Can you give an overview of how you got to where you are today?

DG: Sure, it's kind of a weird, windy path. It's not the typical story of, "Oh I was a PA (production assistant), and then I worked my way up."

When I was nine years old, I just wanted to get out of my house. I was the oldest and needed my space, you know? I was too young to babysit, so I started asking all of my mom's friends who had babies if they needed a mom's helper. And as soon as I could babysit, I did. I was always into the "next steps."

I'm also not one to sit still; I hated school. I was a horrible student, and I didn't finish college, though I am still pursuing my education. It's not something I talk about, or usually ever tell people because there's such a stigma behind it. I've seen people that I respect hear that I didn’t finish college, and immediately attach some sort of judgment to it. I've always judged myself for it, but I've recently accepted it because I realized that this was the right path for me. Who knows, I’ll probably end up going back. During school, I worked a lot and that was always the thing that I loved doing most.

While you were in school, what was it like?

I went to college to get out of my parent's house. I'm from LA, and I went to Cal State Northridge. In school, I joined a sorority and partied a lot, but I worked through it the whole time. My path started to change while I was working at a little Apple retail store - my parents split up, I dropped out of school, and I felt very lost.

The store was really small; it was quiet and slow. I had this coworker who went to Brooks, which at the time, was a very respected photography school (sadly now it's gone). He brought his cameras to work and was always doing photo projects. We were often bored, so he’d tell me about his projects, and I became super interested in photography. I got my own starter Canon and sometimes the owner of the store would bring in his kid and their dog so I'd shoot them, or take photos of the products in the store.

My photos weren't particularly good, so in my spare time, I'd mess around with them in photoshop. Nothing serious, I’d give my family member a third eye or something. One day, this guy came in, we'd been bantering for a bit, and I was helping him with some products. He asked what I was doing in Photoshop, and I told him I was interested in photography.

He said that he ran an ad agency that did all of the marketing for Arclight Cinemas and asked if I wanted to sit in on the shoot that they were doing that week. I went to the shoot and didn't have any idea why I was there, but I knew there had to be a reason. I found an open seat; there was only one, and it was next to the photographer. Instead of shooting models, they were shooting real Arclight members, and the photographer wasn't super engaging. I found out later that he was a sports photographer, which makes complete sense. His lighting was beautiful, but it was just missing a bit of engagement with the subjects, so I started talking to the people as he was shooting them. Honestly, it was the fucking boldest thing. Now, I would never do that in a million years.

But they thought it was amusing and they hired me; both the guy at the ad agency and the photographer. At first, the photographer had me assist with lighting on a couple of shoots, but I didn't know anything. All I knew was how to talk to people. I had only ever worked in sales. I think he recognized that I could help him in the sense of networking, but I didn't really know how to make a job out of that.

So what were you doing at the Ad Agency for Arclight Cinemas?

I did a lot of production, but more from an event standpoint. I also put on Q&A's, for example, we'd show old movies like "The Breakfast Club" or "Ghostbusters." And I'd hit up literally every agent to get as many people as I could for a Q&A. Sometimes, I'd host them as well. This job was a great segway into production, but there was no creative outlet for me so I felt pretty uninspired.

So what came next?

I was open with the owner of the ad agency who initially hired me, and expressed my interest in working in photography. I went on Craigslist and typed in “Los Angeles” and “photography.” The first thing that came up was "Sales for Fashion and Celebrity Photographer" and it was like five minutes from my house. It seemed strangely perfect.

So, I went and interviewed with the photographer, and I think he really liked how green I was. I ended up becoming his in-house agent and worked with him for two years. It was a tough job. It was full-time, literally eight hours a day of cold calls. I had a call log and would show my progress at the end of every day. I arranged meetings for him, tried to send him to different cities to get people to meet with him, and produced shoots for him as well. Aside from photography, he was also a model scout. Right when I started working with him, he discovered Taylor Hill at a dude ranch, and was the first to shoot her as well. My favorite part about working with him was looking out for these kids he kept finding. Taylor and her family became my family; they become like your little sisters and brothers.

With this job, I definitely got to see what I loved and hated. I realized that I hated cold-calling, but I loved everything about what I was witnessing in this industry. I loved producing, and I loved developing artists.

And then you took those skills and started your own talent agency?

I did. I realized I didn't like seeing people getting taken advantage of, and I loved developing young talent so starting an agency felt like the next step. Instagram was brand new and I started trolling the app, meeting people. I didn't get a loan and I also quit my job because it was a conflict of interest, but I still needed an income to develop the agency and live.

A friend who worked in the music industry knew I was looking for a job and, there was an up-and-coming electronic group called Krewella. The manager, Jake Udell, needed an assistant at Th3rd Brain, and I needed money and liked music, so it seemed like a good enough fit.

I didn't really understand what electronic music was, but I did a bit of research before the interview and ended up working with him and the artists he managed for about two years. Management is a really cool role because you get to see every aspect of what it takes to be an artist; from the label, to the PR, to the syndication, to the creative. There are so many important pieces of being an artist and successfully managing someone. Even with music, I always found myself taking on production of our artists’ photo and video shoots.

It's hard to maintain a steady timeline of the work that I was doing because I was always producing on the side. When I would pitch photographers, I would usually end up producing for them as well, it kind of just went hand in hand. After nearly two years working in music management, I turned full-time to my talent agency, but wanted it to become a production company as well.

Once I looked at all of the numbers, it seemed like a really big investment to take on. I had already put so much in this agency, and I wasn't ready to start something completely new.

So when did Art + Commerce come into the picture?

I think Linkedin emailed me saying that Art + Commerce had an open role in LA right as I was contemplating what to do about starting the production company. I sent in my resume, but I thought it must have been a mistake because I knew they were based in NY. To my surprise, they called me the next day.

How did you format your resume? I feel like that's an obstacle a lot of young people face.

I don't think there's a right way to present your resume. I feel that sticking to one page is important while also keeping it consistent and relevant to the industry that you want to work in.

I've personally worked in so many different roles, and worn so many different hats. But in reality, I was producing for all of them, so it was important for that to be reflected on my resume. I have always submitted job applications with intention. I also suggest taking the time to tailor your cover letter and resume to each role and write something genuine. Show that you researched the company and that your passion is in line with the role you are submitting for.

Once you applied, what was the interview process like?

I applied and quickly received a call back from someone in HR. I think I must have asked more questions than they anticipated, so they referred me to Lila Dominguez, who created the LA office for PRODn (Art + Commerce’s production company).

From there, it was a process of meeting with Lila and taking calls with several different people, but the main event was a shoot in LA. Lila was coming out for it and they hired me to locally produce it as a freelancer. It was a 2-day editorial shoot at Milk Studios in March of 2017. Francois Nars was shooting Guinevere Van Seenus and Adonis Bosso for Marie Claire.

What was the shoot like?

It went pretty late into the night. It was a great shoot and I loved working with the Art + Commerce team. A couple of days later, I got a call from them with an offer. I had to make the decision between freelancing and the freedom it offered, versus working for a company full time. As a pretty extroverted person I knew it was going to be a big sacrifice, going from meeting with different people every day and being on different sets every day, to being primarily in an office.

But I'm so in love with the company, and the clients and artists are very much in line with the direction that I was interested in, so it felt like it was the next step. I closed my agency, and I thanked everyone I was representing for their support. Some people were definitely not happy.

What was the transition like, from producing on your own to producing for Art + Commerce?

At the beginning, it was really hard because I was so used to doing everything myself. Learning to be a strong delegator was a big part. I didn't recognize how easy and important it was to get the help I needed and used it as motivation to build a killer team. Working with a team of producers I have so much respect for is incredible. It opened my eyes to very different methods of producing and has been a great reminder that there is not a “right way” to produce.

Did working as a talent manager prepare you for being a producer?

Oh my god, yes. And so much more than I ever thought it would. In production we have to be ninjas. Right? So our job is to make sure everything's perfect all of the time, keeping eyes that staging remains nicely set, making sure that anyone who needs anything is taken care of; but also to remain unseen.

I have seen people who aren't sure of the appropriate way to interact with the photographer, for example. In the fashion industry, our photographers and stylists are essentially like celebrities, but they're still humans. People can get nervous or starstruck. It sounds so glam, but in the end it's just a bunch of people. It's nothing more than that.

In my previous roles, before Art + Commerce, working very closely with so many artists was an incredible experience. I got to experience who they really are - they're humans who are passionate and usually don't believe in themselves the way that they should. Oftentimes, they need that push to build out their portfolio or to recognize they are good enough to shoot for certain clients, or whatever it is.

Especially with photography, almost every photographer I know is a bit awkward. There's a reason why they’re a photographer and want to be behind the camera. I feel the same way. So I think I'm not phased by the nervousness of celebrity, because I've learned to just see them as people.

