For any girl or boy that has ever flipped through the glossy pages of vogue, immersing themselves in the velvety images and experienced the soft kisses of the silky pages. Then it is inevitable the dream of becoming a fashion editor has floated into your head. Fantasising about a job, a life which centres point blank around the fashion world, that can turn those pages into reality. It seems idyllic to those with a palate for the sugary delights of fashion. Yet how does one become the next sharp bobbed Anna Wintour or the prune lipped Miranda Priestly? Logic would say you need to get yourself a fashion degree, do a couple of tea runs at some small magazine and then Condé Nast are pounding their finely manicured hands at your door, begging you to be the editor of Vogue. But of course Fashion is about as far left of Logic as humanly possible. Trust me. My rose tinted glasses of becoming a fashion editor soon cracked after a bitter realisation at a St Martins open day, just having a degree in fashion isn’t going to instantly offer you hundreds of employment options – it is just the beginning.
In order to even get a kitten heeled foot in the door of a fashion publication, you need that old gem of a word; connections. As much as I hate to admit it, although a degree is great as a foundation for you career it is not the direct route into carving out your career in the industry. As well as scanning the internet for various intern opportunities, also look closer to home in terms of what publications are available for you to get involved with at University. This is a great way to start your publishing career and I found it gives you a bit more support in terms of writing as opposed to jumping into the deep shark invested world of bigger publications.
It is sadly still an industry besotted with back stabbers and it’s definitely who you know over what you know in the industry. In order to get in, you need to get out. Out by writing loads, continuously, obsessively, for whatever publication big or small, you need to write. By gaining work experience in the fashion publications, you’re showing future employers that you’re truly dedicated to the industry. That you understand it will take being completely dehumanised, being a modern day slave and becoming capable of making a banging brew with little recognition to begin with. Because to a prospective employers twisted eye, this shows commitment. This shows you’re willing to put your life on the line for the greater good of fashion.
Again, speaking very loosely (nothing can be set in stone in the fashion world) you could eventually be noticed by a fashion publication through your sweat, tears and numb index fingers. This is then when you should theoretically be offered a job in said magazine. Not of course as a fashion editor but as assistant. From there you will then eventually have to cat fight with every other wannabe editor in the joint and make your way up the steep incline to that elusive jack pot of a fashion editor.
Again this is hyper theorised around your dream pool of what it takes to become a fashion editor. I guess my main point which I cannot stress enough is to use every opportunity you can to show off your writing skills, to suck up to those who may be of use to you and of course work your Kim K butts off!
