Stitching Together a Global Fashion Tapestry

Kent State University is expanding the seams of its renowned School of Fashion Design and Merchandising, tailoring it into an international program without borders.

“We have an ambitious plan,” said Marcello Fantoni, Ph.D., vice president for global education. “The concept is that Kent State’s fashion school will be the first truly global program of the university.”

The expansion has brought a flurry of activity to the fashion school’s global footprint over the past year, including the formation of a Kent State fashion school in Kigali, Rwanda, the debut of a joint degree program in India and a new home in Paris.

Mourad Krifa, Ph.D., Margaret Clark Morgan Director of the School of Fashion Design and Merchandising, said the steps will solidify Kent State’s status as a global leader in fashion education.

A New Paris Home

When a group of fashion students from Kent State departed for a semester in Paris in January, their destination was a 16th-century palace located between the Luxembourg Gardens and the Jardin des Plantes (Paris Botanical Garden).  

Kent State’s Paris program has found a new home at the International Fashion Academy (IFA).

The search for a new location has been ongoing since the tragic 2023 gas explosion and fire that destroyed the Paris American Academy, which had been Kent State’s Paris partner for many years.

Krifa said IFA is a major player in French fashion education, and Kent State had been collaborating with the academy for fashion shows at Kent State’s New York City Fashion during New York Fashion Week for the past several years.

“The partnership has been very beneficial to both and very productive,” he said.

IFA’s programs in fashion design and merchandising are housed in a newly renovated space in a historic structure in a student-centric neighborhood of Paris’ 5th arrondissement.

The campus is located at the Hôtel Scipion Sardini, which was built in 1565 for a wealthy banker, Scipion Sardini, and later was used as a hospital. The building, recognized as a historic monument, was the first building in Paris to be constructed using both brick and stone, featuring Italian-style arcades and a large cobblestone courtyard.

Aside from the historic significance of the structure, Krifa said the partnership with IFA fits seamlessly with Kent State’s fashion school and beyond.

IFA is part of a network of small, private higher education institutions with international locations beyond Paris, and Fantoni expects collaborations beyond fashion design and merchandising to result in the near future, including architecture and interior design and modern and classical languages.

New construction planned on land near the campus may become a dormitory, which would make the campus even more accommodating for visiting students, he added.

“There is an openness for further collaboration as IFA is part of a consortium of schools,” Krifa said. “This partnership can go much further than what we historically had in Paris and it has the potential for growth.” 

Pioneering African Fashion Education

Growth is at the heart of the soon-to-open Kent State University School of Fashion Rwanda.

In January 2025, the Rwandan Minister of State for Education, Claudette Irere, visited Kent State and signed a letter of intent for the university to bring its fashion program to Rwanda, to help elevate the fashion industry there and in Africa.

“This will be a first for the university where a full four-year program that is 100% Kent State is implemented in a foreign country,” Krifa said.  

Kent State’s school will also be the only American university-level fashion school in all of Africa, Fantoni said.  

Fantoni elaborated: “This is not a partnership, this is not a brand, this is not a dual degree. We are creating a Kent State Fashion School in Africa – period – with our faculty, our courses, our degree, our policies. We are doing this because sub-Saharan Africa has very aggressive development plans through the Pan African Association and they have identified the textile and fashion industries as one of the key tools for workforce development and building fashion professions.”

Fashion, Krifa said, is always a stepping stone for economic growth in developing areas and what Kent State can bring to the table educationally is in perfect synergy with the Rwandan government’s strategic priorities.

Kent State has hired Maximilien Kolbe Hategekimana, a Rwandan fashion designer and consultant, to serve as program manager for the effort. The university has leased four buildings in the nation’s capital of Kigali to house the school, and soon will begin renovations.

While there is not an official timeline in place, the intent is to open the school within the next two years, Krifa said.

“We will be actively recruiting all over Africa and hiring faculty internationally,” Fantoni said.

Hategekimana has been advocating education as the right way to build the fashion industry in Rwanda, and he is pleased that the government is behind the idea through this Kent State partnership.

Without a strong educational component, Rwandan fashion would be thwarted in its efforts to become a full-fledged industry and could be dismissed as a hobby or creativity without the needed structure, he said.

Hategekimana is one of the founders of Kuza Africa, an organization to support fashion entrepreneurs in Rwanda.  “Kuza means to nurture or grow,” he said.

