky step. Even today’s best designers once struggled to learn the techniques they now use routinely in their designs. Remember: “practice make perfect.”

Most important, enjoy!

Many of our lessons include special files that you can download to your computer, tablet or smartphone to enhance your learning.

The links to these downloads are on the same pages that enable you to watch our video lessons. So,the first step to locating the file you want to find is to go to video playback page for that particular lesson. To do this, click our Lessons menu, choose that particular lesson's discipline (e.g. Sewing, draping), scroll down and click on that lesson's picture.

On its video playback page, look just below its description beneath the video player for a clearly labeled, clickable link. It will be on the left side of the page. If you don't see the link there, then look for it inside the list of Tools & Supplies on the bottom right of the same screen.

If you still can't find what you're looking for, please use our Contact form on the top of every page to tell us what specific download you want to find. We will get back to you promptly and help you locate it!

Before we provide our suggested Draping lesson order, remember, the best way to learn is to do! To get the most out of each University of Fashion lesson, you should buy the tools, fabrics and supplies necessary to complete that lesson, and then sit at a large table and do exactly what the teacher is doing in that lesson, yourself.

With that said...

If you’re new to draping, start with our "Intro to Dress Forms", then move to "Draping Basics: Muslin Blocking Marking Pressing". After those, do the "Bodice Sloper" and then the "Straight Skirt Sloper" lessons. Advance next to the "Bustier Bodice" and the "Princess Bodice", then follow along and learn from the "Sheath Dress" and the "A-Line Dress". Finish up by mastering the "Flared Skirt Straight Grain Center", the "Yoke Dirndl Skirt" and the "Fitted Torso Sloper", in that order.

You can then either finish up the rest of the Beginner lessons or move on to discover our Intermediate lessons. These videos will teach you how to drape design details like cascade ruffles, button front and button placket closures, silhouette styles including the dropped shoulder, princess kimono and peplum and how to set a banded and convertible collar. At this point, your choice of where to start should be guided by your particular interests.

Our Advanced lessons teach the art of draping bias garments, creating tailored silhouettes, merging draping with pattern making to design a lined jacket and much more. Don't be afraid of these. Once you have followed along with 10 or more Beginner and Intermediate lessons, you should be able to enjoy these more difficult lessons.

Before we provide our suggested Fashion Art lesson order, remember, the best way to learn is to do! To get the most out of each University of Fashion lesson, you need to buy the tools and supplies necessary to complete that lesson, and then sit at your dining room table and replicate exactly what the teacher is doing in that lesson, yourself.

With that said...

If you’re new to fashion drawing and illustrating, start with the "Female Frontal pose" and the "Female Contrapposto pose" in the Beginner section on our Fashion Art page. [Our advice is to master hand drawing in this section before you move on to designing on a computer in our CAD section.] Next, try to draw the "Female Walking Pose" and the Female Side Back Pose" in Fashion Art. Then, move on to our "Female Relaxed Standing Pose" and "Female Head, Hands & Feet". Finally, choose and finish 4 other Beginner lessons that interest you, or seem challenging, before moving to our Intermediate section.

Our Intermediate Art lessons will teach you to hand render your designs. Each lesson comes with a free downloadable croquis template and swatch so that so that you can follow along with the instructor. We will also teach you how to find your own sketching style, which "brands" you and sets you apart from other designers. After mastering at least 6 Intermediate lessons, move on to the Advanced lessons.

Our Advanced Art lessons will teach how to illustrate your designs in gouache (“water paint” or “splash” in Italian). Download our Free fashion croquis for these lessons and follow along with your instructor to perfect the techniques we introduce in these lessons.

If you're feeling very comfortable with your hand rendering skills, move on to our Computer Assisted Design (CAD) lessons. You'll find them in the CAD section as a subcategory in our Lessons menu at the top of any page. We've laid out our CAD page in the order we recommend you watch (and follow along) with these lessons. Start with the first lesson, then move to the second lesson, etc.

We recommend that you begin your introduction to pattern making with our "Basic Straight Sleeve Sloper" lesson. Then move on to the "Basic Straight Skirt" and the "Basic Pant Sloper".

Once you have mastered these lessons you can move to our beginner basic bodice sloper lesson entitled “Drafting a Shoulder Dart Bodice Sloper from Measurements. This will enable you to create the slopers that you will need for our "Kimono Sleeve" and "Raglan Sleeve" lessons. It will also be your foundation for the lesson on how to "Convert a Bodice Sloper to a Fitted Torso Sloper".

We also recommend that, if you have a dress form, that you drape a Basic Bodice or a Side Bust Dart Bodice w/Back Neck Dart, then convert the drape to a paper pattern and then onto oaktag. Watch our lesson on how to do this by viewing our pattern making lesson entitled "Transfer Side Bust Bodice Drape to Paper-Oaktag".

Once you have created your sloper library you are ready to begin designing and manipulating your patterns to create variations. Be sure to watch our other pattern making lessons on collars, sleeves and circle skirts.

Feel free to write us through the site's Contact form if you have questions or want even more suggestions.

Before we provide our suggested Sewing lesson order, remember, the best way to learn is to do! To get the most out of each University of Fashion lesson, you need to buy the tools, fabrics and supplies necessary to complete that lesson, and then sit at your dining room table and replicate exactly what the teacher is doing in that lesson, yourself.

With that said

If you’re relatively new to sewing, start with Threading the Brother 1500s" (sewing machine), then go on to master our “Intro” lessons. Move next to our series of lessons about “Finishes.” Then, let us teach you the ins and outs of zippers. Watch and master 6 more lessons in this section, the ones that interest you most, before moving on to our Intermediate lessons.

In our Intermediate section, We will teach you couture sewing techniques ranging from how to applique a lace seam, the basics on couture buttons and buttonholes and finally how to create hand-made fabric flowers. Choose any 5 lessons that interest you, and nail them.

Before jumping into our Advanced Sewing section, first look and listen to our Beginner lecture called "Leather Tanning to Types". Then run through our Advanced 6-part leather sewing lessons in this section to teach you how to sort and cut leather, how to interface and stabilize leather seams and the sewing techniques you need to know to sew a complete leather jacket.

We offer 3 different subscription plans:
- Yearly
- Monthly, and
- Group

Yearly Subscription

Our Yearly subscription costs only US$189 per year, plus sales tax*.  In return, you get unlimited access to all of our video lessons and special features. Everything! Look around on the web. Most other online courses cost many hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars for just one class.

Our Yearly subscriptions expire automatically at the end of 365 days. They do not automatically renew. We contact our yearly subscribers near the end of their subscription terms and ask them if they want to renew for another year, often at a discounted renewal price. Yearly subscriptions are, by far, our best subscription value for individuals.

