Office: HS 211 D

Rachel Anderson's creative work and research involves interdisciplinary collaborations between fashion and art, interior design, theatre/costume, jewelry design, metalwork, sculpture, painting, and other multi-media venues. The research narrows the gap between art and design disciplines, showing that the research methods of fashion design as well as the collaborating disciplines are innately similar.  Her creative scholarship is exhibited locally, nationally, and internationally. 

Rachel Anderson completed her Master in Fine Arts from the Academy of Art University in San Francisco and undergraduate study at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City and Texas Tech University. She has an extensive fashion industry background as an apparel patternmaker and fashion designer.  Collaborative learning and research is a key component of her teaching philosophy; and, in Department of Design at TTU she has been preparing students for successful careers in the fashion industry for over ten years. She has served as a professional member of Fashion Group International, Surface Design Association, and the International Textile and Apparel Association. In June 2017 she was awarded the Charles Adams Studio Project, CASP AIR, artist residency, in Lubbock, Texas. In May 2019 she was awarded a second artist residency focused on the West Texas cotton industry with Valerie Hlavaty of the TTU Retail Management program and owner of Homestead Cotton Company at their collaborative studio at 408 Avenue J, Studio E, Charles Adams Studio Project. 

In 2020 she received the Texas Tech University, Institute for Inclusive Excellence Fellowship Award and the College of Human Sciences, Undergraduate Research Experience Grant.

Her recent works include collaborations with the Museum at Texas Tech University, Houston portrait artist Sarah Fisher at the Gwen Cole Art Center at Stephen F. Austin University, the College of Human Sciences art installation “Celestial Bodies” by California artist Ismael de Anda III, FiberMax Center for Discovery collaborative wedding dress with John Deere and Valerie Hlavaty, and numerous Texas based printmaking, sculpture, and mixed media artists.  Her work has been exhibited regionally, nationally, and internationally at academic conferences, art galleries, and fashion shows. Her service and outreach activities has included over 30 curated, single, or collaborative exhibitions at Charles Adams Studio Project during her artist residency, teaching fashion camps for foster children with Lubbock Arts Alliance, serving on Advisory Councils for regional high schools, Advisor for Hi Tech Fashion Group, judging 4H fashion competitions, serving on the Advisory Council for the Louise Hopkins Underwood Center for the Arts, undergraduate design mentorship for the Texas Tech University, Black Student Organization and Hi-Tech Fashion Group's Noir fashion shows, and the local artist collaborative BLNKA fashion shows and exhibitions, and collaborative undergraduate class projects with Under Armour, Malouf's, and the costume collection at the Museum at Texas Tech University.