Vietnam Design Tour

DISCLAIMER: This page is for reserving and confirming your slot for the Spain Design Tour. Payment instructions and further details will be sent via email after your reservation fee is received. Slots are limited and processed on a first-come, first-served basis. Exploring the Craft and Business of Fashion: The SoFA Design Tour 2026 We are inviting you to #LiveDesign through an immersive exploration of Vietnam's fashion, textile, manufacturing, and creative industries from December 6 to 13, 2026. Vietnam presents a fascinating intersection of traditional craftsmanship, textile heritage, entrepreneurial thinking, and modern fashion production. From the historic silk-weaving communities of Quang Nam to the highly structured systems behind contemporary apparel production, this immersion offers students an opportunity to understand fashion not simply as a creative discipline, but as an interconnected ecosystem of design, sourcing, merchandising, quality, production, logistics, and business. Throughout the immersion, participants will encounter Vietnam through both industry and cultural lenses, connecting classroom knowledge with real-world processes and environments. -------- Inclusive of: 7 nights accommodation based on double sharing with breakfast Inner City & Inter City Travel Tour, museum, and destination entry fees & access Exclusive of: Food and drinks (but it will include regular lunch during the Official SoFA Tour Days as we head to the day’s destinations) Airfare, Terminal Fees, and Surcharges Travel/Personal Insurance ----------------- ACCOMMODATION AND FLIGHT DETAILS Accommodation: TRU by Hilton or similar (Arrangements are based on twin sharing) Please note: accommodations will have similar amenities, locations, and standards if any changes occur. Recommended Flight: Cebu Pacific Please note: Airfare is not included to give our participants the flexibility to tailor their travel arrangements to their preferences and individual circumstances. Moreover, we recognize that some travellers may wish to extend their journey by visiting other destinations before or after our Bali trip. PARTICIPANTS SHOULD NOT BOOK FLIGHTS UNTIL SoFA HAS GIVEN THE OFFICIAL GO-SIGNAL TO DO SO. ------------------ TRAVEL ITINERARY December 6 SUNDAY | Day 1: Ho Chi Minh City — Arrival & Creative Orientation Welcome to Vietnam. Upon arrival, delegates will be welcomed at the airport before settling into the hotel. The evening provides a gentle introduction to the journey ahead, allowing participants to rest and prepare for an immersive week exploring Vietnam through the lens of fashion, manufacturing, materials, entrepreneurship, and culture. December 7 MONDAY | Day 2: Ho Chi Minh City — From Fabric to Fashion The Vietnam Design Tour begins behind the scenes of the fashion industry, moving beyond the finished garment to understand the systems, people, and processes that bring design into production. The day begins with an orientation introducing delegates to the program, its learning objectives, and the skills they will take away from the experience, followed by an introduction to the program and its impact agenda. Participants will also meet the mentors who will guide them throughout the immersion. The morning then moves into an extensive factory immersion, tracing the garment's journey across merchandising, fabric and trim storage, fabric inspection, laying and cutting, bundling, fusing, CAD, sampling, sewing, trimming, buttoning, ironing, repair, inspection, folding, tagging, packing, and laboratory testing. Rather than viewing fashion as simply an act of creation, delegates will experience the industrial ecosystem that transforms a design idea into a finished product. In the afternoon, the focus shifts from -making to thinking- through an entrepreneurial mindset session exploring vision, values, perspective, adaptability, growth, leadership, decision-making, and the integration of business and creative practice. The day concludes with a focused introduction to merchandising, including the garment life cycle and the fundamentals of costing. December 8 TUESDAY | Day 3: Ho Chi Minh City — The Intelligence of Materials Today moves deeper into the material intelligence behind fashion. Beginning with merchandising, delegates will explore how garments move from inquiry and quotation through purchase orders, production calendars, fabric requisitions, and trim requisitions. Thus revealing the complex systems that sit behind a seemingly effortless finished piece. The immersion continues into textile/fabric science, examining the relationship between fibers, yarns, fabrics, and garments. Participants will learn how fibers are identified, how yarns are produced and classified, and how material properties influence the final design outcome. The afternoon becomes a hands-on exploration of fabric identification and purchasing. Delegates will examine woven and knitted construction, understand tools such as desk looms, strike-offs, lab dips, and yarn skeins, and learn how fabric weight, density, and GSM inform material decisions. The day concludes with fabric costing and the journey from greige material to finished fabric. The final session examines fabric inspection and testing: from identifying defects and applying the four-point inspection system to generating inspection reports and mill performance scorecards. Through this experience, delegates encounter material not merely as a surface or aesthetic choice, but as a system