Monthly Subscription

Our Monthly subscription costs only US$19⁹⁵ per month, plus sales tax*.

These automatically renew every 30 days unless you cancel them (Easy! Just click "Cancel" under Membership Management on your Account page). Like our Yearly subscriptions, these subscriptions give you unlimited access to all of our video lessons and special features. Everything! They are great subscriptions for those interested in evaluating the quality of our video lessons or for those who frequently turn our service on or off to tie to their available free time or needs, e.g. vacation times, summer breaks, clothes needed for upcoming special events, client orders, training meetings, etc.

Group Subscription

Our Group subscriptions are yearly (or longer) subscriptions for large organizations. These are for schools, libraries, fashion companies, retail stores and sewing clubs that want to provide their students, patrons, members, customers or employees with full access to the University of Fashion library. These subscriptions vary in price depending on the number of people permitted to access our library.

*We only charge sales tax to subscribers who reside in California, USA

Subscribers get unlimited access to absolutely every video lesson we have . In a world where most online schools charge hundreds, or even thousands of dollars for a single class, you get access to hundreds of video classes at the University of Fashion for just pennies a day!

And, unlike the teacher demonstrations in school, you can replay all or part of our demonstrations over and over again, until you really understand what we're showing you, and can do it, yourself.

A subscription to the University of Fashion also gets you a ton of "extras"

Many of our lessons include downloadable files to help you understand key concepts, make tricky calculations or customize a project for different sized models.

Every one of our How-to lessons comes with a full, written transcript. These transcripts enable you to read exactly what the teacher is saying in each video.

Every one of our How-to lessons comes with an active Table of Contents containing live links allowing you to jump immediately from one section to another in a lesson.

Your subscription enables you to ask us questions about our lessons, career concerns or anything else. Our team of professional fashion designers will answer your questions quickly, usually within 24 hours, even on weekends!

We provide much more than just great lectures, fashion tours, interviews and How-To lessons with your subscription. We also provide information that can help you develop your general fashion knowledge and career. Go to our website at universityoffashion.com and hover your mouse over the “Resources” menu at the top right of our Home page. Then click on any of the special services we offer on the resulting dropdown menu. Here are just some of the many special services we offer:

Croquis

We provide many types of free downloadable croquis to improve your drawing skills and help you to flesh out your design ideas.

Terminology

Not sure what a “Bar Tack” is? Our Terminology page helps you look up all the different terms used in fashion design.

Fashion Design Tools

From “Tracing Wheels” to “Tailor’s Chalk”, we show you what the key fashion designer tools look like and how to buy them directly from our website!

Marketplace

We provide an ever-growing list of the fashion companies and suppliers that you ought to know. These companies make just about anything you would ever need to become a great fashion designer, e.g. fabrics, sewing machines, dress forms, woven garment labels and much, much more.

Fashion books, Magazines and blogs

We provide a constantly updated list of fashion books, along with a way to instantly buy them. We also introduce you to some of the more interesting fashion magazines and blogs.

Fashion Museums

We provide a thorough, and constantly updated review of the most interesting fashion museums in the world

The University of Fashion Blog

You can access our popular blog directly from our website!

Other social media

We have had a presence in many social media channels for years. Many subscribers use our Pinterest page for inspiration and ‘mood boards’.

• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/universityoffashion
• Instagram: https://instagram.com/u_of_fashion
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/U_of_Fashion
• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/UniversityofFashion
• Pinterest: www.pinterest.com/univoffashion

In short, you'll rarely find a better value than a University of Fashion subscription.

If you are an individual...

1. Go to UniversityofFashion.com
2. Click "Sign-up" on the upper right hand side of the page
3. Click "Order Now" under either Monthly or Yearly
4. Follow the prompts on the screen
5. Start learning immediately!

If you are an organization (a school, library, fashion company, retail store, sewing or fashion club or any group of 2 or more individuals)...

1. Go to UniversityofFashion.com
2. Click "Subscriptions" on the top of the page, then click the submenu, "For Schools, Libraries & other groups"
3. Enter your name, email and organization name, then click Next and follow the prompts from there
4. We'll get back to you promptly to learn more about your needs and to provide a quote

How sweet of you to give someone a University of Fashion subscription! Here's how to do it:

If you don't already have a Free Member or paid subscription account, yourself:

1. Click the "Sign-up" button at the top of any page, then click Sign-up Now!" under either the “Monthly” or “Yearly” Subscription columns.

2. Fill out the order form that appears using your own e-mail address, name and address. However, when the form asks for your desired username, choose a username tied to your gift recipient's name. For example, if you're giving a gift to Sally Jones, set the subscription's username to "sjones".  Use your credit card or PayPal to pay for the subscription.

3. Seconds after you create the subscription, you will receive its password at your email address.

4. Now for the fun part! Give your gift recipient the username you created and the password you received via email. Tell your gift recipient to change the account's password and email address by logging in and clicking "Edit Profile" under MEMBERSHIP MANAGEMENT on the first screen they see.

If you already have your own Free Member or paid subscription account:

Do all the steps above, but use a different email address for the gift subscription than the one you use for your own account.

If you don't have a second email address, get a new, free "disposable" email address from www.spamex.com. Just tell Spamex to forward any emails sent to your new, 2nd email address to your regular email address. Or, you can simply ask a trusted friend to "lend" you their email address for a few days. Remember, eventually, your gift certificate recipient will change your friend's email address to his or her own, so you won't need to borrow your friend's email for long!

To upgrade your monthly subscription to a yearly subscription,

1. Login to the University of Fashion Website
2. Look on the page for the “Upgrade to Yearly Subscription” link and click it
3. Provide the information requested

It is easy!

Your new yearly subscription will start immediately after upgrading.

You'll be charged every 30 days for a monthly subscriptions, until you cancel it.

It's easy to cancel your monthly subscription at any time. Just login and click the appropriate cancel subscription link under Membership Management.

Yearly Subscriptions

If you have a yearly subscription, you can renew early. But, our advice is to wait until you receive our reminder email before doing this!

We will send you a reminder email about a month before your yearly subscription term is up. These emails almost always offer a special renewal deal!

So wait until you see our first reminder email before you renew!

BTW, if you renew while there's still time left on your current yearly subscription, don't worry. You won't lose that time. You paid for it! Your new yearly subscription will always start after your current yearly subscription ends.

Monthly Subscriptions

You don’t need to do anything to renew your Monthly Subscription.

These subscriptions automatically renew every month, until cancelled.

University of Fashion accepts Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover, Maestro, Solo and PayPal.

To buy either our monthly or yearly subscription, just click the "Signup" button on the top of our Home page, fill in our order form and choose one of the above payment methods to complete your order.

We will accept checks for Yearly subscriptions, only.