How did you get to where you are today?
Looking back on everything, it totally makes sense. I started with an interest in fashion, then right after college, I got my first job at a multi-brand showroom. I didn't even know that showrooms, buying and selling through this third party, existed. I just found out about that job through a friend. From there I started to do lookbooks for the designers in the showroom because for some reason I felt like their lookbook could be better. So I would just do it for free, for fun, and then I started a little side business producing lookbooks. From there I wanted to get into buying, so I worked for Nasty Gal when they were starting in 2011 so that was after they moved from San Francisco to Los Angeles. For Lisa Says Gah, I’m doing sales, producing lookbooks, and buying; so every past job has kind of surfaced with this one.
What did you study in college?
Advertising and Italian.
Were you able to apply your degree in advertising to your job at the showroom?
Advertising was the most creative major at my school, it was as close as I could get to fashion. I learned how to pitch ideas and create a story.
Totally.
But still, at my first job I was so green. I had no idea how anything worked. That job opened my eyes to, "Okay, there are designers that make the product, they have seasons, they have the showroom where they sell the product to all of these different buyers who buy for their customers.” While being a showroom assistant, I shadowed and watched everything that was going on. I was pretty much steaming all day, so I just listened in to get an idea of how it all worked.
Did you learn any skills as a sales rep or a buyer that helped you with Lisa Says Gah?
For sure. As a sales rep, you're the voice of the brand, and responsible for its success in all of these different stores. As a buyer, you're doing the same thing but for a business. You're responsible for making the right choices, making sure that your customers are going to like what they see, and that it sells. Having that instinct of knowing what's going to work takes time, you can adjust as you see, but you also have to have an eye for it, too.
As a sales rep, were you involved in that process?
I had worked within the showroom for about four years and over time I became more confident in knowing what the buyers wanted to see, so I became more involved. We would look at a collection and edit down things that we didn't think would sell or that there were too many of. For instance, “You have six jumpsuits, let's narrow it down to two so that there’s a better chance of selling through,” because sometimes more options confuse buyers. Then we would explain that to a designer because they have a different vision. It’s about combing through things to help both parties meet.
How did you come up with the idea for LSG?
After I had left Nasty Gal, I moved to San Francisco and didn't know what I was going to do. I had done fast fashion, and I had worked for different designers, so I felt like I had a really good experience with both.
My idea was to start a shop that was focusing on sustainability, slow fashion, and highlighting female designers who were doing something cool within the contemporary market. So the initial idea was to say, "no" to fast fashion say "gah" to these designers.

Can you give an overview of how you got here?

I grew up in Saskatoon, Canada and attended the University of Saskatchewan. While I was there I tried out all of the different classes, although the only ones that stuck were photography related. But, I had no idea how I could ever make a career out of it. It was just so far fetched in that part of the world (central Canada).

I had an assignment to create a series of photographs that told a story. So, I started looking at a bunch of fashion magazines, and I found this Fall issue of W Magazine with a spread of Karlie Kloss shot by Tim Walker. There was this one image of Karlie standing over a broken humpty dumpty thing….

Oh, I know that image. It’s so good.

Yes! Immediately I fell in love with Tim Walker; I was amazed that he could tell this incredible story through images. The props were amazing, the styling was great, and I had no idea who Karlie Kloss was at the time, but I was just amazed by this whole thing.

I decided that I wanted to work in fashion photography, but having zero idea of how to do that, I attended a program at the Vancouver Institute of Media Arts. It’s a 12-month intensive diploma course, and from there it helped me get a job at Aritzia. I worked there as an in-house retoucher for three years. During that time I would ask to assist the photographers that Aritzia would hire, and that's where I initially met Charlotte. Right away, I was captivated with her work; I loved how she always had this clever feminine humor towards it and of course her colors were so good. It was a lot of fun being on set with her and learning what life is like for a fashion photographer based in New York.

In fall of 2015, I left Aritzia and started working as an e-commerce photographer for Kit and Ace. We had a bunch of photographers in-house, and it was a lot of fun creating the content for the campaigns, e-commerce, and social media.

I had kept in contact with Charlotte since meeting her in early 2015, and in June 2016 I made a trip out to New York to assist her for a week. I was so amped up coming to New York and getting to work with Charlotte on set. I remember walking into Pier 59 Studios, and I was engulfed immediately by that world. A week after I returned to Vancouver she sent me an offer letter to become a full-time digital technician / studio manager / retoucher.

How did you get to where you are today?

I’ve dropped out of college a couple of times, but always knew I loved clothes. Especially in high school, I was obsessed with getting dressed in the morning. I would wake up at 4 am just to sew or alter vintage garments I wanted to wear to school that day. Missed my school bus nearly every day too.

Anyway, fast-forward through me figuring out a few things - I moved to New York, then eventually went back to school, studying at Cal State LA. It’s one of the only public schools in Southern California with a fashion course; it’s a super small program with maybe 30 people in the graduating class.

I know you spent some time in New York. How did you like it?

I liked certain things about it. There was a lot of new talent emerging both musically and artistically during that moment. Definitely a great time to be in New York. October 2013, a month after I moved there, I began an internship at Eckhaus Latta. Mike and Zoe took me in when I literally knew nothing about clothing construction or production. I don't know why they let me be a total fashion dunce for those months, but they have always been a great help to me.

What was your role?

I worked there for about three years; they became bi-coastal in the middle of my tenure, so I continued to work with them when I moved back to LA for college. By the end I was a studio assistant, but I started as an intern. Before that point, everything I'd made was like, "Oh, I'm going to put this and this together and see where this goes." It was cute, but I couldn't remake it. I couldn't tell you how I got there.

My project during that season, their AW14 collection, was to sew these thick, long felted strips into tubes. Do you know how hard it is to bring a tube inside out? I think there were like 30 of them. It was tedious, but I was so happy to do it because I was like, "Yeah, I'm making fashion!"

Then in between New York and coming back to LA, you lived in Berlin?

Yeah, I honestly went to Berlin to do nothing. I thought, "I failed in New York. I need to not go home as a failure, so I'm going to spend three months in Berlin." But within the first week, I met someone who was the managing editor at 032c. We were talking about clothes and they were like, "You know a lot about clothes," and I was like, "I guess I do." They said, "Do you want to help us at 032c?" The next day I was in their office doing research for their upcoming Raf Simons issue. I literally spent two and a half months researching Raf Simons.

TVPS: How has your definition of beauty evolved throughout your career?

J: My first vision of beauty was extra... over the top everything. All of the colors that you could think of, metallics in hair, metallics on faces, metallics everywhere.

As a child, I would watch women come in and out of my aunt's salon in Jamaica during the height of the dancehall era in the 90s; it was a lot of people going out to parties, people celebrating. But as I've grown, I've learned how to appreciate things in their natural state as well.

How long did you live in Jamaica for?

I was born in Brooklyn. Sent to Jamaica when I was about 3 months old. Then right before middle school ended I came back to New York, but my family wasn’t living in Brooklyn anymore. They were living in Jamaica, Queens.

So from Jamaica to Jamaica!

Yeah, it was very interesting because I moved at a time when there was a lot of hip-hop music coming out of Jamaica, Queens. My mother and my two aunts are also musicians, so I've been surrounded by music my whole life. I think that has a lot to do with how I view beauty as well. For me, a lot of musicians set the tone for what is beautiful, you know? What they artistically do with their looks definitely has an impact on what’s popular for our generation.

Did your time assisting influence your definition of beauty?

Absolutely, I saw beauty in a different way. It was also elaborate and extravagant like in my aunt’s salon, but there was a bit more of an artistry to it.

So for me, the two worlds came together. The women that I grew up around acted as if they were on the runway every day, it was almost surreal. I realized that a lot of the techniques that I learned as a child were also being used on the runway in fashion, but were being done in a different way.

I also learned time management, like how to do 40 models within a four hour timespan and make each of them feel special before they go on the runway. So it definitely changed the way that I view beauty, but not too much because I always have that same excitement that I did as a child.

I went to the Fashion Institute of Technology and graduated with my Bachelor's in Fashion Merchandising. For a second, I started to think that beauty was amazing, but maybe it was not for me. I was wrong, it didn’t feel natural the minute I stepped away from it. So I dropped everything and I went right back into the assisting world. And it felt right again.

When you were assisting Guido, Sam McKnight, and Luigi Murenu, what did you notice were the key differences for how each artist approached and worked with hair?

Everyone works in a completely different way. It was interesting to watch how each hair stylist manages their team, interacts with the designer, how fast they get the girls done, and the different ways that they achieve each look.

Did that influence the approach that you take now?

Absolutely. As I watched different people do things differently, I would pull certain aspects that felt right to me. I took one way of managing the team from one hairstylist, and I took how to approach a designer from another.

Sam is very good at talking to people, and you want to have him around all of the time. This job gets so intense sometimes, and it's good to see a smiling face around.

I listened to your interview on Man Repeller’s former podcast, Oh Boy. I heard you say that “you kind of can’t mess up.” So I was wondering if you could talk a bit more about that, and what you mean by it?

It's very easy to feel like there's a right or wrong path to get to the career that you want to go to -- and I just don’t think that’s true. This idea of “one right path” can be enforced a million different ways or by a million different people, and to be fair, there are some professions where you really do have to follow a focused path in order to expedite the process of reaching your goal. If you want to be a doctor, for example, there are steps that you absolutely have to take in order to become a board-certified doctor.

