The Fabric of Cultures is a pedagogical, research lab and platform that interprets fashion, clothing and textile from a historical, theoretical and globalized perspective as well as in mediated forms such as screen media. The Fabric of Cultures is the result of several years of research, teaching, exhibition curating, and program building within CUNY.
Large manufacturing industries and symbolic machines such as fashion and clothing are not neutral platforms and structures. Rather, they affect millions of people in their everyday lives and in their work and social interactions. Fabric and fashion are intertwined domains that touch on the political and the collective. Fashion has a profound impact on the public self, national self-image and projection and utopias, as well as on the most intimate structure of feeling in the construction and perception of identities that are fluid in their manifestation and cannot be divorced from gender, race and class.
In its broadest context and definition, fashion establishes a set of practices, codes and manners–what we could call affective regimes–that regulate the rhythms of people’s existences, as well as the way they communicate in society, with each other and how they project desire through dress. These set of practices are acquired through culture. Fashion then “plays a key role in regulating the politics of [both individual and collective] subjectivity” (Altinay: 2016) and can be interpreted as multiple modes of “embodied historiography” (Altinay: 2016).
The Fabric of Cultures brings attention to the art of making and its knowledge producing processes. At the core of The Fabric of Cultures is the understanding that clothing and fashion work within larger power systems that are linked to economics, migration, social justice, climate change and sustainability, technology, and cultural and political transformations. The Fabric of Cultures pays special attention to women’s work in the fashion industry, NY based entrepreneurs, makers and communities and in a comparative perspective with other countries such as Italy.
We envision The Fabric of Cultures as a platform for activism and social change. Add info about partners.
– Eugenia Paulicelli
Altinay, Rüstem Ertug, Dressing for Utopia. Fashion, Performance, and the Politics of Everyday Life in Turkey (1923-2013), PhD Dissertation, New York University, 2016.
Paperback Catalog
Exhibition catalogue online
The Fabric of Cultures Project Team
Eugenia Paulicelli, Founder and Director of the Fabric of Cultures, is Professor of Italian, Comparative Literatures, Women’s and Gender Studies, Film Studies and Liberal Studies at The Graduate Center and Queens College of the City University of New York. She originated the Fabric of Cultures in 2006, which made possible several collaborative projects and dialogues among CUNY scholars and beyond to fulfill the mission of an academic recognition of the interdisciplinary field of fashion studies through the creation of new courses, exhibitions, conferences and prestigious publications, such as the co-edited volumes with Hazel Clark, The Fabric of Cultures. Fashion, Identity, Globalization (Routledge: 2008) and with Veronica Manlow
and Elizabeth Wissinger, The Routledge Companion to Fashion Studies,(Routledge: 2021 and 2023).
The Fabric of Cultures came alive in digital format in 2017 and since then has continued in its ongoing mission to expand research projects on the history, theory and pedagogy of fashion, exhibitions, documentary and short film production and the use of the website to foster projects with students in different universities as well as working with the Francis Lewis High School located in Queens.
https://sites.google.com/view/flhsfashionshow/home
Eugenia is also the founder of the Concentration in Fashion Studies housed at the Graduate Center, CUNY in the Master of Arts in Liberal Studies, as well as of the Italian Cinema CUNY (IC-CUNY), showcasing Italian cinema and cinematic encounters and featured on CUNY-TV. She is the author of several books. More detailed information can be found on her website:www.eugeniapaulicelli.com.
Iris Finkel, Associate Editor and Website Manager of The Fabric of Cultures, is an Assistant Professor and the Web & Digital Initiatives Librarian at Hunter College. Iris is a former student of Professor Paulicelli’s and is interested in the communication of fashion scholarship through digital modes. Her projects can be found at fashionindh.org.
The latest projects that Iris worked on with Professor Paulicell and students in a course at The Graduate Center is the website Fashion Through Film and Screen Media highlighting students’ exhibits. Following that course, Iris worked with a cohort of graduate students from The Graduate Center and Parsons School of Design. The course, Archaeology of Media, was taught by Professor Paulicelli and Professor Ulrich Lehmann. Students catalogued materials that inspired final projects on the site Montage: Fashion and Film.
Marissa Guijarro, Researcher and Editor, is a student in the Master of Liberal Studies program at the CUNY Graduate Center. Her research interests include fashion and its expressions in terms of identity, culture, and sociopolitical history. In 2022, she completed a certificate in Image Consulting from the Fashion Institute of Technology. Marissa is a retired high school counselor and continues to work as a college counselor and private consultant. In her free time, Marissa enjoys reading, creating, traveling, and going to cultural events in the city.
Sarah Porterfield, Social Media and Blog Editor. “Learning is my passion. I discovered this in 2020 when I began my undergrad studies at The Evergreen State College, a liberal arts school in the picturesque Pacific Northwest. I loved how my world expanded as I read and participated in classroom discussions. Before Evergreen, I spent almost a decade as an actress (and working in restaurants). I learned a lot as an actress. One important lesson was that acting wasn’t for me. I wanted to use my voice instead of the characters’. Education equipped me to do that. As my world expanded, I found my voice more and more. After graduation, I moved to NYC because of my love for the city. Eventually, I missed the constant growth education granted me, so I applied to The Graduate Center. I chose this school because it is the only one in the city that has a concentration in fashion within a liberal studies program. I appreciate the freedom and breadth that liberal studies offer, which makes my study of fashion all the richer. My research interest is in current and historical revolutionary fashion. I am grateful for the opportunity to use my voice here and to build a community. Thank you for being a part of this journey.”
Christina Trupiano, Researcher. Christina was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, where her early love for creativity and craftsmanship first began to take shape. She went on to earn her undergraduate degree from Louisiana State University, studying Apparel Design, Textiles, and Merchandising—a foundation that would propel her into the world of
fashion.
Driven by a passion for both design and critical inquiry, Christina later earned a Master of Arts degree from the CUNY Graduate Center. This combination of artistic training and academic depth allowed her to approach the fashion industry with a uniquely analytical and creative perspective.
Christina has spent 16 years working in the New York fashion industry as a technical design professional. Throughout her career, she has collaborated with designers and major brands to bring garments from concept to reality. Known for her precision, problem-solving skills, and deep understanding of garment construction, she has played a key role in shaping collections across multiple market categories.
With a blend of Southern roots, academic rigor, and New York industry experience, Christina continues to contribute her expertise to the evolving landscape of fashion design and technical innovation.
