Western Wayne sophomores and juniors took a trip to the Lehigh Valley to tour colleges on April 13. Students were able to see Lafayette College, DeSales University, and Moravian University. Topics included admissions, financial aid, housing, athletics, activities and tours of the facilities.

The 2023 Times-Tribune Scholastic Superstars Awards Ceremony took place on May 9.  Western Wayne had three students selected to the 25-member team from over 20 NEPA schools.  The students were selected based only on their merits/accolades by a team of individuals working in admissions at area colleges and universities.  The students earned medals for their selection to the team and are pictured below from left to right: Kylie Merring, Marshall Davis, Evan Peirce, and Mr. Paul Gregorski, high school principal.

The NEIU Scholar of the Year Ceremony took place at Lackawanna CTC on May 10. The recipient of the award for Western Wayne High School was Kylie Merring. Pictured below from left to right is Mr. Paul Gregorski, high school principal; Kylie Merring, Western Wayne NEIU Scholar of the Year, and Mr. Bill Gershey, who serves on the Western Wayne Board of Education and the NEIU Board of Directors.

Western Wayne Fashion students are thrilled to invite the community to their annual Catwalk Fashion Show on Tuesday, May 23, at 7 p.m. in the high school auditorium. This year the show titled “Fashion Flix” is a dedication to Western Wayne’s 50th Anniversary Celebration.  Doors will open at 6:15 p.m. The admission fee for adults is $2 dollars.  All proceeds will be donated to a local food pantry.  Students get in for free. The students will also host the show for an audience of their peers during the school day on Tuesday, May 23.

 Pieces made by students in grades 9 through 12 will be featured. The students also worked in teams led by senior fashion students Analise DeLeon-Bello, Angelina Salvatore, and Ava Daniels.  The feature fashions of the Catwalk came from an inspiration of movies from the 1970s to the present which honors the decades of Western Wayne’s 50 years.  The show will also feature some video clips of Western Wayne alumni who are working in the fashion industry.

The students worked on a set timeline to design a series of pieces for the competition portion of the show.  The winner of the competition will be announced at the show on the evening of Tuesday, May 23. 

 All students involved did an amazing job with this year’s theme Fashion Flix.  The student designers used popular decade flicks as inspiration for their garments.  The garments were designed to be street wear, not costumes, with the flicks providing the theme and music only for the competition. 

The decade themed flicks included Rocky to represent  1970-80; Dirty Dancing to represent 1980-90; Harry Potter to represent 1990- 2000; Avatar to represent 2000-2010; and Stranger Things to represent 2010-2020.

Colleen Carmody, show director and fashion teacher, feels proud of all of her students—especially her three seniors who have their collections featured in the show.

Senior Analise DeLeon-Bello’s collection has the theme EcoLeon which represents how sustainability in fashion is important.

“You can use materials and repurpose them for a variety of things,” Analise explained.

Her favorite garment from the collection is a transformation piece.

“It is symbolic to me,” Analise said. “It is a gray dress that represents industrialized pollution and then when it is released it turns into another green dress that represents how nature overcomes.”

Analise also headed up the competition team called Carmody’s Angels for the show.  She feels very proud of her team and especially enjoyed the dress inspired by Dirty Dancing that they made.  She described the dress as yellow with flower appliqués on it.

“It was the most fun dress out of every piece that we made,” she explained.  “We were able to have a lot of creativity in making it.”

Analise looks forward to continuing to grow her creative skills in college next year.  She will attend Albright College and major in fashion design.  She is interested in both the business and design aspects of a career in fashion.

Fellow senior Angelina Salvatore will also attend Albright College next year with a major in costume design.  She always enjoyed fashion from a young age when she would color designs in coloring books.  She remembers getting fabric for holiday gifts growing up and falling in love with her first sewing machine.

“I enjoy making pieces that are unique,” Angelina said.

Her senior collection has many such pieces. It is called Ang-Vant-Guard, a play on the words of the French term avant-garde.  As the title suggests, her collection features a lot of unconventional fashion.

“Since I want to major in costume design, I used this opportunity to experiment with different things,” she explained. 

One piece in her collection that stands out to her is her prom dress which she made from scratch. It is a floor-length gown with an olive green metallic underlay and a fully-boned corset top.

The piece is especially meaningful because it was the first project in her freshman design class that she drew and then was able to create in her senior year.

“I’m really proud of my prom dress,” she said.

Angelina also felt proud to work to lead her group Backstreet Girlies for the competition portion of the show.  She especially liked working on the team’s Stranger Things inspired piece because of the challenges it presented.

They created a garment made of vinyl and bubble wrap. Angelina described the challenges of sewing those types of materials together.

“It took some time to get the materials to go together on the sewing machine, but once we figured it out, we were really happy with the results.”

Fellow senior team member Ava Daniels also worked to lead the Backstreet Girlies for the competition.  Ava was really happy with how her group excelled at working together.

“If someone was down in the group, then someone else would help out right away,” Ava explained.

Ava’s senior collection is called AvFall’n.  It is a play on words for her name and the fall tones that are featured in her ensemble of pieces.  All of her garments have fall tones of yellow, brown, etc.  She loved how all of her pieces turned out.  One piece that she really likes is a V-neck summer dress in yellow.  She used two different patterns for the dress including a top portion that she created herself.

Ava plans to attend Thomas Jefferson University for fashion design.

Carmody and her students feel so grateful to be able to invite the community to their evening show on Tuesday, May 23, and they look forward to creating more designs to share with the Western Wayne community in the future.