I remember being in college -- I was a journalism and mass/comm major -- and being very concerned that I wasn't taking all the right classes, or that I wasn’t on the right path. Was I going to graduate and suddenly decide that I didn't want to do fill-in-the-blank? There were numerous times in my own career that I worried that I was setting myself up too far along on a path to veer from it and to try something new. But time and time again, I've proved to myself that there's always a way to not only pivot, but to apply what you know and who you’ve met to something new. In a sort of cheesy way, you never know what's going to come up. I do think that being aware that there are possibilities that come up allows you to be more prepared for them, to look for them, or know when they are coming.

An example might be, if you're working in PR but you’ve always wanted to be a writer, and a friend reaches out to you and says, "I'm looking for a writer to help out with this brand that I’m starting and I need someone to be the voice of the brand. Do you know of any writers? Do you want to be a writer?” There's an opportunity to say, "Yeah, I do know one. You're talking to her." You know?

Starting off, can you give an overview of how you got to where you are today?

Overview. Well, it's actually a story that I like to tell. I came to New York, went to Parsons, and I had this idea in my head of how things were going to happen. I was dipping my toes with different photographers; no one, necessarily, that was big or on any sort of level. Then one day, a friend of mine said, "You know, my mom has a studio in Paris and if you want to intern there as a studio assistant whilst you're visiting me, you can get some experience."

So I interned there for about two weeks as a studio assistant and I realized that things were happening every single day; from an e-commerce shoot to a fashion story, to a campaign. People were working, and the industry kept producing something new.

I ran back to New York, sophomore year, and thought, "You've seen how quick it is in Paris. You've got to start working in New York.”

Parsons has their career experience people that are supposed to help you get internships. So I sat down with this woman, and I was keen to get something but she didn't really help me. There was nothing that she could offer that was good, or even something that made me excited.

I kept looking for things, and one day one of my professors sent out an email saying Red Hook Labs was looking for interns. So I looked up Red Hook Labs on Google Maps, and was just seeing this industrial-looking spot that had the appearance of some sort of garage. I'm thinking, "What could possibly be here?" But turns out they work with some of the most sought out photographers in the industry.

I interviewed with Helena Martel Seward, who is now one of my close friends, and is an amazing producer. And it just took off from there, I was at Red Hook for about nine months. Then she left to do her own thing; she started her own company Lolly Would, and I worked there for a bit as well.

From there I went to Steven Klein as an intern. He ended up offering me a job as an in-house producer and in-house casting director. I was still in school at the time, so I said, "Let me come back to you after I graduate. Let’s see where I'm at."

I also interned for Charlotte Wales. It was the day of my graduation that Vogue offered me a job - Helena had put me in contact with some producers there two years prior. I guess that's how it all came together, when people kept recommending me based on the hard work that I was doing as an intern.

So how did you get to where you are today?

I’ve always drawn my entire life. Then I started painting, but on people. It's all that I know how to do, it's so natural for me. That escalated, and one day my friend said, "Yo - I'm moving to London to be a model. Come move into my model apartment and start doing makeup." So I took the plunge and lived in a model house sharing a bed with my mate in her box room.

Where are you from originally?

Oxfordshire. You step outside to countryside where there are only fields and sheep. It's super cute.

So you went straight from there to London?

Yeah, it was a strange time. But really great, as it gave me the opportunity to practice my craft on so many different girls. That was my first foot in the door, and then it just went from there.

Your work is celebrated for pushing boundaries. How did you first find the space to do that?

It actually took years and years for people to accept my work. I couldn't get any photographers or teams that wanted to shoot with me because they were scared of what I wanted to do. Around 7 to 8 years ago, there was only a handful of people doing this style of work.

I ended up taking the photos myself. Then over time, it caught people's attention. Funnily enough, the people that I'd asked before to collaborate with, after seeing my work they turned around saying, "Hey, what about shooting?" I definitely had to create the opportunity that I wanted to be given. I had to work hard and make that space for myself. I wouldn't have had it any other way as it taught me a lot.

During that time, were you also assisting?

Yeah, I was assisting on and off and I've always had a part-time job. I've worked all sorts of weird jobs to get by to ensure that I can stay in London, to ultimately do what I wanted to do. It's been a challenge.

You’ve been represented by Bryant Artists for about a year now, have you seen your work evolve as a result of that?

Definitely, one million percent. Having somebody that believes in you (S/O Louise) changes everything. It creates a whole new level of confidence in yourself from having someone that will back you no matter what, and protect you. Since we don’t have an alliance in fashion, up until you have an agent, it can be very difficult. The industry can be tough, but it's important to learn to stand up for yourself.

To have an agency like Bryant Artists behind you, it takes a load off. It pushes you to achieve more. It's like having somebody constantly saying, "Yeah, you go, girl.” Also, having Louise as my agent, it’s so good. When you sign with an agent, you're basically marrying them. It's a relationship and I think that's something that people forget. It’s integral to have someone that wants to care for you and she has so much love, it's beautiful. She'll randomly send me documentaries on animals, little things to watch over the weekend. It's wicked.

So how did you get into photography?

Well first I got into skateboarding because that’s what you do when you're bored and in the suburbs. I was teaching myself how to skateboard off of YouTube videos and then I met a good group of friends who I started skating with. We all got really into skate montages and skate videos - Spike Jones and things like that - and I started to realize that you could make really good skate videos for pretty cheap. So I fell into that, and then one thing led to another, and now I'm here.

What was one of your first work experiences?

I interned at Art Partner for six months back in 2016, at the exact same time that things were really taking off in my work, so I was going to school, interning, and shooting.

How did you balance that?

I think I feed off of it. I start to go into insanity mode where I don't sleep and just think about ideas all of the time. When I was going to school, working, and trying to do photography, I was maybe more successful at managing my time and being efficient because you have to constantly be in overdrive. Everything has to be so hyper-scheduled out, minute to minute, and you do get a lot more done that way. I also looked at interning at Art Partner as studying, I would go through all of the magazines, and their archives are incredible. From that experience, I started to look at my own photos as an actual body of work, and what fit and what didn’t. You have to take every opportunity very seriously. For me nothing comes lighthearted, nothing comes easy. If you treat things a certain way, you'll get that input.
From looking at your Instagram, it feels as if you’ve suddenly popped up and started working with the biggest people, was it truly an overnight success?

It may seem that way, but I've been working on it for years, well, that’s at least how it feels from inside the of the belly of the whale. But the way you find out about people, the way information is passed along and perceived these days is the whole trickery of social media. You think that people have done this overnight, but they haven't. Nobody has done that. That's not real. I think what's got kids really twisted these days is that they think they need this overnight success. Yes, things did turn around pretty quickly for me and I'm really lucky, but at the same time, there were so many times where I was hanging around at shows and doing anything and everything that I could. I would be lying if I said everything just kind of fell into my lap.

What’s been the biggest aid to your success?

I was an early adopter of Instagram; I always knew that it was going to be ubiquitous. Three years ago we weren't all on Instagram using it the way that we're using it now, and about four years ago I knew that it was going to be the way everyone would communicate. I still love it, even though it's become more sickening at the same time. It's more polluted and clouded, but I find the good stuff always rises to the top.
The internet also taught me a lot about how I wanted to position myself online, which changed my career in a lot of ways, because then the internet became the main avenue for how someone’s photography gets noticed and propelled to success. It also taught me portrait tricks for sure.

How do you protect your work? When did you first learn about licensing for photography?

Everything I learned about that side of it came just by doing, by asking and being curious, figuring it out. Nothing about NYU itself was fun, but being in New York City was the biggest learning experience in the world. I very quickly whipped into shape and had to adapt and understand things on a much sharper and quicker level. As soon as I learned what licensing was, I taught myself how to write contracts, as I wanted my images to be treated with the same respect as the photographers that I admired. From there, the way I started looking at photography changed significantly.

Did you have any other work experiences or how did you first start to meet the people that supported your work?

I interned at this very small, no longer existent film production company, and maybe one other, but my main job was putting my work out there. I was directing a lot of music videos, making any kind of visuals that I could with people that I was meeting on the internet. I was just reaching out to people, and that's how I met Abra, Kevin Abstract, and so many of the people that I work with today.

So how did you get to where you are today?

I would have to say around my sophomore year of high school I started to recognize my interest in fashion. I was applying to schools and seeing where I wanted to go, and Florida State was one of them.

Where are you from originally?

I'm from Davie, Florida. When I was researching schools, Florida State had one of the best programs for what I wanted to major in. So, I decided to go there. They also had this whole in-college magazine called Clutch. It's really cute. I got involved with that during my years of college.

In my freshman year, I was super involved with clubs, and I was also an on campus ambassador for ASOS and Rent the Runway. Then going into my sophomore year, I did my first internship at Seventeen Magazine.

What does a brand ambassadorship entail?

ASOS and Rent the Runway would send us products, and then we would host events on campus. One of the events that I did was in collaboration with Clutch. I brought all of these ASOS cups; getting people to take photos with them and there were also all of these other incentives.

