“I remember going up to the DJ stand and watching the show from the back of C.Y. Stephens with the DJ and remember being in complete awe — it’s all coming back right now.”

That is what Tyler Clarey, 2008 Iowa State alumnus, remembers during his first year involved with The Fashion Show as the youngest director to date.

“Watching all of that live was super thrilling — it was the first time I’d ever experienced something like that at that scale.”

This year is the 35th production of The Fashion Show. Thirty-five years of dedication, teamwork and an entirely student-run show that has captivated hundreds of thousands throughout the nation. The Fashion Show’s 35th production will take place at 7 p.m. Saturday in Stephens Auditorium.

Over the decades, The Fashion Show has branded itself as an industry-standard show. For Clarey, his biggest project for The Fashion Show was making it bigger and better than ever.

“It was an opportunity to push what The Fashion Show was,” Clarey said. “It really was a passion project for all of us — how do we keep pushing The Fashion Show to the next level?”

Change for the better is a part of The Fashion Show’s mission, from technology to advancing promotions — and diversity is no different.

“We have also recruited more male and plus-size models than we have in the past,” Hannah Nation, current producer, said. During his time, Adam Greenfield, 2016 alumnus, set out to expand diversity in students’ area of study.

“I didn’t even know if they would want me in it as an industrial designer because everyone was more within the AMD (apparel, merchandising and design) college,” Greenfield said. “[My co-director and I] were really pushing to try and get a lot more people from outside of the AMD college.”

After Greenfield, The Fashion Show stuck with his initiative.

“From what it sounds like, they have really pushed through with that and have reached out to a lot of other colleges to try to have people involved,” Greenfield said. “I’d like to say we had a little mark on that.”

Not only is there a push for diversity within The Fashion Show, but the AMD college as a whole. According to the Fall 2016 Enrollment Statistics, only 37 men are enrolled out of a total 500 AMD students — 7.4 percent of the entire program.

“It never really struck me because we did have a decent amount of men in my years as well, so I guess I never really thought about it in the sense of ‘I am a man and there are so many women,'” Clarey said. 

He remembers spending most of his days on the eighth floor of Maple Hall, where all of the women in the Common Threads Learning Community lived.

The fashion industry is stereotyped as a female-dominated industry. Henry Wang, who works for apparel company Vince, said that may not be the case.

“I think [accepting men as a part of fashion] will take a little bit of time to progress, but honestly, in our fashion world, it is still male-dominated,” Wang said.

And he’s not wrong. Out of 92 shows on the Paris Fashion Week womenswear schedule, fewer than 30 have female creative directors at the helm, according to Refinery29.com.

Men seem to run the fashion business, but Wang said that women are the foundation of the industry, which he said may lead to the stereotype of the industry being so female dominated.

“My SVP [senior vice president] is a female — she runs the entire men’s division, but my senior creative director is a guy — he gives the vision,” Wang said. “My entire men’s division team are all female. I am the only male under my senior creative director. It’s still owned and dominated by men, but our female team is like a well-oiled machine. You need women, you need those people below the men to run everything.” 

Ethan Lindley, current marketing director for The Fashion Show, said the show has helped him thrive his passion for fashion, go outside of gender norms and stay true to who he is. 

“I love being a little different from the crowd,” Lindley said. “You may find someone who is very quiet when talking, but they put on that one outfit that makes them feel invincible. Fashion is their own armor and brings them out of their shell. [Fashion] is my armor — I don’t feel out of place.”

To defy the stereotypes, it only takes a different perspective to embrace going outside of gender norms.

“In the female world, you have women who are more feminine, but you also have girls who are more tomboyish and more athletic,” Wang said. “When it comes to men, you have the exact same kind of elements. There is always both ends of the spectrum in both male and female.”

Change always makes progress, but the overall buzz of The Fashion Show continues to thrive.

“We are very excited and honored to be the producers for the 35th show,” Nation said. “It’s a tradition that we hope to see continue for many more years to come.”