Please mail us your paper check order in US currency for US$199, payable to "University of Fashion". This covers our Yearly $189 subscription cost, plus a $10 handling fee.

Send your check via postage-paid mail to:

J. Purvin
220 Madison Avenue, Suite PH-H
New York, NY 10016

In your envelope, please include a note with your first and last names, your email address and your requested username and password.

When your check clears our bank, we will manually create a yearly subscription account for you and advise you of this ASAP by email.

If any of the above requirements are not met, we will  not be able to process your subscription and will destroy your check.

Sorry, but we do not accept money orders.

Free Members can access and download our free croquis and watch the 3 free full-length lessons featured on both our Home page and Free Member's Welcome page.

They also get occasional, special “Members Only” discounts on monthly and yearly subscription rates, as well as other pleasant surprises!

Free Members get the University of Fashion newsletter which tells them about any new UoF videos just added to the site, new fashion news, UoF contests and/or other opportunities to improve your fashion knowledge or skills.

Just click on the button marked “Sign-Up” on the upper right hand side of the University of Fashion Home page.

Then, click “Sign-up Now!” underneath the section entitled “Free Membership.”

It's easy to upgrade a Free Member account to a full, paid subscription!

Just log into the University of Fashion using your Free Member username and password. On the first page you see, under MEMBERSHIP MANAGEMENT, click "Upgrade to Monthly (or Yearly) subscription". Fill in the form as requested and we'll upgrade your existing Free Member account to a full subscription!

It's easy to cancel your Free Member account!

Just log into the University of Fashion using your Free Member username and password. On the first page you see, under MEMBERSHIP MANAGEMENT, click "Cancel Free Membership."

We're committed to achieving Level A (or better) compliance with the latest Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). If you need additional help, please write us by clicking the Contact menu at www.UniversityofFashion.com. We will do our best to help you.

Our croquis can help you improve your drawing skills and flesh out new design ideas.

Go to our website and hover your mouse over our “Resources” menu at the top of any page. Then click on Croquis.

Both our subscribers and Free Members can download our croquis for free!

Not sure what a "Bar Tack" is, or what "FOB" means?

Our Terminology page helps you look up all the special jargon and terms that are commonly used in fashion design.

Go to our website and hover your mouse over our “Resources” menu at the top of any page. Then click on "Terminology".

From “Tracing Wheels” to “Hip Curves”, we have a huge section on fashion design tools and supplies.

We not only show you what each tool looks like, we also give you an easy way to buy it directly from our website!

Go to our website and hover your mouse over our “Resources” menu at the top of any page. Then click on "Fashion Design Tools".

We maintain a carefully curated list of the best fashion companies and suppliers in the fashion industry.

These worldwide companies can supply you with the counsel and tools you’ll need to become more professionally successful, e.g. manufacturing services, fabric sources, sewing machine companies, dress form companies, woven garment label suppliers, and much more!

Go to our website and hover your mouse over our “Resources” menu at the top of any page. Then click on "Marketplace".

We have a huge list of all of the best fashion books on the market, along with a way to instantly buy them!

Go to our website and hover your mouse over our “Resources” menu at the top of any page. Then click on "Fashion books".

We maintain a constantly updated list of the most interesting fashion magazines, websites and blogs. Just hover your mouse over our “Resources” menu at the top of any page, then click on "Fashion Magazine, Websites and Blogs".

Select any entry to go to that site and learn more about it!

We provide a thorough, constantly updated, review of the most interesting fashion museums in the world!

Just hover your mouse over our “Resources” menu at the top of any page and click on "Fashion Museums".

We are a big supporter of fashion schools. There are several ways we can help prospective and current fashion school students.

1. Get help choosing and applying to a good fashion school

Many of our subscribers use our video lesson library and other resources to help them find, apply to and get into the fashion school of their dreams.

First, check out our list of great fashion schools around the world. Just hover your mouse over our “Resources” menu at the top of any page, then click on "Fashion Schools". You'll see an extensive list of the world’s best fashion schools, along with links to their websites. Choose the schools that most appeal to you and your particular skill set.

Next, watch our lesson on "Creating a Professional Fashion Design Portfolio." You'll find it in our "Lectures" section (Resources > Lectures menu). Use this lecture to create a portfolio that showcases your fashion skills. Every good school expects you to have such a portfolio. If you've diligently watched our lessons, following along with what the instructors doing in each one, using your own materials, then you will have a big collection of finished samples to show schools in your portfolio or as separate items of interest. These can include patterns fully or partially draped garments, art renderings (hand drawn and CAD) and/or samples skillfully sewn zippers, and much more!

Finally, apply to the schools you've chosen and make sure to show them live samples of your work before the interview process (with photographs) and during the interview process (with live project samples).

2. Use University of Fashion to better understand the principles your instructors are teaching you and to get better grades

Thousands of fashion school students use our lessons every year to supplement their formal fashion education and to help them ace their homework and special projects.

If you’ve ever missed a key class demonstration, then you know it’s impossible to later reconstruct it for a homework project. But, with the University of Fashion, you can find a similar lesson and re-play it over and over until you thoroughly understand it. You simply can’t do that with a classroom demonstration. The University of Fashion can be the difference between getting a C, or an A, when the term ends.

We believe that the best way to learn fashion design is from a live teacher at a good school. Besides seeing personal demonstrations of key concepts, you'll get the benefit of your teacher's experience. Every good teacher has learned a ton of tips and tricks that they're happy to share with their students. Also, only a live teacher can answer your many questions on the spot.

Yet, many thousands of students from the best fashion schools in the world subscribe to the University of Fashion, either personally or through their schools. They use our lessons to supplement their in-class notes, to jog their visual memories, to help them better understand complicated concepts and to help them ace their homework and special projects.

If you’ve ever missed a key class, then you know it’s impossible to reconstruct the classroom demonstration you missed. Sure, you can borrow another student’s notes. But words simply can’t describe an experienced teacher’s physical motions. But, you can always find a very similar lesson in our library to get you caught up. And, even better, unlike that one-time class demonstration you missed, you can re-play our demonstration over and over again until you fully understand it and can master the steps yourself. This can be the difference between getting an A or a C when the term ends.

And learning from one of our video lessons is often much easier than learning from a teacher demonstrating the same lessons in a classroom. Why? Because all of our lessons are taught from the designer’s perspective, i.e. looking down at your work much as you would do when creating something, yourself. This is much better than watching a typical classroom demonstration, where you can only see what the teacher is doing from a backwards or “flipped” perspective. With video lessons, you can rewind any lesson, any time. If you have trouble mastering a particular step on your first try, you can watch it again, then do it again. You can do this as many times as you need to, until you finally get it right!

Last, our lessons are filmed without teacher digressions, mistakes, long pauses and do-overs. As a result, our lessons take 75% less time to watch than in-class lessons.