of performance, quality, cost and design intelligence. December 9 WEDNESDAY | Day 4: Hue — Heritage, Craft & Cultural Context The journey continues to Hue, beginning with a visit to Phu Bai Mill and an exploration of its manufacturing environment. The experience provides delegates with a closer look at the relationship between textile production, industrial systems, and the material foundations of fashion. After the factory immersion, the experience shifts from industrial production to cultural context with a visit to Hue City and the Imperial City.. Here, delegates encounter Vietnam's architectural and historical heritage, providing a different lens through which to understand the relationship between culture, place, materiality, and design. The day creates an intentional juxtaposition between the contemporary systems of production and the historical systems of culture, two forces that continue to shape how design is created, experienced, and understood. December 10 THURSDAY | Day 5: Ho Chi Minh City — The Anatomy of the Detail Today's immersion turns toward one of fashion's smallest but most consequential components: the trim. The morning begins with merchandising through fit samples and pre-production meetings, revealing how a garment moves through critical stages of refinement before entering production. The focus then narrows to trim purchasing: examining the different types of trims, how they are measured and specified, and how sourcing decisions influence both production and design. Delegates will explore the processes behind trim cards, quality control, root-cause analysis, corrective action, and requisition control. The afternoon follows the garment through pilot runs, sample testing, top-of-production samples, and bulk samples. The experience reveals how seemingly minute decisions around materials, specifications, and quality become amplified when a design moves from prototype to production at scale. December 11 FRIDAY | Day 6: Ho Chi Minh City — Designing at Scale Today explores one of the most important transitions in fashion: moving from the designed object to the manufactured system, The morning focuses on industrial engineering, macro planning, and line planning. Delegates will examine the major stages of bulk production, order and capacity planning, time studies, standard minute values, line layout and balancing, capacity, and production efficiency. The afternoon continues into data collection, analysis, machines and tools, machine safety, automation, smart sewing systems, lean management, and the 5S system. Together, these sessions reveal how technology, data, people, and process converge to make large-scale fashion production possible. The day concludes with garment quality inspection, packing lists, and invoices before shifting gears into a cultural exploration. Delegates will visit Lady Buddha and Monkey Mountain, creating a final transition from the technical intelligence of production to Vietnam's cultural and geographical landscape. December 12 SATURDAY | Day 7: Hoi An — Craft, Culture & the Living City After a week immersed in the systems of fashion production, the journey moves into Hoi An for a day of cultural exploration and discovery. Delegates will travel to the historic city and experience its distinctive atmosphere, architecture, craft traditions, and everyday creative culture. The day is intentionally less structured around technical production, allowing participants to experience Vietnam through observation: looking at how local culture, materials, making traditions, architecture, commerce, and daily life intersect within the city. The experience culminates in dinner at Hi Café before departing Hoi An and returning to the hotel. December 13 SUNDAY | Day 8: Ho Chi Minh City — Reflection & Departure The final day begins with breakfast before a dedicated shoot session, capturing the people and experiences that shaped the journey. A final city tour follows, giving delegates an opportunity to experience Ho Chi Minh City through a broader cultural lens before lunch and departure for the airport. As the SoFA Vietnam Design Tour comes to a close, delegates leave with a deeper understanding of fashion not simply as an aesthetic discipline, but as an interconnected ecosystem of material intelligence, craftsmanship, entrepreneurship, manufacturing, technology, culture and human ingenuity. From the fiber to the fabric, from the factory floor to the finished garment, and from industrial systems to cultural heritage, Vietnam offers a compelling lesson in how design becomes real. ------------------ TRAVEL INVESTMENT RATES Single Traveller: Php 63,500 Slot Reservation Fee: PHP 20,000 (on or before 20 September 2026) Full Payment: PHP 43,500 (on or before 03 October 2026) 2-Part Installment Plan: Slot Reservation Fee: PHP 20,000 (on or before 20 September 2026) 1st Payment Due: PHP 23,250(on or before 30 September 2026) 2nd Payment Due: PHP 23,250 (on or before 03 October 2026) Preferential Twin Rate: Php 61,800 Slot Reservation Fee: PHP 20,000 (on or before 20 September 2026) Full Payment: PHP 41,800 (on or before 03 October 2026) 2-Part Installment Plan: Slot Reservation Fee: PHP 20,000 (on or before 20 September 2026) 1st Payment Due: PHP 22,400 (on or before 30 September 2026) 2nd Payment Due: PHP 22,400 (on or before 03 October 2026) After making your payment via online transfer or bank deposit, please send the proof of payment to cashier@sofa.edu.ph and admissions@sofa.edu.ph for verification.