<p>I was really hesitant to ask this question since I brought this up to some teachers and friends who laughed at me because they thought I was joking. I've been secretly wishing to work in the fashion industry, but I hate the looks I will get from some people who would think I majoring in engineering to work in such a "flawed" industry is ridiculous. I think keeping this a secret and feeling insulted has been negatively affecting my mental state. I was thinking of majoring in materials science and engineering to work in fashion. If I do MSE, I might be able to enhance the quality of fabric, develop new fabric (this was really cool vid 3D printing fabric: 3D</a> Printed Dress on the Catwalk at Paris Fashion Week - YouTube), make clothes and accessories, and even design runway sets like these: Alexander</a> McQueen | Best Runway Shows - YouTube CHANEL</a> Spring-Summer 2014 Ready-to-Wear - YouTube</p>
<p>I just want to know if this is feasible at all or if I'm dreaming something intangible before I get my hopes up.</p>
<p>I don’t see what materials science would really have to offer the fashion industry.</p>
<p>Fair enough, but more than likely the engineers who did that 3D printing were doing it as a demonstration, not a primary job function. The ones operating the machine were likely not even engineers. It’s kind of like the NASA project right now trying to 3D print a pizza. Those engineers working on that are currently working on the project but aren’t doing it so they can go into the pizza industry and aren’t likely going to come out of it being respected pizza chefs.</p>
<p>Then again, who knows, maybe you’ll be the one to revolutionize the fashion world by taking the 3D printer mainstream. Still, to do that you hardly have to be a materials scientist. You would really just need basic training on the machine and likely some kind of fashion training as well. I could also just just be a victim of my own cluelessness about the fashion industry, as the depth of my knowledge stems only from walking through a room that my wife is using to watch Project Runway.</p>
<p>It’s a bit of a different approach, but you could always look into something like textile engineering or into fields where you work on developing new polymers for using in clothing. Someone had to develop the fibers, weaving techniques, etc that went into making all the stuff Under Armor does, right?</p>
<p>Actually, it doesn’t seem so far-fetched when you consider Kevin Plank, founder of Under Armour and UMD graduate - although his major was business.</p>
<p>I had a feeling I wasn’t crazy. I was just thinking about this since U Michigan’s researchers in MSE Professor Anish Tuteja’s Research Group were able to develop a surface that repelled every known liquid called “superomniphobic surface”. It would be cool to apply this surface with suits and other clothing. I will look into textile engineering and taking some art related classes that teaches the construction of clothes.</p>