A Group Subscription enables all of your organization's students, patrons, employees, customers or members to access the entire UofF lesson library, at a tiny cost-per-user, compared to our individual subscription rates.

To learn more, simply click the Subscription menu at the top of any page. After choosing the "For Schools (etc.)" sub-menu, simply provide your contact information and click "Next". We'll get back to you promptly with a few questions and a quick quote. You'll be surprised by the affordability of our Group subscription!

A University of Fashion subscription is perfect for schools, clubs, libraries, associations, teachers, consultants or retailers who want to educate or entertain large groups of students, members, patrons, employees or customers. Your "Group" subscription will enable all of your constituents to access all of the video lessons on the UoF site at a tiny cost-per-person!

There are many ways you can use a Group subscription.

1. Schools use UoF’s videos to supplement their teachers’ in-class efforts. Because our videos make it easier for students to successfully complete their homework projects, students enjoy and learn more from their learning experience. This can have a significant impact on overall student satisfaction and student retention rates.
   • Teachers may play UoF’s videos in their classroom then direct their students to use the same videos shown in class to help the students complete their homework projects between classes. This enables students to view specific sections of a video very similar to what they saw in class over and over again until they "get it.". The students can pause, rewind or fast forward the classroom video as much as they want while they successfully complete each step of a project. U of F’s videos supplement the student’s classroom notes and provide much better guidance to those students “stuck” on a particular step in a project than the many awful, amateur fashion videos found on the web, e.g. YouTube™, or the sometimes incorrect advice provided by their fellow classmates.
   • Teachers may prefer to teach their students in-class without using UoF’s videos. However, to improve their students’ success in completing homework assignments, teachers can assign specific UoF videos to their students to help the students complete their homework assignments with a minimum level of frustration and a maximum likelihood of success. Teachers know that some students do a poor job transferring the knowledge they obtained from their in-class experience to their notes. But, when students see and review UoF’s clear, well-produced videos over and over again, in the comfort of their dorm rooms, homes or classroom, their notes will come alive with increased understanding.
   • Schools offering online fashion design programs can use University of Fashion videos, under the supervision of a qualified teacher, to provide an additional effective learning option to their students, especially students located geographically far away from the school’s campus.
   • Schools may also use UoF videos to train new teachers and to evaluate new teaching methodologies for certain lessons.
   • Teachers and students use the UoF’s social media platforms: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and U of F Blog, to keep current on fashion industry trends. Students may use UoF’s Pinterest page as an inspirational source since most of the UoF Pinterest Inspiration boards are linked to individual lessons and vice versa.
2. Fashion companies have hundreds, if not thousands, of employees. These large organizations regularly need to train new employees or to provide “continuing education” to their longer tenured employees. By licensing a Yearly Group Video Subscription license, these organizations can provide all of their employees with unlimited access to all of the educational videos in the entire University of Fashion video library for their use unlimited use any time of day or night for a year. In short, a Group license provides companies with a permanent resource for training and maintaining the technical skills of their employees.
3. Libraries can help their patrons learn or improve their job skills and/or to start new fashion businesses. Libraries with Maker Space programs can use UofF's video lessons to create live teaching programs.
4. Retail stores selling fashion or craft-related tools and supplies can increase customer loyalty and find new customers by offering free (or paid) showings of UofF’s videos in their stores via a UofF Group license to their customers. Depending upon the retail store’s objectives, you can provide and/or sell your customer audience some (or all) of the tools and supplies needed for them to complete the project(s) featured in the individual video(s) you screen for them.
5. Fashion clubs can show UofF videos to their members at meetings and challenge their members to complete the many fashion lessons UofF offers.

You can buy begin the purchase process for a Group subscription by simply clicking the Contact link at the top of the UofF Home page, filling-in the form with your request and clicking “Send.” A University of Fashion representative will get in touch with you shortly.

If you want to test the use of our lessons in your school or other large institution, then you have two easy options:

1. Ask us for a Free trial, or
2. Ask us for a Free limited test subscription

With a Free Trial, we'll allow up to your entire student body to access our site for a few months. This is a great way to test the waters and see how your students utilize our services.

With a free, limited test subscription, we would give a predefined number of your students (and their teachers) individual access for a few months to our website. Everyone will have their own login. This is a great way to test our service among a trusted group of students and teachers you select upfront.

If you'd like a quote for either or both of these Free programs, please write us using our Contact Form (at the top of every page). Describe your goals and tell us how many students you'd like our Group subscription to cover. We'll get back with a quick cost. There's no obligation.

If you are a part of a fashion-related company, you can purchase a Group Subscription and give all of your customers and/or employees a fantastic, 24/7 training resource.

This program will allow your customers and/or employees unlimited access to all of the videos and content on the University of Fashion website. To help reinforce their learning experience, your customers and/or employees will also be able to view the written transcripts for every video lesson on our website and all of our available step-by step pictorial Lesson Guides.

It's easy!

If you have a University of Fashion sales representative, just contact them directly.

Otherwise, write us a note using the Contact form at the top of every page on our website.

Contact your University of Fashion Sales Representative directly, if you have one. Otherwise, simply write us using the "Contact" form on our website.

If you're a teacher in a small school, or you teach students privately, we strongly recommend that you buy a UoF Group Subscription for your students. The cost will be very low and you can include that small cost in each student's tuition. They'll be thrilled, because you're giving them, in effect, a $189 value for free. And, they will each get their own, private login so that, even when your class is over, they can continue to access every single one of our video lessons for the rest of the year!

To get a quote for a Group Subscription, simply click our Contact link at the top of any page. Fill in the form and tell us how many individual student logins you'd like to get from us. Click “Send” and a University of Fashion representative will get in touch with you shortly.

There's no obligation! And you'll be surprised at how little a group subscription costs.

Most of the teachers who subscribe to the University of Fashion first demonstrate a particular design project in class. After answering their students initial questions, they ask their students to go home, or work in class, to do what the teacher just demonstrated, themselves. To help jog the students' memories, the teacher will tell them that, if they forget a step or two, or have trouble deciphering their own written notes, to refer to a particulate University of Fashion lessons to help jog their memories.

Many teachers also assign all or part of a particular University of Fashion lessons as a homework assignment. These teachers later critique their students' homework in class, and use the homework as a springboard to continued learning.

Either way, your students will love you for giving them access to University of Fashion lessons. Why? Besides jogging their memories on what you demonstrated in class, they can play our lessons over and over again, and read their written transcripts, until they can finally "get it." Besides saving you a great deal of between-class time explaining things to students, your students will learn much faster and more permanently.

To get a quote for a Group Subscription, simply click our Contact link at the top of any page. Fill in the form and tell us how many individual student logins you'd like to get from us. Click “Send” and a University of Fashion representative will get in touch with you shortly.

