My name is Madison Block, and I am from a small town outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Currently, I am a junior at Indiana University of Pennsylvania and I am majoring in fashion merchandising and minoring in business administration. I have also recently finished up a semester abroad in London, England where I studied fashion business at the London College of Fashion. For as long as I can remember, I have always loved fashion—the creativity, the choices and the excitement of it all have always drawn me in. I always say that fashion is one of the most accessible forms of self expression, which is also my favorite thing about it. Fashion allows you to communicate with others without having to say a word. It can convey a mood, opinion or stance while also being fun and enjoyable.
When I was younger, my late grandmother would sew beautiful garments and costumes for me, and when she passed away, I inherited her sewing machine. Once I was thirteen, I started to learn how to sew and fell in love with it from the start. From that time on until I got into high school, I had dreamed of becoming a fashion designer. But, in high school, I was exposed to even more aspects of the field through my textiles and fashion merchandising classes. It was there that I learned about the various business aspects of the fashion industry. That was where I decided that I wanted to go into the business side of the fashion industry rather than design, however, I do still love sewing and continue to do it in my spare time!
Having grown up relatively close to multiple cities, i.e. Philadelphia and New York, I have always spent as much time as I could in a city and hope to one day move to either New York or London. Luckily, my city-girl dreams go hand and hand with my chosen career path! Although I have always known that I wanted to live in a big city, I had not gotten a chance to do so until my semester abroad this past spring, and it was even better than I ever imagined city life to be!
The more I learned about different aspects of the industry, the more interested I became. Yet, I also have come across many aspects of the field that I am not a fan of and would like to work towards changing. Because of this, my current dream is to move to a city and eventually open up a business of my own where I can both be a part of all the areas I take an interest in, as well as work towards changing parts of the industry that I do not like.