Oh cool. That was also right at the beginning when Instagram was becoming a new tool for marketing.

It’s crazy when I think about it. They were so ahead of the game when it came to influencers and campaigning, because they knew that these kids were going to buy what their friends had. It was a super cool experience, I took a trip to New York and got to visit the ASOS showroom, and meet with all the PR people there.

I was this bright-eyed young girl who wanted to get into the industry so badly, and I do really feel that my internships on campus and my involvement with our school magazine Clutch, helped me get that first internship at Seventeen Magazine. I was like "I'm not going to let anything hold me back. Just because there are kids that are doing three, four internships in New York during the school year, I can still get an internship during the summer if I work my ass off.

That's so smart. You're one of the first people that I’ve interviewed that got involved in fashion while not at a city school. That had to have made a huge impact.

Yeah, I originally really wanted to go to NYU, but it was just too expensive and I had a scholarship to go to Florida State. I remember when I got that email from Seventeen. I was so happy. That was my first summer in New York; I was living on the lower east side. It was the picture-perfect moment for my first time living here.

Yeah, it was like your introduction to everything.

Yeah, it really was. At Seventeen, I was a fashion closet intern. I met a lot of people that I'm still in touch with. You learn so much. When I first went on set, it made me realize how much I enjoyed working in magazines, whether it's in styling or market.

After Seventeen, what did you do?

I went back to school and continued with the brand ambassadorships. I also did this other brand ambassadorship with a local boutique called Henri Girl. It was an amazing experience and I got to know the retail side.

I think it’s very important when you’re first starting out, to see as many sides of the industry as possible.

Definitely. I knew that I wanted to go into magazines so I made sure to intern in PR so that I could see the other side. I did one PR internship with Anthropologie and then went on to work at HL group as an Account Coordinator. Both these experiences have helped mold my work ethic and how I handle stress.

What were your expectations for your first internship versus reality?

I think when I went into my first internship, I didn’t know what to expect. I thought maybe something from along the lines of when Lauren Conrad interned at Teen Vogue on The Hills.

This was my real first time living in New York and being delved into a very fast-paced environment. I came from a small town. So, being in New York was a whole new experience. It helped mold me into the person that I am today because I don't have high expectations for anything. I kind of go into it with a clear mind.

When you first started at Vogue, you were the freelance jewelry market assistant, how do you think you made yourself stand out?

I think it was just my willingness to learn and eagerness to want to grow in the company and that's what they recognized. Every time I was given a task, I just wanted to do it well and see what else I could do.

Can you give an overview of how you got to where you are today?

Absolutely, so it kind of happened by accident. I was in my senior year at the University of Southern California, and I had a mini-freakout because I realized that so many people around me were interning and had been doing so for years now, and it wasn’t something that I had been focusing on. I was more into my classes, and to be honest, I was just making sure I passed and was doing everything I needed to do.

There was this girl I knew that was working at a photo studio and at the time I didn't realize that that was an actual job that you could have. Nor did I know too much about the business of commercial photography. So I looked online for photo studios that were in Los Angeles, and Milk Studios popped up. It looked really interesting, so I called to see if they were hiring interns and they were so we scheduled an interview for the following week.

Do you remember what your interview was like?

Yeah, I do actually. I was really nervous and didn’t know what to expect. I felt slightly out of place in such a luxurious space. The reception team had me wait in the lobby for a bit, and I watched a couple of guys from the art department bring a huge wall flat into a studio. I remember being confused because I didn’t understand what they were doing at the time.

I also had on this all black outfit. It looked like I was going to a funeral. I was wearing tights-

So kind of like right now.

So kind of like right now. All black outfit, same thing. At the time Monae was working at the front desk, and she pulled me into the cafe to sit down for an interview. She asked me what I knew about the photo industry, and at the time it wasn't that much, but I had still done enough research about MILK to hold a conversation with her. It was short and sweet, and she definitely let me know that while it's a glamorous place, what makes this machine run is a lot of hard work. I understood that coming in, and I think that's what really helped me.

Are there any stories that come to mind when you think about your time as an intern?

I was always running around as an intern. Giving models robes, hauling clothing racks in and out of studios, cleaning everything. I just remember everyone was so beautiful and I’d be running up to clients sweating in my chucks, like “Hey did you ask for this?”

When you first started college where did you think you'd be?

I was a really romantic person when I first started college. I don’t think I was thinking about a career necessarily. I really loved shooting film, developing black & white photos in the darkroom, and writing. Once I started taking more media classes, I had an idea I might work in the entertainment world.

Do you think your experience at University of Southern California prepared you for where you are today? If so, what would you say were your most valuable takeaways?

That's a good question. I majored in Communications at USC, so I really learned how to confidently express my opinion whether I had to write a paper or prepare a speech. Being able to express yourself with confidence is a big deal. If you’re confident, people receive that well. I think a lot of how you get by is just your attitude. Also, being in such a big school, you’re thrown into a completely new world with a bunch of people you’ve never met. You learn a lot about yourself and how to work with others. You’re constantly being challenged both academically and socially. It’s tough. I think it helped me be more open to critique.

Do you remember any learning experiences or specific jobs that you had before this that unexpectedly prepared you for working here?

I was a receptionist at a hair salon, and it taught me how important it is to always show face. Your one-on-one interactions with clients are really important. When I was a receptionist, even if I was stressed and I was scheduling all of these different hair appointments, and someone walked in, I had to completely drop everything and just make sure I was happy to see them and greet them. It can definitely be exhausting, but in a lot of ways, my job now can be like that too.

Can you give an overview of how you got to where you are today?

Where to start? I think it all began in Florence when I first met Luca Guarini and Luigi Vitali; we were students and flatmates at that time. Then after about a year, I went to Barcelona to study graphic design and Luca and Luigi went to Madrid. We decide to start DUST magazine to follow our passion for photography; we started it without any expectations. I still remember we built the first issue via skype and then we met in Poland to finish and print it. I still get excited when I think about that period, we were very young and full of dreams and motivation. I think we still are, maybe that’s the key to keeping it together, with a big dose of perseverance. From there a lot of things have happened.

Where are you based?

I actually travel a lot, I work several months in Berlin during the year, and when I can I return to my hometown Catania in Sicily to spend time with family and enjoy the sun.

So how did you get here?

I grew up in the southeastern suburbs of Melbourne. I always wanted to be a writer, but I’ve always been very self-conscious about my work. I’m a Virgo, so in other words, I’m a perfectionist, and nothing I do is good enough. I thought, "Well, I can't be a writer because this person is better than me. They read more. They've got a bigger vocabulary." So for a bit, I decided to study PR as well because I assumed that it’d be easier to get into, or at least more fruitful financially.

I was still in Melbourne and since the fashion industry wasn’t as huge there, I had a difficult time trying to figure myself out, find the right career and people to look up to who felt like me. After a while I was thinking, "This is not working for me here. I'm going to move to London."

I was 20, and this sounds very privileged, but my mom asked, "What do you want for your 21st birthday?" And I said, "I don't want a party or presents. I want a one-way ticket to London. I think it was about £300." So she sorted that out, and 3 weeks later I was here. I thought, "Cool. I'm going to go to LCF," but the tuition was 10k, so then it was “Guess I’m not going to LCF.”

I scrapped my degree and made my way around London doing a lot of hospitality work, and eventually got into consumer PR a few years after making some money in restaurants. It wasn’t for me – it wasn’t the creative work I had craved. So I took 2 years off to work in hospitality again while I figured it out. I was 25 at that point, and that’s when my now ex-boyfriend, his parents, asked us to look after their apartment while they dealt with some family things overseas.

Oh, sweet deal.

So I picked up my studies again but this time with a focus in journalism. One of the modules that I needed to complete was an internship. I was searching on this website called fashionworkie.com and saw that Dazed had a listing for a receptionist intern, so I thought, "Okay. I'm going to do that because 10 people are going to apply to that one in comparison to 100 for the editorial one.” When I applied this amazing guy, Harry Pearce, emailed back, and asked for me to come in the next day. I was freaking out. I ran out and bought the latest issue of Dazed; I didn't have it. People think that you have to be obsessed with the magazines that you want to work for. You obviously have to appreciate them, but you don’t have to be an expert. You just need to be prepared to learn and throw yourself in head first and whole heartedly.

I looked up everyone in that issue, but they actually didn't ask any of that, they just wanted to get to know me. Harry was asking me questions about my personality and who I am, what I want to do, and I mentioned I wanted to do journalism, and that I was studying it. He said, "Great! Well, you know, if you had the opportunity to intern here, you could obviously, speak to those departments." He’s one of the people that I list for really giving me a leg up.

Somehow I got it and when I started, I was really appreciative to be there, but I was thinking, "How do I get from this point to writing?" So I just said “Hi” to everyone because I was the first person that people saw in the morning. People think that being the receptionist or handing out the mail is trivial but no, it builds relationships. Those people remember you because you've done something for them. I would also ask questions when I could and soon I got to a point where I felt comfortable emailing those people and asking, "Hey, I'm a journalism student, I'd love to write something." And they'd say, "Yeah, pitch some ideas go for it." But nothing was really getting picked up.