There's no obligation! And you'll be surprised at how little a group subscription costs.

All our individual subscribers (both Monthly and Yearly subscribers) are eligible to earn UofF certificates.

If you are a member of a school, sewing club, company or library and you can directly access our website with a username and a password, then you can earn UofF certificates.

If you are a member of a school, sewing club, company or library and you can only access our website by logging into your school's, company's or library's website portal first or if you were given some other way to access our website that doesn't require a username and password, then you can't earn UofF certificates. This is because we don't know who you are and have no way to provide you with personalizes certificates.

University of Fashion subscribers will earn a Certificate of Completion for any lesson or lecture they complete.

You can track your individual progress toward earning certificates by clicking My Learning on the left side of your Account page.

On your My Learning page, you can:

1. See all your earned Certificates of Completion
2. See the lessons titles that you are currently watching, but have not yet completed
3. Download, print or email your Certificates to others
4. Download, print, email or post to social media a summary of your Certificates earned to-date

There is no extra charge for University of Fashion Certificates.

Show your University of Fashion certificates to prospective employers and clients along with the draped muslins, patterns, sewing samples, CAD files and other results you physically produced while watching those lessons. Certificates are great but there is nothing more powerful than showing your actual, hands-on work.

Here are some tips to keep in mind when seeking to earn certificates.

1. Where to go to manage your certificates
Your My Learning page is "Certificate Central". That's where you should go to see and manage your latest progress on earning certificates. How do you go there? It's simple. After logging in, click "Account" at the top right of our site, look to your left for My Learning and click it.

2. Lesson watching accuracy
My Learning will show you which certificates you've already earned and your progress toward earning additional certificates. Keep in mind that we will only track your lesson progress after we formally launched the program on June 1, 2022. Regarding your lesson watching progress toward earning new certificates, all the completion percents we show are approximations, only.

3. You need to have an app that can read PDF files
You need to have an app capable of viewing PDF files installed on your computer in order to download, see and use UoF certificates. Check to make sure you have Adobe Reader, Acrobat or any other app that can read PDF's installed on your computer. We recommend Adobe Reader. Go to the Adobe Acrobat Reader download page and click Install now.

4. Generating and downloading certificates
You know you've earned a certificate when you see "Your certificate is being created. Please check back soon" to the right of that lesson in My Learning. Come back every 5 minutes or so and refresh your browser by clicking the little arrow that forms a circle on the top, left of your browser. When you finally see "View Certificate" to the right of a lesson's title, you know that your certificate for that lesson has been created and is ready to be downloaded and seen. To download it, just click the "View Certificate" link to the right of a particular lesson's title. On most computers, your newly downloaded certificate will appear pretty quickly as a PDF file on the bottom left of your screen. Just left-click the small rectangle to open your new certificate. If you've already installed Adobe Reader, Acrobat or any other app that can read PDF's, your certificate will open. Once displayed, you can then save, print or email that certificate to anyone.

5. Generating and downloading "Summary Certificates"
When you've earned 2 or more certificates in a single discipline, such as Draping, you can download a Summary Certificate for that discipline. This special certificate will list all the lessons for which you've earned a certificate in that discipline. To download a Summary Certificate, just click the link to the right of any discipline that shows a "Request Summary Certificate" link to the right of the discipline. You'll then see "Certificate requested; check back soon". This means that we've started generating your summary certificate. Come back to your My Learning page every 5 minutes or so and refresh your browser by clicking the little arrow that forms a circle on the top, left of your browser's address bar. If you see “Still working. Come back later”, wait a little more, come back and click to refresh your browser's My Learning tab again. Usually certificates finish generating after 10-20 minutes, but sometimes it can take 30 or more minutes. Once you see "View Summary Certificate" to the right of a discipline, you know that your summary certificate is ready to download. Click "View Summary Certificate" and wait for your summary certificate to download. On most computers, your certificate will download in the form of a PDF file. It will appear as a small rectangular icon on the bottom, left of your screen. Just click the small rectangle and your certificate will open in Adobe Reader or Acrobat, or any other app that can read PDF's. You can then save, print or email your new summary certificate.

6. How to easily get back to where you last left off in a still incomplete lesson
In My Learning, just click the title of a still incomplete lesson. That will take you back to the lesson where you last left off in it.

7. What if you can't hear any sound when watching a lesson
Your browser may be set to mute any sound from the tab where your lesson is playing. Right click that tab and click "Unmute sound".

The University of Fashion is more like a library (or a tutor) than a traditional school. Our subscribers come to us to learn at their own pace, not to get a formal educational credential. As a result, we don't award formal degrees or diplomas. However, we offer certificates. Please go to About > FAQ and click on any certificate-related FAQ to learn more about our certificate program.

We offer the exact same fashion lectures and "how-to" demonstrations as the best fashion schools, because all of our lessons are taught by professional fashion designers or fashion college professors.

Every University of Fashion lesson will teach you how to make all or part of a garment, pattern, drawing or special project. Simply buy the fabrics and tools needed for a lesson (every lesson supplies this list), and then follow along with our instructor to make that lesson's featured garment or project. Our students demonstrate their knowledge of fashion design by proving their mastery. They show prospective employers or school admissions officers actual, sewn, cut, printed or drawn two- and three-dimensional samples of the projects they've created from our lessons.

When our students apply for pattern making or other designer jobs, or apply to great fashion schools, they send along photographs and/or actual samples of their work along with their resumes, portfolios and cover letters. When applying for admission to fashion schools, our students create and provide comprehensive portfolios of their work. The schools expect you to have this. We even have a lesson on how to make an effective fashion school portfolio!

Our students cite their University of Fashion experience in their resumés or CV's in a variety of ways, for example:

- University of Fashion (2015-2016): completed 3 projects/lessons ("Name of Lesson 1", "Name of Lesson 2" and "Name of Lesson 3"), or

- University of Fashion (2015-2016): Completed multiple lessons in Pattern making and Draping

- University of Fashion (2015-2016): Completed all lessons in Draping, Sewing and CAD

Many students want to encourage prospective employers to ask to see their work So, they add "3-D samples of all projects available for review" or "Photographs available for review" to their resumés.

We've all met people with decidedly deficient skills who had impressive degrees or certificates. But, University of Fashion students never disappoint, because they can actually prove they know what they're talking about!

Oh, by the way, here's a list of famous designers that never got a fashion certificate or graduated with a degree from a fashion college.

The University of Fashion can help you to become a happy, successful fashion design!

We assume that you really want to learn. So, no, we don't make you take tests.

Rather, we encourage you to follow along with the lessons that interest you and create the projects featured in those lessons.

