Week 4

On Wednesday of this week (half way through already!) the visual group is two days away from window installation so everyone seemed a little stressed. In the morning, one intern went upstairs to prep the main window by measuring out where the balls were going to be placed while suspended in the window while the other 2 and I were downstairs in the art room stringing the gray balls on two different colored strings (yellow and white). There were 8 different combinations of lengths that the strings would be so when hanging in the window the wouldn't all line up but still create an intense color block together. Since there were so many balls and strings the process we started was bunching the finished strings in groups of ten and placing that measurement in a separate cardboard boxes. We did 150 strings per each box, therefore 15 groups of 10. This long process took up pretty much all day but it will be well worth it when the display is up for everyone to see.
On Thursday, we had a new intern come in for visual merch. who actually goes to SCAD as well, her name is Elizabeth. Michelle, Elizabeth and I all started the morning by going into the downstairs office and looking at the online chart of sales which categorized clothing into dresses, blouses, outerwear, etc. We got see what clothing items we were selling well in and which ones we needed to improve upon compared to how the company was doing as a whole. Once we figured which pieces we needed to push today it helped us rearrange sections of the store that had become a little dull and un-shopped. Next Michelle gave Elizabeth and I the task of refreshing and rearranging the loungewear section of the store, which is currently a concept called "Bunk house". There was about ten new items of shipment for loungewear that we had to find a place for as well as rearranging old merch. so it was more appealing. This took us about 30 mins and then we had the visual manager of the entire store (Anne) give her constructive criticism. She did have corrections which were smart and together we fixed the area until it was perfect. After lunch, while Elizabeth worked on placing accessories, Michelle and I placed more new merch. and styled a couple of mannequins. At the very end of the day, we stepped outside to look at the mannequins in the window and dicussed how/if they would still connect with the changing displays that would happen Friday.

Lounge wear section

This Friday was the day I had been waiting for what seemed like forever because it was finally time to install all of our hard work. Almost right when I came into work I was instructed to quickly put my things down and go upstairs to the 9th Ave. window display to start construction. After learning the order of string measurements we would be putting up, I began handing my supervisor, Elisa strings as she tied the end, put a tac through, and hammered it into the ceiling on wood panels we had installed earlier in the week. This whole had two sets of panels in the front on the left and right and one middle panel in the back, which the two mannequins would stay in the middle front. After attatching the strings to the ceiling, we then began the same process attatching them to the ground. Although we had every intern as well as our district manager and regional manager working on the window all day from 8-4, we did not finish in time. We (the interns) had to leave at 4 but my supervisor and the regional manager, Cameron stayed behind to finish. I look forward to seeing the displays finished on Wednesday when I come in next.

Elisa working on the installation process