Richard Hallmarq

In eighth grade, Richard Hallmarq took a home-ec course and produced his first fashion design: a pair of fuchsia satin boxers. Today, the 34-year-old designer is again mixing fashion and academia. Hallmarq is a student and assistant marketing coordinator at the brand-new International Academy of Design and Technology.

“It was time for me to go to school again. I needed to open up another door, talk to people and get to know the terminologies,” Hallmarq said of the decision to enroll in the institute’s fashion-design program.

Though he took last season off to focus on school, Hallmarq’s fashion lines have graced many local runways since he began designing four years ago. And Richard Hallmarq clothing will again be available at Madam Butterfly in spring/summer 2008, with a clothing line called “X.”

Why X? “Because almost everything has black tied into it,” said Hallmarq. “Everything is very mysterious. It reminds me of Madame X. When a woman walks into a room, her dress commands attention.”

Hallmarq’s proudest moment in his own fashion career was the bow he took with poet and musician Ingrid Chavez at the end of Hallmarq’s runway collection at San Francisco Fashion Week. But the designer doesn’t plan to leave his hometown any time soon.

“I love Sacramento. Even when I travel to other states to do work, I always feel good when I come home,” said Hallmarq.

After all, this city has a supportive fashion community. “It’s amazing to me, from models to designers to makeup artists, it’s a family,” Hallmarq said. “Sacramento has an abundance of beauty.”

Catch Richard Hallmarq clothing on the runway at Imagine: Where Fashion, Art and Music Unite, a showcase of designs by students of the International Academy of Design and Technology. Imagine will be held at 8 p.m. March 28 at the Crest Theatre, 1013 K Street; www.thecrest.com.