It's easy to do. We give you a list of all the fabrics and supplies you need to complete each and every lesson we offer. Most of the time, you'll have no problem doing exactly what the teacher is doing in a lesson. But, if you ever hit a snag, no problem! Just rewind the lesson and watch that section again. You can't do this in a school classroom. But, you sure can with a University of Fashion lesson! You can re-watch a section in our videos 20 times if you need to. Eventually, you will end up mastering every step.

Oh, and if you have any questions about a lesson (or anything else), click Contact on the top menu on our site and ask away. A professional fashion designer will respond to all fashion-related questions. Most of the time, you will get a response in less than 48 hours.

We don't need to make you take a bunch of tests. There's no better way to prove that you know what you're doing than to create a great looking garment, drawing, pattern or other project from our lessons.

Video transcripts are documents that include all of the words said by the teacher in a video lesson. A transcript provides a very easy way for you to better understand the steps involved in creating a particular project.

Every University of Fashion lesson includes a transcript.

You cannot change your username except by creating a new account.

If you've forgotten or want to change your username, just click "Contact" at the top of most pages and write to us, giving us the new username you'd prefer, along with your name and email address.

We'll work with you to cancel your current account and create a new account with the new username.

Once you've selected a lesson from our "Lessons" menu, you'll see a large rectangular video screen at the top of the page.

If you're familiar with most online video players, you'll have no problem controlling this one.

But, if you're new to watching videos online, please click and download our brief tutorial at

It's easy to change your e-mail address on file with us!

Just log into the University of Fashion. On the first page you see, under MEMBERSHIP MANAGEMENT, click "Edit Profile". Delete your current email address and add your new one.

Now, scroll down and click "Save all changes".

You're done!

Sorry, but you can't change your username. You can change your email address and your password. But, not your username.

However, if you've forgotten or want to change your username, just click "Contact" on the top of most pages and write us, giving us the new username you'd prefer, along with your name and email address.

It's easy to change your password!

If you're an individual subscriber who did not subscribe as part of your school, library, company, sewing club or other large organization:

1. Click the "Account" button on the top of most pages. This will take you to your personal Welcome page.
2. Scroll down a little and, under Membership Management, click "Edit Profile".
3. Enter your current password, then enter your new password, twice. This makes sure you don't accidentally misspell the new password.
4. Scroll down and click "Save all changes".

If you're a Free Member:

• Follow the instructions, above.

If you registered with a code as a member of your school, library, company, sewing club or other large organization:

1. First, you need to logout by clicking the "Logout" button on the top of most pages. You'll know you logged out successfully, if now you see a "Login" button on the top of the page.
2. Click the "Login" button
3. Enter your username or email address. If you've got multiple email addresses, make sure to use the one you used when you first registered.
4. Click "Get New Password". You'll see a message saying "Check your email for the confirmation link."
5. Go to your email program and look for an email from University of Fashion. Within the email, look for the words, "To reset your password, visit the following address," then click the long link following it. A small window will appear. The small window will start by saying: Enter your new password."
6. Look under "New Password" on the small window, above. You'll see that we've automatically provided you with a strong password.  If you like the password we created for you, click the "Reset Password" button on the bottom of the window. But, if you want to change the password we provided for you, just replace it with your preferred password, making sure your password has at least 6 numbers and/or characters. Then, click the "Reset Password" button on the bottom of the window.
7. You've successfully changed your password if you see a new window that says, "Your password has been reset."

Having problems?

Click the "Contact" menu at the top of most pages and write us. It will really help if you provide the text of any error messages you receive.

Many of our lessons offer downloadable files.

You can find these by clicking their discipline (e.g. Draping or CAD) under our Lessons menu, then locating the lesson you're looking for (that offers downloads). Just click on that lesson's picture and you'll be taken to the lesson's Video Playback Page.

Just a little below the big playback screen at the top of the Video Playback Page, you'll see clickable links from which you can access the lesson's downloadable file(s). Just click the link and download the file(s) to your computer.

Many of our downloadable files come in a compressed state, called a "Zip" file. If you're unfamiliar with these types of files, search on the internet to find out how to extract the file(s) within each Zip file on your type of computer. It's usually very easy. Often all you have to do is double click on the Zip file saved on your computer to get the computer to show you what's inside each Zip. You can then easily save the file(s) inside the Zip individually.

You should now be able to use one of your computer's resident applications, e.g. Adobe Reader or Illustrator, to open the file(s) you just downloaded.

Yes. We have a team of fashion designers who can answer both your lesson-related questions and even your general questions about fashion and your career.

To ask us a question, just click the “Contact” tab on the top of any page and ask us what you want to know!

The University of Fashion is proud to have very close ties with many of the top fashion school and companies in the world. Many choose to place advertising, video lessons and testimonials on our site.

However, the University of Fashion is not formally associated with these fashion educational and business organizations.

We want to hear your ideas, your compliments and your complaints!

Your comments will help to make our service better.

Click on the “Contact” link on the top of the University of Fashion Home page. This will take you to a form that will ask for your contact information and give you a space into which you can tell us what’s on your mind. After you’re done, click “Send”

University of Fashion only offers its video lessons online, directly from its website. There is no option to gain physical possession of any of University of Fashion's video lessons or transcripts by mail or any other physical means.

University of Fashion only offers its video lessons and written transcripts online, directly from the University of Fashion website. However, you can download the files we provide with certain lessons if you are a subscriber. These can be downloaded by going to those lessons and clicking the appropriate download buttons shown under the video playback screen at the top.

There's no need to apply for admission to the University of Fashion.

Everyone is permitted to subscribe and learn from our fashion design lessons!

When you subscribe, our classes start whenever you want them to start. Our lessons are always available, anytime of day or night.

Our classes are held wherever you want them to be held, at any location with an internet connection. You can watch our lessons at home, in your favorite coffee shop, at a friend's house, in a hotel room, or just about anywhere you want!

We do not offer scholarships because the cost of our fashion design education is already extremely low.

If you are unable to get to the UoF website, we suggest you contact your internet provider to see if their service is “down.” UoF’s website is readily available to our customers around the world with only a tiny percent of site downtime.

Most internet connection problems are not due to a specific University of Fashion problem. Often your own internet provider is the real problem, i.e. our site is working fine, but your internet provider’s service has been interrupted for some reason.

We encourage you to tell us more about your connection problems by contacting our customer service department. Simply click the “Contact” link on the bottom of the University of Fashion Home page, fill out the form displayed then click the “Send” button on the bottom. Your questions will then be emailed to our customer service specialists for careful review and response. If we can, we will help you.

First, open different browser and try to play our videos from that new browser.

Next, check to see if you can view any of the videos available on the VIMEO.COM website. If you can't view Vimeo's videos either, then there's a likely a problem with your computer or your internet connection, not with the University of Fashion website.

