Rumor has it that The Studio at Central Saint Martins was a beautiful young girl with long, luscious hair and large eyes that glistened like the stars. She was gorgeous, organized and talented, the absolute definition of perfection, but don’t follow her home — unless you want to see dirty laundry explode across the sofa like fireworks, bedsheets tangle themselves into tight knots, and stained coffee mugs from weeks ago line the nightstand. 

The latest gossip, however, reported that The Studio was a genderless figure clad in black from head to toe, save for their vibrant, exaggerated makeup. They were loud and obnoxious, but at the same time, they were nosy and cunning. They’d leave you walking away from a conversation feeling glad that you had a genuine heart-to-heart, but they’d speak negatively of you as soon as you left. People preferred to steer clear of The Studio, maintaining a cordial relationship with them at best. 

Apparently, none of the above was true: The Studio was, in fact, a casual person who always showed up for work in loose, comfortable clothing; how could anyone be productive otherwise? After all, the dirty environment that The Studio called home prevented anyone from arriving in a gown for the red carpet. They were picky and easygoing, tense and relaxed, messy and organized all at the same time — The Studio was a living paradox, formed by all the dualities of the world. 

But rumors could only capture a fragment of The Studio. What did The Studio look like in its entirety? What were their most notable character traits? What relationships did they have with their peers, and how did they influence each other?

Who was The Studio, really?

The Studio was all about making things pop — at least, that was what Mira Maktabi thought. From the boundary-pushing works in the White Show to the whimsical, eccentric reputation and ambiance, she expected Central Saint Martins to echo the mantra of “bigger is better.” However, The Studio surprised Mira by appreciating her attention to detail and grasping her messages with ease. For the first time, she felt like she truly belonged; The Studio was exactly who she wanted to grow her design identity with.

Perhaps googling “best fashion school” to pursue higher education was quite a naïve thing to do, but Mira had to thank her naivety for allowing her to meet The Studio. In 2016, she left her home in Beirut, Lebanon, for a new life in London, starting her foundation year at the London College of Fashion, studying fashion design and development. 

Through her work, Mira appreciated the nature of her materials, utilizing delicate craftsmanship to give every last piece of fabric a purpose. She worried about whether her style would mesh well with The Studio’s peculiarity, but she didn’t want to stray away from her integral design identity by trying to make something loud and huge. The Studio responded to Mira’s fears by wrapping their arms around her for a reassuring embrace, the same way she reacted to their differences. 

“It feels like the development and growth here was monumental compared to the rest of the six years of foundation, BA, and placement,” Mira said. “It was such a privilege to get that because I’ve had years of people misunderstanding what I wanted to communicate, even when I try really hard to explain it. The dialogue and conversation that happens here, even if I process it a month later, is really valuable, and I grew so much in the past year.”

The Studio’s feedback always hit the nail on the head, even if it sometimes took some time to fully grasp. While her peers loved The Studio’s messiness and clutter, Mira loved the serenity that organization brought about — she even cleaned up her friends’ workspaces as a kind offering. Even during the weekends, she made sure to practice the basic self-care tasks that people tend to forget about: eating healthy, sleeping well and working out. But if anyone marveled at her productivity, she’d laugh and explain that she only comes off this way because in reality, her head was a mess: “It’s more out of obligation than anything,” she’d say, but really, she was just being modest.

Clearly, it worked in her favor — on days when she felt unmotivated or lazy, she spent time with The Studio, having positive conversations and bouncing off ideas with them, and things just started to click. It was like The Studio was a magician; with this amazing community, she felt like she could get a little bit of work done even on her worst days. 

But of course, as much as everyone wished it was all sunshine and rainbows, the reality was that The Studio was far from perfect. Some tried to befriend The Studio just to parade the title around, and everyone wanted to be The Studio’s best friend. Every designer’s dream was to show off their masterpieces in London Fashion Week, but nobody was given a sneak preview of the list of finalists; after all, they had to work under extreme pressure for weeks until the participants were announced, ten days before the show. 

Mira would’ve been heartbroken if she hadn’t been chosen — there was no point in lying about not caring. For some people, the show was just one way to kickstart their careers, but Mira knew that it was an opportunity she really needed. To combat the overwhelming stress, she kept telling herself that no matter what, she’d finish her collection to the best of her abilities so that she wouldn’t have any regrets. 

Her friendship with The Studio helped her maintain her positive mindset. Ever since she met them, she realized that their interactions had to be conversations instead of monologues, and whenever she responded and engaged with The Studio’s feedback, her work improved. 

“Sometimes we forget that we’re here because we acknowledge that this feedback is valuable,” Mira said. “Sometimes it’s constructive, and sometimes it’s not. Ultimately, it is a conversation, and even when I had a little resentment, I kept telling myself that I’m going to come into this fitting with an open mind.”