Then I thought, "Whatever, I'm just going to email the fashion features editor,” who's now our editor-in-chief, Isabella Burley. She's a huge inspiration, and I was nervous, but I emailed her and asked, "Do you have anything that I can write?” She emailed back saying, "Hey, write this. Someone's written it, but I'm not happy." I was freaking out because she wasn’t happy with the one that she paid for! But I wrote it and sent it back to her, and she said, "This is great. When can you come and intern for me?"

So I did and I made myself indispensable. I was still working part-time at the restaurant, but I was just so excited to be there. I would go home and stay up all night transcribing the editorial team’s transcriptions. This one time I knew what I had transcribed was going to be in print so when it came out, I was like, "Oh, I transcribed those words." It’s so silly but it’s the small things that you really take hold of and appreciate.

Also, Dazed is really DIY, and we're still independent, which filters through to the way that things are structured and how we work. Everyone is doing a million jobs at once, and since there’s no time to micromanage, you're thrown right into the deep end which is the best thing. I never had to get anyone coffee or walk someone's dog. Instead, I was transcribing, coming up with interview questions, working on brand features, from the get go. I was so scared, of course. I was good scared, though. I would stay up until 4 AM writing something. But the feedback that I got was so helpful where I just hung around after my internship ended and did things for Isabella here and there.

Also, another thing is that everyone is really friendly, you just have to put yourself out of your comfort zone. I was 25 years old doing an internship with 18-year-olds, and I wasn't like, "Hey, I'm a failure. I'm 25, doing my first internship." I was appreciative that I probably had my head on a bit more than my 18-year-old self. I put my pride aside. I didn't take it personally when they would say something like, "What is this sentence you've written?" Instead, I would say, "Okay, great, I'll change that." I feel like if I had done that internship at 18, I don't know if I would have been the same person doing it at 25. Every time I was transcribing and researching I took that as a real learning opportunity.

Then a freelance job popped up at Nowness when they were relaunching their site so I took that. I was recommended by my colleagues at the time, Trey Taylor and Owen Myers – I’ll never forget how appreciative I was to them, and still am. At first, it was a lot of menial tasks, but soon, the editor in chief at the time, Terence Teh, asked me do a few interviews for them. Also, just meeting all of these people, they might not do something immediately for you, but 6 months down the line, they're going to say, "Hey! I remember that person." Hopefully. I always thought that even though I wasn’t the best writer but if I was nice, friendly, and open then I might land on my feet.

So after a year of interning and assisting, I was getting pretty antsy, like “Shit I’m real tired and broke, and where is this even going?” Luckily though, the digital assistant was leaving Dazed, and Harry, who's always looked out for me, said, "On the down-low, nobody knows this yet but the digital assistant is leaving her position, and you should apply before it's announced.” So I did, and, after a few interviews and serious moments of doubt, I ended up getting it.

Within that year a lot of things were changing, so I sat down with the HR and said "This is what I'm doing, this is what I have done and this is what I can do. I need some more faith; I need a different job title." Then the guy who was our editor in chief at the time, Tim Noakes, said, "Do you know what? You're going to be our Arts and Culture editor, but we can’t pay you anymore right now. You’ll see though; this will open a lot of doors.”

At that point, I was walking to work, I was so broke. Tim was right though, quite quickly, things did start to change. So many doors opened which made me realize that, of course, you need money but if there’s any way that you can make it work, prioritize on getting the job that makes you excited to go to work every day.

It was tough; I used to try and get on the tube and not pay the fare. Where I was living, I could take the DLR, and there were certain points where you could get on and get off, and you wouldn't have to tap in. There are no gates. Or I’d get on a bus and not tap in or whatever. Don't do that though; I got done a few times. It's not great.

Someone said this the other day, and I think it’s true, I find that it’s the journey up to wherever you want to go that is the most important because once you get what you want, it's even scarier. I guess because you have to decide what to do with it. But that journey is the most rewarding and when you're going through it, it's important to stop along the way and think, "Wow! This is what I'm doing.”

I feel like today everyone is so focused on what’s next and I want to say enjoy where you are, don’t look at who's around you or who you think might be doing better, appreciate where you are. And just move forward with your own thing.

Starting off can you give an overview of how you got to where you are today?

Yeah, so when I was at Saint Martin's I was in the fashion communication and promotion course, but I didn’t enter it with an awareness of fashion. Which sounds strange, but I was advised the course when I was in foundation year. I actually wanted to do fine art and specialize in photography, but my professor told me, "You just won't do any work." I am not very good at self-motivation, I need targets, I need deadlines. So he was like, "You'll spend 3 years doing nothing. You need to do a course that's much more, almost vocational, really concentrating on one thing." I'd never considered fashion before, so that was quite a turning point. But I did start taking photos during the course, so when I left, I was a photographer. I took pictures, I got commissioned...

Yeah, I saw you got published by Dazed before you started working here.

Yes! So weird. It's all come full circle.

It took me a couple of years but I realized that I way preferred other people's photographs to my own, and that's not me being humble. That's just factual. I enjoyed taking pictures, and I liked the pictures that I took, but I didn't feel like they represented the aesthetic that I had in my head. So it just didn't match up for me, and it didn't satisfy me as much as a creative career should.

Then I met my now-husband who is a photographer and he just lives for it. You know what I mean? It's his entire world. He's got such an obsessive personality. He is completely addicted to it, and I was thinking, "I'm just not in that place." I’ll always love it, but I started to get those feelings like, if I did this every single day, and had to do it for money, would I love it as much? I don't know if I would.

So those were the thoughts that were going through my mind, and I was taking photographs, working in a designer boutique, which was amazing because there were so many creative people working there. One of my best friends there was a stylist, one was a set designer, Georgina Pragnell, who's doing incredibly well now. One was a pattern cutter who now works for so many amazing designers. So it was a real creative place, really interesting people to meet there. But I didn't imagine myself working there forever.

I was on Facebook during my lunch break and a friend of a friend, Chloe Kerman, who was a stylist at the time, had left Tank Magazine. I knew she had gone on to work for this new magazine that everyone was really intrigued by but no one quite knew what it was. She posted on Facebook "We are in desperate need of a producer." I thought, "Oh, maybe I could do that."

At the time, the boutique that I was working for was closing down the woman's bit so I emailed her.

I was interviewed by Garage’s managing editor at the time who's now one of my very good friends, Becky Poostchi, and she was having a dinner party at her house in France. So she was interviewing me on Skype while she was preparing for this dinner party. It gave me such a good feeling about it and I got the job. Garage completely changed my trajectory because it was something I'd never really considered. It was such an exciting project. It was a brand new magazine, and they'd never had an issue before. It was right at the beginning of their story, and it was so exciting to be a part of that.

How did you get to where you are today?

In my sophomore year of college, I interned at Glamour magazine in their fashion closet. Starting in the fashion closet isn’t something I would necessarily recommend, but it gives you a perspective of how the machine of fashion works. The next internship I had was at a website called Lifestyle Mirror. It was my first writing internship and it was a really small place so they let me write stories. The summer after that, I interned at the Daily Beast, where I also got to write. But the internships that really got me where I am today were at The Cut and Man Repeller, where I landed after graduating. I learned a lot about how 2 different types of organizations are run. Man Repeller was a super small operation at the time, which was amazing because I would have an idea and they would say go for it.

For instance, they let me go to fashion week, which was great. But one of the first big things that I did was when Cathy Horyn, my idol, left the New York Times I wrote something about why we need Cathy Horyn’s criticism in the industry, and she liked my tweet and it was like my entire world exploded. It was the first time where I realized you can put something out into the world and people see it. It was a scary thing but also an addictive and exciting thing. At the end of the summer, I reached out to Garance Doré who is a blogger. I was her personal assistant, so again it was all hands on deck. It was different from Man Repeller because it was more about about visuals. She had such a strong visual identity, whereas Man Repeller had a very strong voice and mission. I learned so much in a completely different way, but I realized that I wanted to be a writer. I had actually applied to Condé Nast multiple times in the past so my resume was in their resume bank, so they were the ones who reached out to me when they had a position open up.

They were looking for another assistant position and I didn’t want to do that as I was trying to move in a different direction, so I told them that. Then they mentioned that they had an opening at W, so of course, I asked to interview for that. I got along really well with the editor who interviewed me, and it was clear that it was the perfect fit.

When I first started, I learned so much because I was doing so many different things, like social media for instance. Through that experience, I got to see firsthand what posts do well and what posts don't do well. I learned the ins and outs of sharing content which ended up becoming a valuable tool for my writing. I was given this amazing opportunity of a lot more responsibility and freedom because it was and still is such a small team. I got to interview celebrities and figured out that I also really liked interviewing musicians as well.

When you first started college, did you have any idea of where you thought you wanted to be?

