George Brown is coming to Regent Park, and it’s bringing opportunities. With the opening Tuesday of a fashion hub in the community, which has had problems with poverty and is on the up, the school is targeting the youth in Regent Park for better education and employment opportunities. The Fashion Exchange is set to offer community-based skills training to people aged between 18 and 29, in a 16-week program about apparel fit techniques and industrial power sewing. It is also an opportunity for the school to provide manufacturing support to local companies and designers, for the production of short runs and samples, said head of fashion school Marilyn McNeil-Morin.

“Being right in the community lifts the barriers and allows us to be more accessible,” she said, noting many in the low-income communities are unable to join the mainstream universities and colleges. George Brown’s fashion school has already been working in collaboration with Regent Park community, and 150 youth have gained entry-level skills through the program. The services are expected to enable growth of local small brands as well as develop capacity and expertise for production in Toronto. Having the facility right in the heart of the community brings an added connection to it, said McNeil-Morin. Especially in the fashion industry, there’s a growing need to know the history behind the making of clothes, she said.

“We realize that increasingly people want to buy made-in-Canada clothes,” she said, stressing the importance of helping up and coming local designers.

“But they’re also asking questions like who is making these clothes and how are the workers treated?” she said.

“There’s this whole local accountability attached to it.”