Staff Profile
Tutor (Fashion Communication)
Academic and professional qualifications
PhD Candidate, University of Glasgow, Glasgow. (Awaiting for viva).
Thesis: Connecting Threads: The Transnational Textile Trade between Nineteenth-century Britain and the Spanish-speaking World.
MA History of Design, Royal College / Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Dissertation: Woven Knowledge: From Print to 'Textile Enlightenment' in Spain (1759-1813)
BA (Hons) History of Art, Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona
International Exchange Scholarship, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.
Grant recipient: International Mobility Scholarship, Becas Fórmula Santander €6,000
National Exchange Scholarship (Sicue), Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Madrid
Grant recipient: Seneca Sicue, National Mobility Scholarship €5000
BA (Hons) Textile Design, Escola Superior de Disseny, Universitat Ramón Llull, Barcelona
Erasmus Exchange, École National Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs, Paris
Previous Employment
At the University of Edinburgh, I also work as a research assistant for the digital humanities project Subaltern Histories of Global Textiles, an interactive, public-centred digital resource built on connecting collections which aims to de-centre (fashion) history by disentangling the dress phenomenon of Madras, a South-Indian fabric whose large consumption by Black communities in the Caribbean reshaped Indian production, fostered British competition and was appropriated by Europeans in the craze for ‘Oriental’ fashions.
Academic service (administration and management)
I act as Personal Tutor to Level-6 students
Languages
▪ English: Bilingual
▪ Spanish: Native
▪ Italian: Fluent. Spoken, written, and read
▪ French: Fluent. Spoken, written, and read
▪ Catalan: Fluent. Spoken, written, and read
Undergraduate teaching
Fashion Cultures 1
This unit introduces the critical & Contextual Studies approach to Fashion as a cultural concept, industry and creative endeavour, developing ways of critical thinking and academic enquiry that will form the basis of subsequent study. The unit introduces students to a wide range of key cultural concepts, whilst developing skills in research methods, literature reviews, critical thinking, reading, analysis and academic writing that will inform subsequent study.
Fashion Cultures 2
This unit enables students to further develop their critical skills and research interests, contextualising and analyzing key issues and shifts in the domain of Fashion. This unit builds on and extends the knowledge and skills developed in Fashion Cultures 1. Students will critically contextualise and analyse contemporary issues and cultural shifts in Fashion. Students have opportunity to focus on an area of critical and contextual studies that aligns with their personal practice.
Fashion and Society
This unit explores the connection between fashion, consumption and popular culture. Students are introduced to key cultural theories and sociological concepts such that they can begin to further understand and critically engage with key ideas that have shaped the fashion system and the culture in which it acts.
Directing and Producing
This unit provides an opportunity to distil ambition for designing change within Fashion Art Direction contexts. An initial proposition will be continually refined in order to achieve visionary and innovative responses through practice informed by theory. You will be encouraged to reinforce the notion of the collective through continued engagement with relevant cultural and creative opportunities.
Exhibitions
Exhibition Research Assistant for Mediums and Visionaries 15 Feb. to 2 June 2019, Es Baluard Museu d'Art Modern i Contemporani de Palma.
Membership of professional associations
▪ (in process) HEA Fellowship, United Kingdom
▪ DATS (Dress and Textiles Specialists), United Kingdom
▪ FHD (Fundación de Historia del Diseño), Spain
▪ AFET (L'Association Française pour l'Etude du Textile), France
▪ CIETA (Centre International d’Etude des Textiles Anciens), France
Research
Research Interests
Textile history
Fashion history
Business history
Transimperialism
Material culture
Connected histories
Invited Papers
▪ London College of Fashion (London), ‘Connectingthreads.co.uk: Developing Subaltern Histories of Global Textiles for the Wider Audiences’, Threads and Fabrics: Textiles and Cloth as Material Culture, The Costume Institute of the African Diaspora, 28 October 2022