Yeah, I always knew I wanted to be a writer. It was one of those situations where it was like, I'm good at this, and I'm also not good at anything else. My interest in fashion has always been there. At the end of the day, I can't fight it; I love clothing. When I went to the McQueen exhibit at the Met, I felt something emotional. It’s so artistic and beautiful, and fuck anyone who tries to tell me that it's not. Every once in awhile I’ll think I should be writing about politics, then I realize I’m bad at that and someone better than me can do that, and they will. I need to focus on what I'm good at.

So how did you get to where you are today?

My career is eclectic. At first, I wasn't sure what sector of the fashion industry I wanted to be in, but I at least knew that I had to be on the luxury end of it. So I decided to try out an internship in sales.
Why luxury?

I wanted to be a part of what first caught my eye in the industry, and I was also interested in how the bigger houses operated.

I think when you start your career, especially at a brand, you have 2 choices. The 1st you can start at a smaller company and have a lot of responsibility but not as much visibility. Or you can start at a bigger company and have greater visibility to important people but less responsibility.

I ended up choosing the latter and starting my career at a bigger company. But I ended up getting really lucky because I got more responsibilities quicker than I expected. Maybe I was lucky, but I believe it’s about what you bring to the table. If you work hard and go beyond your missions/tasks, people recognize your efforts.

So before Loewe you were at Christian Louboutin for a bit?

Yeah. I was a PR intern there.

Oh, Amazing.

Yeah, it was really great. I liked how the PR team was set up there one girl worked with VIPs, one girl was dedicated to France, one worked for the rest of Europe, and another one worked for men. Each of them had their own intern, so it was a pretty big PR team.

When I saw that they were looking for an intern, I thought “Ok. I have to apply.” And then they called me 20 minutes later, so it just worked out really well. At that point I had already graduated from university, so I wasn’t thrilled about being an intern again, but I had very little experience in PR.

I feel like sometimes you have to put your ego aside and do what’s best for your career. It was worth it; everything went well, the girls were amazing, Christian is amazing. His office was right next to us so it was a really special experience.

How did you get to where you are today?

I accidentally got here, but I’m happy that I did. I was never interested in fashion; I don’t care about what I wear or what designers make my clothes. I didn't know anything. I was getting my master’s degree in communication with a focus in digital work. I had no idea what I wanted to do, but I had to intern before I graduated. I sent out a lot of emails and when no one answered, I started to call the people I had already emailed.

One day, Premium Models Agency answered and said, "When can we meet?" It was like a dream. So I had the interview, and they told me, "Okay, you don't know anything about fashion, but we’re going to teach you.” I spent 6 months with Premium Models, and it turned out to be a really good internship, I loved what I did.

After that, I went back to school to finish my master’s degree, and I had to find another internship. I didn't know if I wanted to go back to a modeling agency or not. I was pretty open minded and was looking everywhere. Then Elite called. They wanted someone to work on their social media, so of course, I said yes. I stayed there as an intern for about 6 months.

One month before it ended, I went to the director’s office, and asked him, "Okay, my internship is ending, but I finished school, and I would love to stay here." He ended up offering me a full-time position as their social media manager, and I’m still there today.

So tell me a bit about how you got to where you are today.

I went to high school in Manhattan, not too far from where I work now actually.

Oh which one?

Elisabeth Irwin but most know it by Little Red. When you’re growing up in the city, or maybe because I went to a particularly artsy school, it felt like everyone's parents were artists, or musicians, or worked in fashion. So it felt like a very tangible industry, which I guess is a little ridiculous. At the end of high school, part of the curriculum was an internship, so I ended up interning at this agency that represents various photographers and makeup artists. But I was definitely more drawn to the journalism side of the industry. So when I went to Rutgers, I majored in English and Journalism and wrote for the school paper.

Then senior year I interned at WWD. It was definitely, as a lot of internships are, a monotonous position but I met a lot of cool girls whose interests matched mine and having the opportunity to go on set and to see all of that firsthand was definitely a good experience. During fashion week we would run the memory cards between the shows and our office. So we would go and meet all of the photographers at each show, which was pretty cool and I also managed to sneak into a lot of shows.

I was always pretty confident that I wanted to be on the journalism side of the industry but being open minded definitely helped as Mode PR ended up giving me my first full-time position. So right out of college, I became the accessories and swimwear account manager. I had like 8 accounts and no idea what I was doing but I went with it.

In the back of my mind I was like, "I'm a writer. I don't want to be writing pitches. I want to be interviewing designers. I want to be telling their stories." I ended up emailing the market editor at The Cut as I’d worked with her quite a bit at Mode. She got back to me and said, "Actually, we're relaunching the site, and we need some extra hands to help us with production if you want to come in, we can talk about that." So I did and ended up getting hired as a freelance producer. For an entire summer, day in and day out, I was pulling photos off of Getty Images, putting together these lookbooks, which now I oversee. Then September rolled around, and they needed extra help for fashion week, too. They overhauled the whole runway page, and we had galleries of each show from runway, to beauty, and we had to tag everything meticulously by trend.

They asked if I’d run production on the runway during the day, which is super intimidating because you're the one pushing things out live and if you mess up it's going to fall on you. But I was like, "Alright. I'll give it a shot." After that, I was kept on as a freelancer for a couple of years, working on a lot of slideshow building and photo research until finally my boss, Sally Holmes, was moving on. She went to Elle, where she still is. But right before, she sat me down and asked, "Hey, would you like to take my position as The Cut's fashion producer?" I was totally blindsided; I went into the meeting thinking that I was getting fired or something. And she was like, "Oh no! I'm leaving. And do you want my job?" And I was like, "Okay!"

So tell me about your background.

Well, I was born in Kuwait and grew up over there for most of my childhood until I was 18. I'm Lebanese, but I never lived in Lebanon. After graduating I moved to New York to go to The New School and went to Eugene Lang, which is the school for liberal arts. The first year I was there I was in New Media Culture Studies, but then I applied to the BA/BFA program, wanting to do a double major with Parsons for fashion design, which is also under The New School.

How was your time at Parsons?

It was a really good experience in terms of understanding my creative potential and just learning how to be a fashion designer from inspiration, to illustration, and then to execution. You essentially graduate from there and have the skills that it takes to be a designer. Since I was also studying culture studies, I did a few study abroad programs. I went to India, I lived with a Tibetan refugee family, and I studied Buddhism. I also went to Cambodia, and I studied Cambodian politics and worked in an orphanage over there for a while, sort of like as a program for my education.

That’s amazing.

It was the perfect combination of both of my passions. So when I graduated, I wanted to find a way to merge both passions because I didn't just want to do fashion design for the sake of making clothes for rich people. The fashion industry didn't really make sense to me in terms of the work that I wanted to spend my life doing.

Yeah totally, so what was next for you?

I decided to move to Lebanon because I'm Lebanese and I thought if I was going to work or get myself anywhere then, I thought it should be in the country that I'm from. There's so much work that needs to be done here, so I figured that I should come back.

You started at Lang, but you went into fashion after. Did you always know you wanted to go into fashion eventually or was it something that happened within your first couple of months in New York?

Well, not really. When I was younger, I always thought about it, but I never thought it would be something that I would actually pursue. I used to always rip apart my clothes and put it together in a different way but I never really thought like it was a possibility, you know what I mean? When I was at Eugene Lang, I decided I would build a portfolio to apply to Parsons. I realized, the access I had to fashion, and so that pushed me towards it.

So once you decided to go back to Beirut, how did Creative Space, develop after that?

I moved to Lebanon, and I started out working with a textile furniture company called Bokja. It was really nice, very creative and hands-on. At the same time, I was also working at an NGO, it was called United Lebanon Youth Program, and I was teaching pre-school. I realized I didn't want to pursue both my passions separately. I wanted to find a way to merge creativity and social justice. Some time after I was in New York visiting, and I was sitting with my professor from Parsons. She was a mentor of mine. Her name is Caroline, and I was sitting with her talking to her about all the things I wanted to do, but I didn't know how. I was just lost ... And then she just looked at me out of nowhere, and she said, "You know, why don't you start a free school?"

Wow..

As soon as she said that, it was the light bulb moment when I was like, "That's exactly it. That's exactly what I want to do." It's the merging of the 2 things that I love most: creativity and social justice. It was super challenging, but at the time, I was just so focused on something that I needed so I didn't care about the challenges. Caroline told me if I could make it happen then she would come and join to teach and help start the school with me.

How did things start to progress after that?

A friend of mine, Bessie, was working for Donna Karan at the time, and she said, "If you do this, then I'll donate fabric from Donna Karan." She had like 70 fabric rolls, and it was beautiful quality, something that we would have never been able just to buy. So at that point, I had the teacher, I had the fabric, and then I had to figure out how to find the students, where to get the space, and where to get the funds.

So how was that process?

At first when I went back I wanted to see if I could just join another NGO and basically include the program in an NGO that already exists, but after looking into it I realized that NGO’s had too many rules and obligations that I didn’t believe in.