When The Studio told her that her wishes had come true, she was overjoyed. The days leading up to the show were a blur — it was almost like a drug, and she was still experiencing the after-effects. While the likes and followers her collection garnered did matter, Mira loved seeing the people noticing and communicating with her work. These opportunities given to her by The Studio helped propel her career forward, and Mira thanked them for all their guidance; now, the future was in her hands. 

“The show isn’t going to give you anything,” The Studio echoed. “It’s what you do with it that counts.”

The Studio was Chao Li’s biggest archenemy. Underneath the dramatic and enthusiastic mask that they always wore was a type of seriousness that propelled them forward, and Chao hated that type of person. The Studio forced him to stay away from them and refrain from relying on anyone else, teaching him about individualism through observation and experience. 

Fashion wasn’t just about cutting and sewing fabric — for Chao, fashion was about attitude. His humorous expressiveness and brutal honesty came together to form a flamboyant character, and Chao’s work attracted just as much of the spotlight as his personality did. His interest in textiles led him to pursue an education in fashion print; he had been a designer at Central Saint Martins ever since he moved from his hometown in China to London seven years ago. Chao’s love for textiles could be seen in his graduation collection, titled “Kitchen Glamour,” which featured hand-embroidered tweed patterns adorned by Swarovski crystals. 

Although he was very proud of the work he created with The Studio, Chao’s interactions with them were characterized by disappointment and suffering. His design philosophy emphasized the importance of creating commercial garments for a business; ultimately, fashion design was a job that was supposed to support the designer’s living, but The Studio represented the fantasy of new possibilities. They cultivated the top designers, but they seemed to place less importance on the basic, practical skills that every designer needed to perfect. 

“I'm very artistic, but I'm also a really practical person,” Chao said. “Central Saint Martins just gives you a dream, but once you leave this dreamland, you have to do everything by yourself, so it’s really important to think about what will happen outside of school.”

All dreams eventually come to an end, and so will everyone’s time with The Studio — that was why the experience was especially important for the designers. They were here to learn, grow and change, but Chao was disappointed in The Studio’s efforts to guide him. Sadly, his collection wasn’t selected for the Central Saint Martins show at London Fashion Week, but what upset him more was The Studio’s deafening silence since the announcement.  

“For the people who aren’t in the show, we haven't communicated for two weeks,” Chao said. “Of course, they really care about the show, but what about the others? We haven’t graduated yet. Where's my design tutorial about my portfolio? Where's my money?”

Instead of sitting and sulking, Chao took matters into his own hands. He couldn’t just depend on others to hand over opportunities — he had to fight for them himself. As an entrepreneur, Chao ran his own business, reviewing design portfolios and offering guidance. As a content creator, he posted his collection to social media platforms, sharing his work with the world. As an event planner, he worked with the Chinese fashion community Labelhood to organize a show in the upcoming Shanghai Fashion Week. 

Regardless, he was unhappy about The Studio’s selectiveness. It was already such an accomplishment to be a part of their exclusive clique, but in the end, only 21 out of the 36 designers had the opportunity to present their collection in the show. Chao wondered if The Studio not only loved drama but also tried to create it inorganically. It seemed unfair to him that only those who were selected for the show would be able to see their hard work pay off on the runway. 

If beauty was truly in the eye of the beholder, why were only 21 people chosen? Why? What was fashion, and who decided that? Was it just someone sitting in front of their laptop? Or was it something for the world to decide?

It didn’t make sense to Chao, and to make matters worse, the competition was toxic. The atmosphere reeked of gunpowder; interactions with The Studio became intense and suffocating. Every private conversation made people restless as they grasped at every possible opportunity. Countless eyes watched even the slight movement. People were generally afraid of defying The Studio; who would be stupid enough to throw away their golden ticket to a glistening future? 

It was a brutal battle for the top, and those willing to play the game had sacrifices to make. 

“It almost feels like there’s a monarchy that nobody dares to anger,” Chao said. “Nobody’s willing to speak up, even though everyone is discontent in some way, but the monarchy determines whether you’re a part of the show or not, so everyone keeps quiet.”

Loud, outrageous, and slightly snobbish — The Studio wore a façade of genuineness, and Finlay Vincent’s work was quite the opposite. To him, fashion was a tool for the body, and functionality was his priority. Combining elements of structure, order and simplicity, Finlay’s work was driven by the concept of “less is better.” His exercise in reduction transformed his garments into forever works-in-progress, bestowing the gift of creativity to all users. 