▪ Ghent University (Belgium). 'From Paper to Cotton: Visual Translation and Technological transfer. The case of 'Mexico y sus alrededores' in Nineteenth-century Britain', Symposium of the International Network of Nineteenth-Century Hispanists, 20-21 May 2022
▪ Cristóbal Balenciaga Museoa, Getaria (Spain). 'Supplying Woollens for Cristóbal Balenciaga: A Comparative Analysis of the Commercial Strategies of Garigue and Agnona (1947-1968)', I International Conference on Cristobal Balenciaga, 1-2 October 2020
▪ Musée Maritime de La Rochelle, La Rochelle (France). 'La perméabilité culturelle dans le développement de la technologie imperméable. Le Poncho au 19ème siècle', De la mer aux textiles. Journée d’étude 2018-AFET, L’Association Française pour l’Etude du Textile, 12-13 October 2018
▪ Abegg-Stiftung, Riggisberg (Switzerland). 'Global Cross-Cultural Influences through the Study of a Failed Transaction from the Philippines to West Africa: A Case of Hispanic' Guinea Cloth', in 1778' A Taste
for the Exotic: Cross-Cultural Influences in Early Modern Dress and Textiles, Dressing the Early Modern Network, 26-27 September 2018
▪ Museo Histórico de Acapulco Fuerte de San Diego, Acapulco (Mexico). 'Weaving Co-dependency in the Light of Informal Empire: Nineteenth-century Textile Between Britain and Spanish-Speaking America', Co-dependent Empires: 2nd Annual Conference of Imperial Entanglements. Trans-Oceanic Networks in British and Spanish Colonialism and their Legacy, Warwick University, 13-14 July 2018
▪ Centre de Documentació I Museu Tèxtil de Terrasa, Terrasa (Spain). With Rosa Creixell, 'Fabricando novedad: Los oficios de la seda en la Barcelona de 1700, entre la tradición y la innovación', I Coloquio de investigadores textil y moda, Grup de Recerca Tèxtil i Moda and Fundació Història del Disseny, 17-18 November 2017
▪ Art Workers' Guild, London (UK). 'From the Philippines to West-Arica: A case of Hispanic "Guinea Cloths" in 1778', Interwoven. Dress that Crosses Borders and Challenges Boundaries, The Association of Dress Historians, 27-28 October 2017
▪ University of Glasgow and Edinburgh College of Art, Glasgow and Edinburgh (UK). With Rosa Creixell, 'Towards a science of bleaching. The translation and dissemination of Francis Home's Experiments on Bleaching in Spain', Colour in Cloth, The Pasold Research Fund Conference, 10-11 April 2017
▪ The Courtauld Institute of Art, London (UK). With Rosa Creixell, 'Fabricating Novelty: The Barcelona Silk Trade in the Eighteenth Century', Fabrications: Designing for Silk in the Eighteenth Century, The Courtauld Institute and Victoria & Albert Museum 5 March 2016
Grants
- Sept 2022 Project Grant, The Karun Thakar Fund and Victoria & Albert Museum, £890 (towards my forthcoming article 'Object Lesson: Learning from a Failed Transaction from the Philippines to West-Arica: A Case of Hispanic 'Guinea Cloths' in 1778')
- Sep.2017 - Mar.2022 Lord Kelvin - Adam Smith Interdisciplinary PhD Fellowship, University of Glasgow £78,250
- 2018 Ella Maxwell Travel Scholarship, University of Glasgow £120
- 2018 Conference Travel Grant, Royal Historical Society £500
- 2017 Research Activity Grant, The Pasold Research Fund £500
- 2015 Research Activity Grant, The Pasold Research Fund £500
- 2015 Travel and Research Fund, Royal College of Art £250
Journal Articles
de Lorenzo, V., 2022. ':La decoración ideada por François Grognard para los apartamentos de la duquesa de Alba en el palacio de Buenavista (The interior decoration envisioned by François Grognard for the apartments of the Duchess of Alba in the Palace of Buenavista)', West 86th: A Journal of Decorative Arts, Design History, and Material Culture, 29 (1), pp. 137-140.
de Lorenzo, V., 2021. 'Supplying Woolens for Cristóbal Balenciaga: A Comparative Analysis of the Commercial Strategies of Garigue and Agnona (1947–1968)', Fashion Theory, 25 (4), pp. 481-511.
de Lorenzo, V., 2019. 'Costumes espagnols entre ombre et lumière [Spanish Costumes: Darkness and Light]', Fashion Theory, 23 (4-5), pp. 589-599.
Alcantara, VDL., 2019. 'Mariu Emilas, Balenciaga: Mi Jefe; Hubert de Givenchy, Denis Itxaso, Tony Willlis, Eloy Martinez de la Pera and Igor Uria, Rachel L. Mellon Collection', Costume, 53 (1), pp. 135-137.
de Lorenzo, VA., 2017. 'Fashioning the Early Modern: Dress, Textiles and Innovation in Europe', Textile History, 48 (2), pp. 292-294.
de Lorenzo, V., 2016. 'Spanish Fashion in the Golden Age (La Moda Española en el Siglo de Oro), Museo de Santa Cruz, Toledo, Spain, March 26‒June 14, 2015', Fashion Theory, 20 (5), pp. 575-588.
Office Location
Room 2.35
Cavendish South
Manchester Fashion Institute
Manchester Metropolitan University
Cavendish Street
Manchester M15 6BG