President’s Message at 2017 Annual ICG Members and Board Meetings

Philip Gust

My focus has been on financial stability, growth, educational outreach, and providing value for our affiliated chapters and their members. It is surprising to realize just how much the ICG has accomplished in the last seven years. Here are 10 things, in no particular order, that I’m especially proud of:

1. The ICG’s finances are strong, enabling us to fund existing programs and institute new ones that benefit members and the costuming community.
2. Membership and chapters have increased, and existing costuming organizations are increasingly interested in the benefits of affiliation.
3. The International Costumer has gone digital, with high-quality articles in full color, published bi-monthly with a searchable index.
4. More U.S. chapters participate in our GEL program to become 501(c)(3) non-profits, and now receive free financial management software.
5. The ICG Archives has gained international recognition for its continuing work in preserving the history of costuming and being an educational resource.
6. Special Interest Groups (SIGs) were chartered, enabling costumers across the ICG with common interests to come together and share their knowledge.
7. The Marty Gear Fund was established to award grants to projects that benefit the costuming community.
8. The ICG Press was founded as a publisher of books and monographs on topics of interest to the costuming community.
9. Chapters and SIGs can now receive free web hosting and domain names through the ICG.
10. The ICG website now offers extensive online resources to help chapters and SIGs getstarted, operate, and grow.

Three officers did not stand for re-election this year. Bradbury-Enslin served one term as Vice President. She was also on the ICG Guidelines revision committee whose work continues this year.

Kathe Gust served five terms as Recording Secretary. On the Communications and Public Relations Committee, Kathe created all the PR brochures, business cards, and postcard templates on the website and the “PR Tips and Media Guide,” and “Events and Ideas Bank” articles for the Chapters and SIGs Resource Center. She contributed to the Publication Committee by finding, digitizing, and indexing back issues of the ICG newsletter and all ten years of the Costumer’s Quarterly magazine.

This was also my final term as ICG President. I have served five terms, and two terms as Vice President before that. The ICG is in very good condition, so this is an ideal time for someone to bring their new ideas and enthusiasm to the position. ICG founder Martin Gear served five terms as our longest-serving president, and I would also like his record to stand un-broken as a mark of my high esteem for Marty.

ICG members are being offered a slate of officers, including Tonya Adolfson, serving her fourth term as Corresponding Secretary, and Jeanine Swick, serving her ninth term as Treasurer. Joining them will be Anne Davenport as ICG Recording Secretary, Mera Babineaux as Vice President, and Marianne Pease as President. Their candidate statements are in the 2017 annual meeting agenda on the ICG website. Please join me in thanking the officers who have served in the past, those who continue to serve, and those who are beginning their first terms.

I look forward to even more amazing accomplishments for the ICG in the coming years under the leadership of the future officers, and I ask the members and the ICG Board to give them your full and unqualified support.