Simplicity seemed to be the antithesis of aesthetical self-expression, a quality that defines The Studio. But the juxtaposition between The Studio’s exuberance and Finlay’s designs was exactly what he was looking for. He wanted to place his work directly next to its opposition, to question where exactly it could fit in an environment where it seemingly didn’t belong. 

Though he may seem reserved with his soft voice and gentle gaze, Finlay was a rebel at heart. His beginnings in fashion stem from his upbringing in Kenya. His frequent trips to second-hand markets as a child allowed him to observe clothing details, which subconsciously informed the way he fine-tuned his own work a decade later. After moving back to the West Midlands at 15, Finlay started making t-shirts with his brother; on a non-school-uniform day, they distributed the shirts and paraded around campus, laughing at the head teacher’s furious reaction. 

The rebellion excited him, but it also allowed him to realize that those shirts were badly designed and badly made — if he was going to pursue fashion, then he had to make sure his garments were more sustainable. After an education that focused on design’s technical details and sustainability at Falmouth University, Finlay felt prepared to present his skills to Central Saint Martins. 

The Studio fostered a strong sense of community that always led to innovation and inspiration. Finlay always met them at 8:30 AM sharp, spending the entire day learning from their masterpieces and mistakes. He admitted to being quite the workaholic, but being with The Studio allowed him to focus on whatever he wanted and purely create. Together, they created a welcoming space for introspection and improvement. 

“Sometimes you feel that a conversation is unnecessary, but it really leads you to some kind of feeling or emotion,” Finlay said. “You're looking at someone's work and you're learning what you like and don't like about their work, which also informs you about your own work.”

The materialization of his love for the community began with two fabric swatches gifted to him from his friends’ works. Slowly, everyone pitched in with their own swatches, and Finlay created an archive that displayed each designer’s artistic choices and inner world. It was a visual yearbook that would remind him of the people he loved so dearly and The Studio that brought them all together. 

But at the same time, Finlay also realized how sterile and boring the fashion industry had become. The experimental rebellion that once shaped legendary designers like Alexander McQueen and John Galliano was slipping away with the passage of time, and replacing it was a vacuum of academia, where certain briefs may have been chosen to meet funding criteria. He wasn’t sure when or why The Studio started playing things safely, or maybe it was always this way, but people were braver. Regardless, Finlay didn’t want to walk in anyone else’s shoes — fashion was about doing what you enjoyed, whatever that might look like. 

“Dare I say, I think that Central Saint Martins is on its way out very soon,” Finlay said. “Something new is needed. Or maybe it's not even a university — it's just people who didn't go to university and doing their own thing. That's excites me more.”

The rebellious fire in him burned brighter than ever, and he knew that he wasn’t the only one who wanted change. As the Central Saint Martins show at London Fashion Week drew to an end, Finlay walked out onto the runway, holding up his garment ‘Jacket’ in one hand and a V-sign with his other hand. It was a provocation, an act of defiance, a statement against a system that encouraged elitism and dishonesty.

A faint murmur rippled through the crowd as he walked off into the distance. He was surrounded by a mixture of confusion, anger, excitement, and shock, and the emotional response was priceless. In the background, he could hear a staff member’s frantic voice: “He’ll never get a job in fashion,” he screeched. “Oh, my god, he’ll never get a job in fashion.”

The memories brought a fond smile to Finlay’s face. “I quite love that,” he laughed. “I can't think of anything worse right now than a job in fashion.”

“Did it work?” The Studio’s question echoed in his mind, but frankly, whether the risk he took paid off or not was neither here nor there. With design and art, risk should always be a complementary factor: some of them pay off, and others don’t. This wasn’t about wealth or publicity — it was about staying true to the rebel inside him, echoing the braveness that The Studio used to symbolize. 

“Just do what you want,” Finlay said. “Don't be ruled by anyone else.”

Rumor has it that The Studio was whimsical, eccentric and all about making things pop, but if you didn’t identify with any of those characteristics, they accepted you for who you are, too. The Studio motivated those around them to exchange ideas with each other, allowing their peers to evolve into their best selves. 

The latest gossip, however, reported that The Studio was toxic and competitive, someone you wouldn’t want to work with. If anything, you’d probably want to stay as far away from them as possible and focus on yourself instead, which proved to be so much more effective than trying to play their game. 

Apparently, none of the above was true: The Studio was an old soul whose rebellious spirit had been extinguished. Long gone were their days of fearless experimentation, and replacing them was a boring, monochrome lifestyle. The Studio’s prime time had passed; it was up to the newest generation to fight for themselves. 

These fragments may seem self-contradictory, but that was exactly what made The Studio human. They were the personification of the endless possibilities that fashion presented, regardless of whether they were good or bad. 

The Studio was a mosaic of everyone who loved and hated it, even just for a heartbeat.