What my MFA in Fashion taught me about product design
People are often surprised when they learn I have an MFA in Fashion. But to me, the connection to product design and UX has always been obvious. Both are about understanding people, building products, and managing lifecycle at scale. It also combined business, design, and technology in a really interesting and effective way.
In fashion, my graduate thesis focused on jewelry design for social change. That work required me to do everything a software product designer does today, as well as what a product manager or product marketer does: market analysis, competitive research, user insights, defining need gaps, designing the product, overseeing its creation, testing and quality control, launching it, marketing it, and managing its lifecycle. Every collection was a release.
It also went beyond the product itself. I concepted and designed an omnichannel retail and marketing experience that spanned web, mobile, a traveling retail truck, and the entire customer journey of touchpoints, along with the full business plan, product samples, and merchandising strategy. My goal was to create a growth path for independent and/or underserved women jewelry designers by giving them a selling platform. On the customer side, it was meant to reach people where they were and create coherence across physical and digital touchpoints. At the time, both social media and omnichannel were only just emerging as experiences.
Because this was an MFA, not an MBA or a technical degree, it gave me a foundation other design leaders may not have:
Sensitivity to aesthetics: how form, proportion, and color influence perception and usability.
Storytelling and cultural critique: seeing how products exist within broader cultural contexts, and learning to communicate meaning, not just features.
Embodiment and the human form: designing with the human body in mind gave me a deeper understanding of ergonomics, accessibility, and lived experience.
Systems and materials: I studied textiles which taught me how to think about structure, layering, and how small design decisions in material create large-scale effects, and how surface design ties into that.
Iteration under pressure: the seasonal collection cycle taught me to work within rapid, iterative deadlines while still refining craft and quality.
On the merchandising side, I took business courses that grounded my creative training in leadership and management. I studied marketing, financial planning and forecasting, merchandise planning, product development, and organizational and people management, all of which translated directly into product strategy and scaling teams. That balance of creativity and business acumen is something I draw on constantly as a design leader.
The MFA also gave me craft. Because it was a design degree, I refined practical skills like sketching, drawing, usability and quality testing, color theory, branding, visual merchandising, experiential design, and storytelling that still show up in my design and leadership work. When I guide teams, I can see both the micro-details and the macro-system, and I can help designers connect the two.
I went through the entire MFA program while working full-time, constantly applying professional experience to graduate work and bringing academic rigor back into my day job. During that time, I also ran a fledgling jewelry business creating and selling my own jewelry designs. While it was small, it wasn’t just about designing pieces. I handled marketing, branding, ecommerce, and setting up a physical booth at local markets. That experience gave me early, hands-on lessons in business and product strategy, which continue to shape how I think about building and scaling teams today.
So when people ask how an MFA in Fashion relates to my role in product design, my answer is simple: it shaped my perspective, my methods, and my ability to lead. It gave me tools and instincts that MBAs and technical programs don’t always emphasize. It may look like a detour or frivolous on the surface, but it was a foundation for how I think about design today: human-centered, systemic, and creative at scale.
