Art Institute of Pittsburgh fashion design grad Romina Vairo to be featured at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week

Romina Vairo is no longer a student at The Art Institute of Pittsburgh, where she earned her degree last year in fashion design. But around campus a lot of people know her name — even if she doesn’t know theirs.
In recent weeks she’s become a celebrity of sorts to the student designers there. Ms. Vairo, 23, of Pleasant Hills is one of a dozen students and recent grads from Art Institute schools across the country selected to show some of their looks in a runway show Tuesday at Lincoln Center in New York City as part of Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week, which runs through Thursday.
“The fact that I can show my own collection under my own name is honestly priceless,” she says. “It’s a huge deal, and I’m super grateful and super thankful for the opportunity.”

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The Art Institutes show at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week has been going on for a couple of years, but it’s only the second time campuses beyond New York City were invited to participate. Schools with fashion design programs that demonstrate a lot of progress and are graduating designers with a high caliber of skills were picked to submit up to three students to be considered for the event, says Scott French, who produces The Art Institutes runway show at Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week. A panel of industry professionals in New York evaluated students’ garments and illustration boards. Ideal candidates would have quality, cohesive collections with a presence that will make an impact on the runway, he says.
Ms. Vairo’s collection, “Frozen Bone,” features winter wear that celebrates the “silent beauty of women” with muted hues and layers of textiles, a lot of which she created herself. She pulls her inspiration from artists, especially Leonardo da Vinci, whose anatomy drawings influenced the lines and shapes Ms. Vairo played with in her collection.
“When you see the collection on the runway, you’re going to see a different aspect [from the] front, back, side, profile, three-quarters,” she says. “Like an artist, they’ll step away from their painting — I’ll drape something, step away. Go back and drape it. Step away. ... There has to be a feel to it.”
This great attention to detail is a signature trait of Ms. Vairo’s work. She even delayed her graduation so she could make her senior collection “more perfect than it was,” says Stephanie Taylor, who heads the fashion design and fashion retail management programs at The Art Institute of Pittsburgh.
But at the heart of it all is a passion “to make stuff with my hands,” Ms. Vairo says. She grew up in Squirrel Hill loving to draw. Sketching people eventually translated into sketching clothes for them.
“Girls in high school always wanted me to draw their prom dresses,” she says.
After graduating from Oakland Catholic High School, Ms. Vairo lived for two years in Italy — where her parents are from — and studied at Polimoda International Institute of Fashion Design in Florence. The school had a fashion design curriculum and a marketing curriculum, but to Ms. Vairo’s dismay the two sides didn’t intermix.
“I had no idea of the business side, and I said, ‘How am I going to get into this business if I don’t understand that business?’”
Back in Pittsburgh, the city at the time was prepping for its inaugural Fashion Week and The Art Institute of Pittsburgh recently had launched its own fashion design program, which expects design students to hone technical skills as well as to take business classes. Her hometown now had the balance of creative and commerce-centered courses she was seeking, Ms. Vairo says, so she returned to Pittsburgh to complete her education.
Her selection for Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week not only is a feat for her but also for the reputation of The Art Institute of Pittsburgh — and Pittsburgh’s fashion scene at large, Ms. Taylor says.
“When you talk to people outside of Pittsburgh they just don’t know that there’s anything fashion here,” she says. This will “take us to another level.”
Enrollment of the fashion design and fashion retail management programs at The Art Institute of Pittsburgh is modest yet steady — approximately 100-120. Other Art Institutes Ms. Taylor has worked at had about 500-700 students on average in these programs. Most of the students come from Pittsburgh, West Virginia and Ohio, with a few from New York state.
“I like to focus on quality versus quantity,” Ms. Taylor says. “I’d rather have a smaller group of good quality students than just, ‘Oh, we’re just letting them come through.’”
The approximately 5-year-old fashion design program has had graduates go on to work for Pittsburgh-based retail corporations, including Dick’s Sporting Goods and ModCloth, or start their own brands. This week, Ms. Taylor will take a bus of about 35 students and staff to the Big Apple to watch the program’s latest success story.
“I think not only does she make our department proud, she makes the city of Pittsburgh proud,” Ms. Taylor says.
Ms. Vairo hopes the experience will open some professional doors for her, she says. After Fashion Week, she plans to save money to move to New York City in pursuit of a job with a fashion house, with her ultimate goal to be a creative director for a brand.
“I know what I want to do, but I just have to find whatever route. That’s kind of how I’ve gotten where I am. It’s how I live my life,” she says. “Wherever there’s going to be a road, I’m just going to take it.”
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