Stick thin beauties, mingling with the ‘it’ crowd, dressing up for every and any occasion… It seems like life is one big cocktail party for the fashionistas of the glamorous world known as the fashion industry….
However, life in fashion isn’t always as glamorous as you might think. frock. paper scissors interviews three Brisbane designers to get their inside perspective on the most unglamorous things about the fashion industry.
Amy Hughes, Brisbane based shoe designer for Colorado group, has painted a picture for frock of a day in the life of a designer. So here we go… clear your minds of all things glamorous….
As quoted by Amy…
6:00am Wake up, slap on a few layers of make-up, piece together a presentable outfit. The thing about working in the fashion industry is you have to look good for people to take you seriously, but I never pass up an opportunity to dress up, even if it is when I am still half asleep.
7:30am Bus and coffee, I am yet to meet a member of this industry who is able to survive a day without coffee.
8:30am Arrive at work, we don’t officially start until 9am but it’s good
to get a head start, especially when your work load builds up by the minute.
8:30am –10am My eyes become square as I frantically check all my emails. Emails are usually from suppliers, manufacturers, basically every company we rely on to meet our deadlines. These companies are based in China.
10am -12pm My favourite part of the day. I get to work on new designs and patterns for the shoes, experimenting with colour and shape. This usually keeps me fuelled for the rest of the day.
12 – 2pm Dealing with any delays in productions. Samples often come back wrong. If a factory doesn’t get the delivery on the ship in time then there are major delays in getting the range in store. Most days there aren’t too many delays to deal with, so we start working on the price point of the items.
2 – 5pm It is 5pm officially, but most days anywhere between 6pm and 9pm. My lunchbreak, if you can call it that, is really sitting in front of my computer with a sandwich and a coffee. During this time I work on specification sheets for every design, changing details on the shoes, analysing samples. I am also on the phone to companies in China, negotiating prices. The buyers expect us to be able to produce the range for a certain price, but due to constant rises in labour costs, it seems like life is one big negotiation between the buyers and the factories, with poor little me in the middle trying to find a mean.
11pm – 6am A good night’s rest and it starts all over again!
Perhaps now we see why no-one actually WANTS to work in the industry. There is absolutely no rest for the (unglamorous) wicked who work in fashion!