Haute List • CRESCENDO

• Haute List - CRESCENDO is Edessa School of Fashion’s annual fashion production reimagined as a symphonic and thought-provoking performance. Where design, music, and social consciousness rise together.

• CRESCENDO treats fashion as a score, the runway as an instrument, and the audience as part of the composition. This is not a gala. Not a party. It is a precise, rising sequence of movements that frames how style, agency, and collective power meet.

• THIS IS WHAT A MOVEMENT LOOKS LIKE •

Info: Guests arrive in all-black attire, stepping into a space shaped by lights, architecture, and quiet anticipation.

Cocktails by BIANCHINI set the atmosphere, but the tone remains focused, an opening moment to orient, observe, and prepare for what is about to unfold.

Info: The show is structured as four movements, each informed by pivotal eras of protest and cultural resistance.

Movement I Ignition

Quiet tension. The first spark of defiance.

A low hum of tense energy begins to build.

Movement II Mobilize

Bodies in formation. Codes of dress as communication.

Fashion as signal, symbol, and shared language.

Movement III Uprising

Rhythmic, urgent, and escalating.

Lines sharpen. Sound deepens. The runway becomes a site of collective force.

Movement IV Resonance

A high point of clarity and conviction to carry forward.

The final note cemented not by volume, but by precision, unity, and intent.

Across all movements, Edessa Students, faculty, and guest designers deliver original work shaped by social narrative, architectural influence, and the tension between beauty and resistance.

Scores by Arnold Cifax anchor the performance in structure and tempo.

Anchored by the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, the ACLU of Wisconsin, and the Milwaukee Alliance, this work stands

Info: As the final movement resolves, guests are invited to remain in the space to meet the designers, partners, and organizations behind the show.

This is a moment of dialogue, reflection, and alignment, the quiet interior of a movement before it steps outward.

Info: The night concludes outside of the Bradley Symphony Center beneath large-scale projections cast onto the building.

Imagery, film, and statements honor the partners, spotlight the work, and project the collective vision forward into the city.

The adjournment is not a farewell.

It is the first step beyond the stage, the point where fashion, community, and civic action leave the building and enter public space. CRESCENDO means louder together. Not by noise, by intention, by design, and by presence.

This is the movement we’ve been waiting for.

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