Few people ever have the opportunity to attend the prestigious Parsons The New School for Design in New York City, whose graduate roster includes a who’s who of American designers such as Marc Jacobs, Tom Ford, Donna Karan and Alexander Wang.

So a little bit of Parsons is coming to Hawaii thanks to Punahou alumna, accessories designer and Parsons professor Bliss Lau. She’ll be returning home to host an interactive master class in design and branding on Saturday, along with fellow Parsons professor and brand strategist Jasmine Taka­ni­kos. For three years they’ve been co-instructors of a course in accessory design and brand strategy, helping students of all ages and backgrounds develop the skills to translate their ideas into products and communicate their ideas to consumers.

Both women had already been teaching at Parsons when Lau approached Taka­ni­kos with an idea of introducing information she thought was lacking in the Parsons curriculum: a combination of the evolution of a design philosophy, and how to pre­sent it to a public often resistant to new ideas.

"She (Lau) told me, ‘My students have tremendous design skills, but they’re lacking the know-how to shape their ideas and take it to the marketplace.’ They’re not thinking about who is their customer, they’re not thinking about distribution," Taka­ni­kos said.

"What ends up happening is that a person comes into our class like a beautiful piece of clay. We shape it, fire it and make it into something."

Lau said, "What we’re offering is not only design thinking and philosophy, but the process of creativity."

A whirl around any local-oriented boutique reveals a sameness in the offering of T-shirts, aloha shirts and sundresses that would suggest a dearth of creativity.

"Habit is a really scary thing. In order to change you have to know what’s next, and you don’t necessarily know what’s next," Taka­ni­kos said.

Simply offering what sells to the broadest segment of the population may appeal to many and represents the surest path to sales, but Lau is speaking to the frustrated artists among merchants.

She’s been there.

The Parsons graduate enjoyed early success at age 22, designing an eponymous line of handbags that immediately won a place in Fred Segal’s West Hollywood boutique in 2003. As enamored of handbags as she was, four years later she moved on to jewelry.

"I don’t know what it was. It’s just something inside of you that changes, like falling out of love with someone and you don’t know why. I just found working on the body to be pure and beautiful," Lau said.

But her jewelry, which fetishized and wrapped around the body, didn’t win her the same accolades as her handbags.

"When I first did my line of jewelry, people laughed at me. They thought it was scary. I had to stand there at a trade show and listen while they told me, ‘My client would never wear that,’ or, ‘I wear a necklace around my neck, not my shoulders and body.’

"When you create something, it’s a major emotional investment. It’s hard to have people tell you they don’t like something, but you have to believe in yourself and your product, because why would you ever put out a product you can’t defend? If nobody ever liked my jewelry, it would have been a big lesson, but it’s funny how the things that scared people five years ago are so standard fare now. It shows you how quickly clients’ palate can change."

Today her designs are sold as such high-end stores as Saks Fifth Avenue.

Even so, she said failure comes with the territory.

"I have a lot of failures. If I create 10 designs, there will be three that nobody wants. But you’re going to learn a lot more from your failures than your successes. You’ll learn about the problems you have to correct, like a bracelet that’s too heavy, that needs to be more delicate.

"So if you make a dress a little ugly, don’t discard it. Put it away and come back to it later."

Lau also recommended enlisting friends, who may also become clientele, for their opinions.

"Maybe your friends aren’t in the industry, but they may have a good eye and know what they want. You can create your own committee to advise you."

Today much of her jewelry is inspired by New York icons such as the Chrysler Building and Brooklyn Bridge, and she utilizes the Socratic method that she employed even as a student at Punahou to push her art forward — asking and answering questions to stimulate critical thinking and advance her design ideas.

Just two seasons ago the "Embraced" collection she brought to Hono­lulu comprised strips of leather and heavy chain. She’s since developed a fine-jewelry line incorporating precious metal, diamonds and onyx.

"I never want to stop learning. I always want to try something new. I never want to do things twice," Lau said.