I wanted to find 5 people that were super talented and very dedicated and passionate, but that didn't have the chance to pursue their education. I took the proposal to my father, and I told him what I wanted to do, and he said, "Okay, I'll fund the first 3 months, but after that, you have to figure it out." We had a 3 month pilot project where we found 5 students from different backgrounds, so there was Palestinian, Lebanese, and Armenian refugees. Caroline came to Lebanon, we got the donated fabric, and for 3 months we taught them how to design. At the end of those three months, they all made around 30 dresses. We sold the dresses, and we generated around $17,000, so we were able to take that $17,000 of initial seed money to continue.

That's amazing. How is the program set up now?

So Creative Space was founded in 2011 and today we’re a 3-year program. The school functions every day from Monday to Friday. Our students come from all over Lebanon, they're super talented, but they can't afford to pursue design education because it’s just so expensive. During the 3 years, we collaborate with different designers and teach different courses from illustration to theory for execution, to sewing, textile design, and pattern making. It’s very organic because we're so small and we only accept 3 to 5 students every year. We just had our first graduating class this past December. Each student created their own collection, and we presented it in a fashion show.

Tell me about how you found the first students. How did that selection process go, and how do you select the students now?

At the beginning it was difficult because I never lived in Lebanon before so I didn't know that many people. I just started asking around, and so I had to personally go and knock on people's doors. I would go to community centers, refugee camps, NGOs, orphanages, etc. I was just a 24 year old girl who had an idea and was going around telling people, "Okay, this is my idea. Would you join?" The thing that gave me credibility was the fact that I had Caroline from Parsons who was coming. She is originally Lebanese and has about 50 years of experience in the fashion industry. She's amazing. Essentially what I had to do is meet people, set them up on the idea and sort of gain their trust and then from there they would introduce me to people.

When you were developing the curriculum, did you keep in mind your time at Parsons and the American system?

Yes and no. A lot of the time what they do in university is they sort of compartmentalize the skills. For example, it’s like, this is the sewing class, this is the drawing class, which is 6 hours. They're very separate things but it’s not like that in real life when you’re a designer.

So the first 3 years at Parsons you're learning specific skills, and it's only the last year where you get to create your own collection. With our program, they’re creating from the start. It's much more organic, especially because we're not an actual institution or an actual school. After five years we're still not a registered school because we accept students that never graduated high school, and in order to be a registered school or a university, you have to at least have a high school degree. For us, we don't believe that that's important. What we're looking for is talent.

Tell me a little bit about how you got to where you are today.

Well I got my first camera at 14; at first I was shooting around here in Split, Croatia, where I grew up. When I started shooting, I immediately knew that it was something that I wanted to get into deeply. I entered the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp. I studied photography there where I lived for five years, that's how I learned about magazines and books and fashion, things like that.

So in your opinion, were your experiences in school paramount in your development as a photographer?

Not really actually. Maybe school just helped me with some technical stuff, but really the best thing about it was the access to connecting with fashion students, because it's really a fashion academy. The Royal Academy of Fine Arts is famous for its fashion department. Meeting and talking to those students was so valuable because it opened up my point of view on everything.

Starting off, do you want to give an overview of how you got to where you are today?

I went to Syracuse and studied advertising and minored in fashion communications, which covered everything from fashion advertising to magazine. Ever since I was little, I knew I wanted to be somewhere in fashion. I worshiped magazines.

In between my junior and senior year, I freelanced at Teen Vogue as a graphic designer, but I also got to assist on set. I became obsessed with the energy of it all, I got to help style a bit and also art direct, which was amazing and confirmed that that was what I wanted to do. So after senior year, I interned for Elizabeth Sulcer. Then in September of this year, she hired me as her assistant.

Oh, amazing.

Yeah, so it worked out well. I'm really happy at the moment.

How do you think you were able to stand out as an intern at Elizabeth?

It all just comes down to working really hard which sounds really simple, but I would always try to go the extra mile. It's definitely not a 9 to 5 job, with regular hours or regular tasks, so you have to learn how to be super flexible. Also, it’s important to always be thinking of new ideas and ways that you can contribute. I think if you’re always as helpful as possible then that will make you stand out. I was always putting 110% into that internship, and I think that is how I got to where I am now.

How did you get to where you are today?

I was in my last semester of university, and I was under quite a lot of academic pressure. I was in that kind of weird mentality where you're like, "I can't go out and have fun because I need to be studying," but I couldn’t study all the time, and I was going crazy sitting in the library, so I just started doing these drawings. Turns out I was much more creative than I allowed myself to be.

Then my sister's birthday was coming up, and I had no money to get her something, but I had these watercolors that were just sitting around. So I made her a book that was like this cautionary tale for turning 18. After I thought, “This is really fun!”

So I continued drawing, mostly little comic books or jokes and then fashion week came around, so I did some drawings responding to that because I thought, “This is so funny. People love to laugh at fashion, people in fashion love to laugh at it. Everyone loves to laugh.” Then that sort of became my routine: wake up, draw, library draw and then to bed. I have to say, it’s really what got me through school.

How do most of your collaborations come about?

People either DM or email me or contact my agents directly. Actually, I have a book coming out in April which initially started from a DM. This girl who is now my publisher, sent me a message with a picture of her business card in it to basically say “I’m not a weirdo, I’m legit.”

How did you go about developing your aesthetic?

I was talking about this with my mom the other day, and she was saying “Oh, you’ve always drawn this way. If you look through everything you’ve given me, it’s always been very linear, and you always like the black line” Which is interesting because I hadn’t even noticed. But yeah it’s always somewhat simplified and then I have a few staples, I like to draw the top quarter of a person, and I’m a huge fan of cheekbones.

Ooh, flattering!

Also, my sister and I were always encouraged to draw as our parents didn’t want us to buy them presents because they were like we could just buy it ourselves, draw something. So basically, drawing has always been a part of my life in one way or another. Recently I’ve been painting with acrylic, but that’s just for me. I definitely have a strong aesthetic preference.

So how did you get to where you are today?

I’m from Georgia and moved to New York to attend Parsons and major in Strategic Design and Management. During college, I picked up different types of internships. My last one was in Education + Professional Development at the CFDA and I ended up getting hired! This June it’ll be 2 years. So that’s my long story short!

When you first entered Parsons, did you have any idea of where you wanted to be?

I knew I was interested in fashion, but I had little knowledge about the industry and the kinds of jobs that existed. It was very black and white to me. I actually wanted to be a buyer. I feel like when you first go into the industry, you think, “I want to be a buyer, a merchandiser, in sales, or a designer.”

Do you think the Strategic Design and Management program at Parsons helped give you the tools to get you where you are today?

The great thing about Design and Management, like a lot of the majors at Parsons, is that it gives you a wider scope of the industry with an understanding of the different areas you could be involved in, and from there, it’s really up to you to take the classes that fulfill your own personal interests. For me, I turned towards the business side of the fashion industry.

Another great thing is that Parsons always pushes you to do a lot of internships. You can pretty much tell a Parsons resume, because they always have some 20 internships on them. The school prompts you to just jump right in.

How did you get to where you are today?

In college I worked closely with a talented photographer, Dikayl Rimmasch. He worked on lots of shoots, film and photo and we worked a bit together. One day he says, "Alex, you're organized. Can you produce this photoshoot for me?" I was excited but nervous, and in college, but took him up on the opportunity. Eventually he introduced me to film production, too.

After that, I worked for The Row, Intermix, and Escada, and from that, I realized that I wanted to be on the production side of the fashion industry. I went to college with someone who had been working at Eyesight and emailed her non-stop for an internship. The team there ended up really believing in me, and 3 years later I'm an employee and partner at the company.

Also trying out different areas of the field helped me understand what I liked and what I didn't like. By the time I got to Eyesight—my last internship—I had a strong idea of what I wanted to do.

When you first started college, did you have an idea of where you wanted to end up?

Not really, but I knew that I wanted to work in some element of fashion. In college, I studied economics and foreign language which gave me a strong foundation for whatever I wanted to pursue.

Can you give an overview of how you got to where you are today?

These days I’ve been running my own label since receiving the Newgen sponsorship for AW15. Since AW16 I’ve been showing my collections with presentations on schedule at LFW. On the side I often take on freelance work (in design, teaching and stylist assisting) to help fund myself. I also receive Swarovski sponsorship at the moment, so it’s really exciting to integrate crystals into my collections.

I also do animations, which my brother and I started making together at university. He was studying film, and I was doing fashion and stop-frame seemed like a fun and exciting way to illustrate a project that I was working on. At the time I was interning with Katie Hillier, and she loved the animation we had made and asked if we could make them for her forthcoming jewelry brand. So that’s how we got into making them for clients.

How was your time at Central Saint Martins?

I studied my BA at Brighton and my tutor Jane Shepherd recommended that I apply for the CSM MA for the Textiles pathway. It was the best decision I made because before then I always struggled a bit, and found pattern cutting very tricky. Once I began approaching design through textiles, I felt everything fall into place. I spent the whole first year experimenting loads, and learning a lot form my mistakes. The course taught me to recognize my strengths and edit my ideas to deliver a focused and refined outcome.

Who or what prepared you the most for the challenges and successes that you have faced in your career?

Having Louise Wilson as my MA course leader definitely prepared me in more ways than I could have imagined. She sets you up to be tough and rely on yourself and the design identity that you forge through the sheer hard work and focus whilst on the MA.

