SSU Pop-Up Experience at Sheridan

How 3 Departments Brought Valentine's Magic to Campus

If you happened to visit the HMC Student Centre for Valentine’s Day, you may have noticed a giant pop-up event – but do you know the story behind how it came to be? Curious about how these giant envelopes of love found their way into our spaces?  It was created by Sheridan’s Visual Merchandising Arts students and a fellow SSU student leader and in collaboration with SSU.

In the middle of January, Visual Merchandising Professor Diane Spiridoulias assigned her Tradeshow and Showroom Design class a contest to create a visual pop-up display for Valentine’s Day. The rules were simple: try to make the display environmental-friendly and use as many of the resources available inside Sheridan’s prop room as possible. VMA students jumped at the opportunity to take their creative ideas into real life and started brainstorming some concepts for a cool Valentine’s pop-up event.  

At the same time, inside the Sheridan Student Union office, Vice President of Engagement, Ritz Cruz, was brainstorming fun ways to celebrate Valentine’s Day on campus. As a VP, Ritz is responsible for creating new collaboration opportunities within the college and offering opportunities for growth for students and SSU staff. For Valentine’s Day, Ritz was hoping to create a booth where students could write encouraging messages to friends, pick up candy and treats and feel welcomed. What Ritz hadn’t realized was that the students in Spiridoulias’ class were already cooking something up.  

Although the SSU has collaborated with the Faculty of Arts, Animation and Design in the past, most recently through the launch of our pop-up collaboration inside the Hudson’s Bay, this was a great opportunity to make an impact within our student spaces. “We've been working on building the relationship with VMA for the past few months!”, said Social Media & Community Engagement Manager, Lexx Senior. “They've let us use some of their props for our social content and one day asked if we wanted to do a collaboration with their class for V-day!” Three moving parts – Ritz’s engagement, the Visual Merchandising Class and SSU Marketing Team all came together to bring this concept to life.

VMA students had just four weeks to work on their project: they brainstormed and pitched in week one, practiced presenting in week two, pitched to the SSU team in week three, and brought their ideas to life days before Valentine’s Day. “We watched about 3-5 different presentations and honestly couldn't decide [which pop-up to choose as the winner] they were all so good, and well thought out! We asked if it was possible to combine different elements from each project into one vision and that's how they came up with the final product for the popup.” Lexx shared.  

One Visual Merchandising student in Spiridoulias’ class, who also happens to work at the SSU, had been waiting for the opportunity to combine her love of merchandising with tangible work experience. Maja Sosa, Social Media Assistant at the SSU, often saw the natural overlap between Sheridan Student Union pop-up events and the skills she was learning in her final year at Sheridan. When the class contest was first announced, she was excited for the opportunity to incorporate what she was learning in class into an experience for students. "Turning the SSU space into a playful Valentine's pop-up gave me the chance to execute a creative idea, connecting with emotions through colours and textures” Maja shared.

“More than a pop-up; it was a professional development opportunity for me as a future Visual Merchandiser.”  - Maja Sosa, VMA Student

On Valentine’s Day, Sheridan students walked into the HMC Student Centre to see a massive pink and white-stripped display with the thoughtful message ‘Take A Valentine, Share A Valentine’, life-sized heart-shaped messages, and a window to take selfies and photos with friends! "It’s one of the perks of being a VP, the possibilities are endless in creating student-centered events.” Ritz shared. “Collaborating with the VMA students made a more interesting and engaging addition to the SSU Valentines Pop-up at HMC Campus and I think that we should provide more avenues for Sheridan students to showcase their unique talent and skills moving forward!"

As we move on from Valentine’s Day, the Sheridan Student Union is still committed to finding opportunities to collaborate with Sheridan College faculties to empower our student leaders. Since expanding the Vice President roles back in 2021, moments like this help reaffirm the impact that partnerships between the SSU and Sheridan College can have to enhance the overall student experience on campus. We look forward to finding more ways to collaborate in the future and thank everyone who was involved in helping make our Valentine’s Day special.