Merchandising students are thinking outside the box for a project in the promotion principles course.

Associate professor of merchandising and textiles, Patricia Warrington, said the students of the department of design, merchandising and textiles are divided into groups and receive the opportunity to create a mock store window that is displayed in the department’s building.

Junior fashion merchandising major Caroline Crawford’s group decided to be the first in this program to design a bridal window, she said.

“We wanted to do something that had never been done before,” Crawford said.

The group chose to create the window from the products at a local bridal shop, De Ma Fille.

Warrington said the products that the students choose for the window they would like to create must be from a real business. Students in the past have chosen from businesses like Dirty Laundry and Neiman Marcus.

The students who have participated come up with all the elements of the display themselves, from the concept, to the scene, to the retailer, she said.

“Our program is what we like to call a concept to consumer program,” Warrington said.

It is designed to be an applied program so that the students receive hands-on experience.

“The more experience they get from doing what they read about, the more prepared they are for the market when they graduate,” Warrington said.

Crawford said the window display project was one of the most enjoyable projects that she had done while in the program.

Warrington said, “It’s a great process for them to see how it came from the seed of an idea to actually being a window.”