His work caught the attention of Kent State administrators, who tapped him to help set up the Kent State program. Without Kent State’s involvement, he said, it may have taken generations to accomplish the industry goals.

“This is going to be a game-changer for the country of Rwanda, but also the whole continent of Africa,” Hategekimana said.

African fashion, Krifa said, is a growing landscape.

“In my trips to the country, I have met with up-and-coming designers and fashion businesses, and it is a very active and dynamic scene,” Krifa said. “It is also very connected to the surrounding countries.”

A recent United Nations report on world economic growth highlighted the fashion industry in sub-Saharan Africa as a leading economic sector of the future, he said.

“There’s so much untapped potential in terms of creativity, in terms of heritage and entrepreneurship is very strong. Coupled with one of the youngest population demographics, the sky is the limit right now,” he said. 

New India Program Debuts

Two continents away from Rwanda is Kent State’s new degree partnership with Bennett University, located about 30 miles outside of New Delhi.  

In two years, the first cohort of students from Bennett University will be heading to Ohio to begin the final two years of their fashion education at Kent State.

In May 2025, the university signed an agreement with Bennett, a private university located in Greater Noida, in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, to establish a 2 + 2 dual degree program in fashion design.

Under the agreement, students will complete their first two years of study at Bennett’s School of Design, before heading to Kent State to complete their degrees. Once completed, students will have both a bachelor’s degree in fashion design from Bennett and a Bachelor of Arts degree in fashion design from Kent State.

Krifa said the first cohort of students will begin their studies this fall in India.

“We collaborated with them over the last year to develop the curriculum for the first two years that will take place at Bennett,” Krifa said, “so that when they come to us, they will be ready to engage in the third and fourth year.”

Bennett University is part of a multifaceted conglomerate that owns many media outlets, particularly fashion media outlets, and Bennett wanted to focus on creating a fashion school to complement its existing industry, Fantoni said.

“There is the potential for this program to be very big,” Krifa said. “Ultimately, there is the potential for having several hundred students in the program because there is a lot of demand in India.”

"Fashion is inherently global, and this dual degree program reflects the reality of today's interconnected industry," he said. "Our students will now have the opportunity to immerse themselves in diverse cultural perspectives on design, preparing them to become innovative leaders in the international fashion landscape." 

Expanding Degree Program in Florence

At 54 years old, Kent State Florence is the university’s oldest education-abroad program and continues to provide a vital link in fashion education.

Each year, about 200 fashion students elect to spend a semester of their education in Florence, soaking in the culture and heritage of a country that sets international standards for textiles and design.

But the program is not resting on its past success, and Fantoni expects soon to see a major development in Florence: “The plan is to make Florence a full fashion degree-awarding location within the next two years,” he said.

Barbara Guarducci, coordinator of the Florence fashion program, said that its focus aligns with the Kent Campus' approach to integrating sustainability in fashion, extending that mission through a unique experiential component shaped by Italy’s strong manufacturing heritage. 

“In all courses, we give students a clear understanding of the future of the industry and what responsibility means in practice,” she said. 

The Florence program, with its proximity to Milan, also offers the students the benefit of studying in a region that is world famous for its textile production and home to many international fashion brands, such as Ferragamo, Prada and Giorgio Armani.

Offering a bachelor’s degree completely at Florence would be a draw for international students who may not have the ability to come to the U.S. for study, while offering the same quality of education.

“That has a lot of growth potential for us,” Krifa said. 

Fashion Education Without Borders

With its expansive reach across the globe, the time is close when a Kent State student will be able to earn a bachelor’s degree in fashion without ever having set foot in Kent, Ohio.

“It’s all over the world,” Fantoni continued. “You could get a Kent State fashion degree in Rwanda, in Italy, everywhere in the world. The idea is that we would make it possible for all students in our fashion programs to go wherever they wanted at any time during their enrollment at Kent State.”

The fashion school would become a global journey.

“Students from India could go to Paris one semester and Kigali, Rwanda, another semester,” he said, explaining the vision. “Every location will be open to all students belonging to the fashion school.”

And just like fashion itself, fashion education would exist without borders worldwide.  

“We are leaders in the space,” Krifa said. “And we will continue to grow that role as a leader in the global space.”