Here's what we suggest:

1. Go to your internet router (a box usually with several blinking lights that your internet provider gave you, or that you bought yourself). This device transmits your internet signal wirelessly inside your home or business and may also be connected to one or more of your computers via thick Ethernet cables. Find the electric connection on the back of the box. Pull the electric cord out. This will turn off the box. Wait 15 seconds, then put the electric cord back in. This will cause the box to start up again and reboot itself. It will take the box about 5 minutes to restore its internet connection.

2. While you're waiting for your internet router to start up again, close all the applications currently running on your computer, remembering to save your work first. Then turn your computer off, i.e. shut it down. After all lights go out on the computer, wait 15 seconds then turn the computer back on again. Wait for it to complete its reboot procedure. By then your internet router should have finished rebooting, too. Then go to our site, login and click on any of our video lessons.

These steps are very likely to reconnect you to the internet or to improve your internet speed. If you complete the 2 steps above and our videos still don't run smoothly for you, then the problem almost certainly lies with your internet provider. Even Providers offering fast connections occasionally have outages or other technical problems that affect the quality of their service. Call their technical support phone number and ask the agent if their internet is down or is experiencing problems. Explain what you're experiencing on your end. They will often be able to flip a switch on their end that returns or improves your service. If there's no problem with their service, you can be sure that they will suggest you do the two steps we provided you above!

Here are some less likely ideas for solving your problem.

1. Our video hosting service does not currently support SSL (Secure Socket Layer). If you are using a plug-in in your browser like “SSL Everywhere,” please disable it and try the page again.

2. Also, make sure you have the latest version of Flash and that you've installed the latest update to your your brand of web browser.

If none of these fixes solve your problem, please contact our customer service department by clicking the Contact menu at www.UniversityofFashion.com. Tell our customer service specialists what operating system you're using, what error message you're seeing and which of the above steps you've already taken.

If you're trying to order a paid subscription and get a message saying: "Can't execute this transaction because the email is already in use", you probably already have a Free Member account with us that uses the same email address. Here's how to order a paid subscription using that same email:

If you know your Free Member account's username and password

Just log back into the University of Fashion using your Free Member username and password. On the first page you see, under MEMBERSHIP MANAGEMENT, click "Upgrade to Monthly (or Yearly) subscription". Fill in the form as requested and we'll upgrade your existing Free Member account to a full subscription!

If you don't remember your Free Member account's username and password

You have two choices

1. Click the "Contact" menu at the top of any page, tell us that you want to order a subscription but that your email address is already in use. We'll write you back with help.
2. Order your paid subscription using a second e-mail address. Basically, you'll then have two accounts with us, your Free Member and your subscription accounts. Each account will be associated with a different email address.

If you have a slow internet system, you will likely not have a good experience streaming UoF’s videos to your computer. Our videos require a great deal of internet bandwidth. There is really nothing we can do to fix your slow internet connection.

However, we encourage you to share your video issues with us. Please contact our customer service department by clicking the “Contact” link on the bottom of the University of Fashion Home page and filling out the form displayed. Your questions will then be emailed to our customer service specialists for careful review and response. If there’s any way we can help you, we will.

You cannot change your username except by creating a new account.

If you've forgotten or want to change your username, just click "Contact" at the top of most pages and write to us, giving us the new username you'd prefer, along with your name and email address.

We'll work with you to cancel your current account and create a new account with the new username.

While no website is secure from sophisticated hacking and viruses, University of Fashion employs industry leading internet service providers to safeguard your personal information.

We do not sell or otherwise make your personal information, e.g. your “Profile”, available to anyone outside of the University of Fashion.

For more information, please review our Privacy Policy by clicking the “Privacy Policy” link at the bottom of the University of Fashion Home page.

We do not store anyone’s credit card information or password on our premises.

All of the advertisements we place on our site simply send you to that advertiser’s website. While the University of Fashion does not make any guarantees about the safety of our advertisers’ websites, we do our best to only provide ad links of reputable businesses.

The University of Fashion may sometimes place “cookies” on your computer. We will only do this if we feel we can improve your user experience in some way, e.g. to enable you to gain faster and/or easier access to your account information and videos.

The University of Fashion, however, will never provide your personal information, i.e. your name and email address, to other companies or persons, except for the service organizations we hire to execute the financial and other transactions between our customers and University of Fashion.

For more information, please review our Privacy Policy by clicking the “Privacy Policy” link at the bottom of the University of Fashion home page.

You cannot change your username except by creating a new account. If you've forgotten or want to change your username, though, just write us and give us the new username you'd prefer. We'll work with you to cancel your current account and create a new account with the new username.

However, you can easily change your password. In fact, we encourage you to do this regularly to assure the security of your account. Here's how to do it!

If you're an individual subscriber who did not subscribe as part of your school, library, company, sewing club or other large organization:

If you're currently logged in

1. Click the "Account" button at the top of most pages. This will take you to your personal welcome page.
2. Scroll down a little and, under Membership Management, click "Edit Profile".
3. Enter your current password, then enter your new password, twice. This makes sure you don't accidentally misspell the new password.
4. Scroll down and click "Save all changes".

If you're not logged in

1. Go to UniversityofFashion.com then click "Login" at the top
2. Enter your username and click "Forgot Password."
3. You will be taken to a page that says "Please enter your username or email address." Simply enter your username and then click "Get New Password".
4. In a moment, you will receive a temporary password by email. Use that password to log in to the site. If you want to change your temporary password, just follow the instructions, above, under "If you're currently logged in"

If you're a Free Member:

Follow the instructions, above, for individual subscribers

If you registered with a code as a member of your school, library, company, sewing club or other large organization:

1. First, you need to logout by clicking the "Logout" button at the top of most pages. You'll know you logged out successfully, if now you see a "Login" button on the top of the page.
2. Click the "Login" button
3. Enter your username or email address. If you've got multiple email addresses, make sure to use the one you used when you first registered.
4. Click "Get New Password". You'll see a message saying "Check your email for the confirmation link."
5. Go to your email program and look for an email from University of Fashion. Within the email, look for the words, "To reset your password, visit the following address," then click the long link following it. A small window will appear. The small window will start by saying: Enter your new password."
6. Look under "New Password" on the small window, above. You'll see that we've automatically provided you with a strong password. If you like the password we created for you, click the "Reset Password" button on the bottom of the window. If you want to change the password we provided for you, just replace it with your preferred password, making sure your password has at least 6 numbers and/or characters. Then, click the "Reset Password" button at the bottom of the window.
7. You've successfully changed your password if you see a new window that says, "Your password has been reset."

Having problems?

Click the "Contact" menu at the top of most pages and write us. It will really help if you provide us with the text of any error messages you receive.

No. Never.

We don't keep records of our members' or subscribers' passwords.

Feel free to change the password we send you. If you're already logged in to your account, just click the "Account" button on the top of any screen, then click "Edit Profile" under Membership Management on your Welcome page. If  you're not currently logged in, then log in and click "Edit Profile" under under Membership Management on the first page you see (your Welcome page).

If you can't remember your password, search in your email "trash" and try to find the email we sent you just after you joined or subscribed to us. Your account password will be in that email.

If you can't find our original email, no worries! You can get a brand new password.

If you're an individual subscriber who did not subscribe as part of your school, library, company, sewing club or other large organization:

If you're currently logged in

1. Click the "Account" button on the top of most pages. This will take you to your personal Welcome page.
2. Scroll down a little and, under Membership Management, click "Edit Profile".
3. Enter your current password, then enter your new password, twice. This makes sure you don't accidentally misspell the new password.
4. Scroll down and click "Save all changes".

If you're not yet logged in

1. Go to UniversityofFashion.com then click "Login" at the top
2. Enter your username and click "Forgot Password."
3. You will be taken to a page that says "Please enter your username or email address." Simply enter your username and then click "Get New Password".
4. In a moment, you will receive a temporary password by email. Use that password to log in to the site. If you want to change your temporary password, just follow the instructions, above, under "If you're currently logged in"

If you're a Free Member:

Follow the instructions, above, for individual subscribers

If you registered with a code as a member of your school, library, company, sewing club or other large organization:

1. First, you need to logout by clicking the "Logout" button on the top of most pages. You'll know you logged out successfully, if now you see a "Login" button on the top of the page.
2. Click the "Login" button
3. Enter your username or email address. If you've got multiple email addresses, make sure to use the one you used when you first registered.
4. Click "Get New Password". You'll see a message saying "Check your email for the confirmation link."
5. Go to your email program and look for an email from University of Fashion. Within the email, look for the words, "To reset your password, visit the following address," then click the long link following it. A small window will appear. The small window will start by saying: Enter your new password."
6. Look under "New Password" on the small window, above. You'll see that we've automatically provided you with a good, strong password. If you like the password we created for you, click the "Reset Password" button on the bottom of the window. But, if you want to change the password we provided for you, just replace it with your preferred password, making sure your password has at least 6 numbers and/or characters. Then, click the "Reset Password" button at the bottom of the window.
7. You've successfully changed your password if you see a new window that says, "Your password has been reset."

Having problems?

Click the "Contact" menu at the top of most pages and write us. It will really help if you provide us with the text of any error messages you receive.

PayPal errors 36, 10754 or 10486 and MasterCard error 15005 mean that your credit card has a problem. If you're paid up on all your bills, give your card issuer, usually a bank, a call and ask why they are not allowing you to use your card.

Sometimes, your bank has put your card on temporary hold until you complete or approve certain recent transactions.

Other times, your bank rejects your order because you didn't include exactly the name, address or security code that the credit card company has on file for you. Even a small misspelling of your name or address can lead to a rejected transaction. Consider calling your credit card's bank to ask them what address, exactly, they have on file for you. Then fill out our form again being very careful to input the proper spelling of these items.

The best solution is often to simply use a different credit card.

PayPal error #10486 can mean a lot of things. If you have a PayPal account and tried to pay with it, the account may not have sufficient funds. If you have a PayPal debit card, sometimes PayPal leaves cookies on your computer requiring you to pay with that debit card. The solution to the latter is to clear your browser's cache and history so that your PC no longer has a PayPal cookie blocking you from paying the way you want.

MasterCard error #15005 means that you don't have sufficient credit remaining on your card, or that your card issuer has not authorized you for:
1. Foreign transactions, or
2. Paying for things in a foreign currency

The best solution for the latter error code is to call your MasterCard bank and ask them to enable your account to pay for goods internationally.

There's never a need to cancel a yearly subscription because it automatically cancels itself at the end of a year.

Here's the easiest way to cancel a monthly subscription.

If you paid for your subscription using a credit card:

1. Login to the University of Fashion Website
2. Look on the page for a “Cancel" link under MEMBERSHIP MANAGEMENT and click it
3. Respond to any prompts you see

If you decide to cancel, but there's still time left on your current monthly subscription, don't worry. You won't lose that time. You paid for it!

Your cancellation is effective only after your current monthly subscription ends. Once your subscription is canceled, you will never see another charge from us.

If you paid for your subscription using PayPal:

If your PayPal email address is the same as your University of Fashion e-mail address, just follow the instructions, above, for credit card purchases.

But, if you used one email address when creating your University of Fashion subscription and used a different email address when you paid for it using your PayPal account, our system will require you to go to PayPal to cancel. This often happens to customers who share "Family" PayPal accounts using another family member's email, or customers who use their friends' PayPal accounts to pay for their University of Fashion subscription. The problem is: PayPal only knows your PayPal email, not your University of Fashion email.

So how can you cancel your PayPal-paid University of Fashion monthly subscription?

1. Log in to your PayPal account, not your University of Fashion account.
2. Click Profile at the top of the page.
3. Click My Money, then click Update beside My pre-approved payments to find your payment.
4. Select your University of Fashion automatically recurring payment, and then click Cancel.

You can cancel your monthly subscription at any time. [Our yearly subscriptions automatically cancel themselves and do not automatically renew.]

It's really easy to cancel a monthly subscription.

Just log into universityoffashion.com, click the appropriate "Cancel" link on the screen, under Membership Management, and follow the prompts from there.

If you cancel before your next monthly payment, you will become a "Free Member" and not be charged any more.

Oh, and don't worry. You won't lose the remaining paid time on your current monthly subscription. Your cancellation won’t take effect until your current, paid subscription term ends.

Our policy is to not provide refunds. Unfortunately, some people have subscribed to our service in the past and watched hundreds of video lessons, only to then demand a refund, claiming they ordered our subscription by "mistake."

However, if you're an honest person and feel that you have a legitimate case for a refund, we encourage you to contact our customer service department by clicking the “Contact” link and filling out the form displayed. Our customer service specialists will carefully review your case and respond as soon as possible.

Monthly subscriptions, and their recurring monthly charges, continue until you cancel your monthly subscription. [Our Yearly subscriptions, however, cancel themselves at the end of a year and do not automatically renew.

It's very easy, though,  to cancel your monthly subscription to stop future charges.

1. Login to the University of Fashion Website
2. Look on the page for the “Cancel Subscription” link and click it
3. Respond to any prompts you see

If you decide to cancel, but there's still time left on your current monthly subscription, don't worry. You won't lose any of that time. You paid for it!

Your cancellation is effective only after your current monthly subscription ends. Once your subscription is canceled, you will never see another charge from us.

The University of Fashion doesn't offer any means to gain physical possession of any of its video lessons, so there's never a need to return a lesson.

Simply click on the “