And your time at J.W. Anderson?

I worked with J. W. Anderson in my year out between BA and MA. My friend Mel was a pattern cutter there and got me on board. It was a great insight into how a small label starts out and runs itself, which gave me some of the knowledge that I needed to start my own label.

It’s really tough to start your own label and initially I was scared of it from seeing how stressful it was for Jonathan. I thought it would be mad to go it alone, but opportunities (Newgen in particular) came my way, and I’ve found myself here now!

Has the animation partnership helped the Sadie Williams brand and vice versa?

Yeah for sure. It’s a way to express my creativity using another outlet besides fashion design. I think the first time I recognized that it directly helped my brand was when I was approached by Mandi Lennard to design a collection for Barbie and she specifically asked if we could make an animation to accompany it too. Which is actually one of my favorites!

Did you have a plan on the best way of how to introduce your brand to the market?

Nope. I accepted several projects (Selfridges ‘Bright Young Things’, Barbie collaboration, & Other Stories collaboration) that came my way after graduating and this lead to my invitation to join Newgen and to, therefore, start my own label. I still really love working on collaborations and special projects if it suits me/my brand.

How are the Newgen community and your peers there?

It’s the best thing. I hands down would not have my own label without Newgen. It offers a support for the business side of things, and through it, I have made great friends with many of the other designers. Especially Marta Jakubowski who started at the same time as me. We’re now best mates and are constantly supporting each other in all sorts of ways.

Let’s start off with your experiences that lead you to become an editor at Into The Gloss. Internships? Northwestern? How was it?

I wasn't paid for the longest time. And I have opposing views in my own mind about whether that’s a good thing. Sometimes it's okay to do work for free, if you know what value you're getting out it—maybe there’s no money, but the byline is worth something. That said, not everyone can intern for free, and not everyone should intern for free. When I did I lived very frugally, I didn't pay rent, I lived with family. You make it work.

I think meeting a lot of people is really important and Northwestern allowed me to do that. Any time I came to New York, I looked up alumni, I set up coffee meetings with people who had experiences I wanted to replicate. And internships, to an extent, did too. Face time is so important—probably equally as important or more so than pure training and skill. Studying and writing and practicing were things I was obviously conscious of, but I don’t think I’d have my job had I not met a lot of people for coffee.

That's kind of how it is for me. I’m at Parson's and granted, I am so lucky to be there, but at the same time I’m learning 10 times more from the people that I meet. Who range from photographers to painters to musicians to designers. In the first year no one was separated by major yet, so just talking with those people and collaborating with those people ended up teaching me so much.

I definitely think that's a great way to look at it. I'm a big proponent of just emailing people, like guessing their email address and emailing them. That's how I got internships and that's how I get celebrity interviews for ITG to this day.

Was there an experience that directly correlated to where you are now, or that gave you some insight into where you wanted to be?

I had a really great experience at New York Magazine, because I got to do a lot of things. I was an editorial intern for print, so I was assisting the senior editors and the editor in chief predominantly. I worked a lot on the hard reporting, but the fashion assistant at the time was Amelia Diamond who's at...

Oh, Man Repeller!

She oversaw parts of the Wedding Issue and she needed help, so I volunteered. I honestly would just go up to her and talk to her and suddenly I was assisting on her shoots and I became very close with her. She left to go to Man Repeller while I was still interning and I took over her job for maybe a month until they hired someone full-time. I think what I learned from that was that busy people get the work done. There's some stat that student athletes in high school get better grades in season than out of season because when they're so busy they work more efficiently.

Now that you’re an editor at Into The Gloss, can you talk a little bit about the interview process for getting the position?

I graduated early so I could focus all of the third quarter on finding a job instead of juggling it with coursework. I emailed all the people I had worked with—it’s hard to know what to do when no one is hiring. But someone I knew from New York Magazine heard that Into The Gloss was looking for an editorial assistant and tipped me off. I emailed Nick at ITG and said who referred me, why I loved the site, and I sent them three pitches. Which I actually think is a really good idea. You shouldn't just say "Hey, looking for a job." You should be like "Hey, looking for a job, look how well I can do that job."

At first, he didn’t email back. I let a week go by and then email him again, figuring what’s the worst thing that could happen? On the second email he got back to me right away and was like "When can you come in?" We did a brief phone interview and he sent me this brief edit test. Maybe a week later, I came in, we got breakfast, and I met with five other people on the team, all in that one day. And then I didn't hear anything for two weeks.

I was freaking out because I got really good vibes from everyone. But hiring takes time—and people are busy. No one drops everything and just looks to hire someone. They’re juggling that with 15 other things. So I didn't hear anything for a while, and then they brought me in and I met with more people. They gave me another edit test, which they actually ended up publishing. Then I didn't hear anything again. That's when I started getting really anxious. So, I just started writing stories. I would email, "Hey, I have this idea for a story, here it is completely written in case you want to run it." And they published that one too! Finally, they wrote me up the offer. And I started as an editorial assistant two years ago in June 2014. Very different company back then than it is now. Which has been fun.

How so?

They hired me and I didn't know anything about Glossier. I came in on my first day and was like "What's going on with all these G label things." They're like "Oh, so we're launching products." And I was like “Oh, okay. That's new.”

We've grown a lot. My first day was also the first day of our COO. It's become much more of a company and we've also transitioned from being a niche media property to a true tech start-up.

So how did you get to where you are today?

I'm originally from Poland. My interest in fashion started very early, I remember I used to watch fashion TV at my grandparents place, especially the backstage footage from the shows. At first, I wanted to become a stylist, but after flipping through magazines, I started to become very interested in makeup. I found it super interesting how makeup could change your perceptions of a model and how powerful makeup really is.

So when I was 16, I went to my first makeup school in Poland, and then I set up my first makeup studio in my bedroom. I started doing my friends makeup, and then I actually got real clients. After that, I knew that’s what I wanted to do, so I found a makeup school in LA and that was all I thought about.

When I finished high school I went to Los Angeles. That was also when I became financially independent. I went to MKC Beauty Academy and I had my first real work experiences while I was there.

I came back for Christmas to my hometown in Poland, and then I decided to try Paris, as it seemed to be the best choice to work in the fashion industry, and still not too far from home!

It was so spontaneous because I just took a bus with my makeup kit. I didn't know anybody, and I didn't know the language. It was really a big adventure. I’ve been in Paris for 8 years already, and I'm living my dream :)

How did you get to where you are today?

I worked in the fashion industry in general at first after art school trying out styling and then PR before going into makeup as I’ve always loved beauty but didn’t really see it as a job option when I was younger. I think it’s different now with celebrity makeup artists and social media; there’s a lot more openness around it. I spent 3 years as the first assistant to Georgina Graham who really trained me before branching out on my own.

What was your role when assisting Georgina?

I assisted her with anything she needed, so working on shoots and shows both on set and also the prep work before it. Moodboards, research, kit prep, product research as well as being generally on hand when needed and a lot of traveling at the last minute.

*How did you know you were ready to branch out on your own?

I don’t think you ever stop learning so I could have kept going but I started to feel more confident in my own work, and that I had a solid base to start from. Georgina has always been incredibly supportive which gave me that extra push to take off the training wheels so to speak.

How did you get to where you are today?

I’m originally from Australia, grew up in the UK, and then went back to Australia to study fashion design at university. While I was at university, I’d always come back to the UK over breaks and intern for a production company. After I had graduated they offered me a job as a junior producer, so I started in that role and worked there for about 2 years. It was great because it gave me the fundamental tools for being an assistant. I learned how to stay organized, write strong emails, communicate effectively and be a good team player. I had an immense amount of respect for what they did, but I was never very passionate about becoming a producer.

Since I wanted to be in styling, I had to get out there myself and eventually start freelancing. One of the first jobs that I worked on was in New York with Poppy Kain. Which was cool because it was also my first time in New York.

How did it go?

Really well! But At the time Poppy had just left assisting Venetia Scott, so she didn’t need a full-time assistant. She ended up recommending me to another stylist, Stevie Westgarth, and I worked with him for about 6 months. Then I found a position with Gillian Wilkins, who was the fashion director at Russh Magazine at the time. I was with her for about 2 years.

Were you between Australia and the UK? or...

Just the UK because that’s where Gillian’s office was located which was a bit of a challenge when it came to communicating with PR’s. UK PR’s we could talk to all day but New York PR’s would open at 2pm and then with Australia you’d wake up in the middle of the night and answer emails at 4am. We would always be working on quite a few projects at once, which would add to the craziness.

Wow.

It was definitely a 24/7 job and pretty hectic. But I loved it. Then when Gillian moved to New York, we parted ways. It was good timing because I realized that by then I had learned everything that I needed from that position at that time. I feel like when you’re not progressing anymore and you feel like you can do that job with your eyes closed you know, it’s the right time to move on.

So then I started doing more freelance work, and later I became Julia Sarr Jamois’s first assistant at i-D. I was with her for about 8 months, before a job opportunity came up as the Junior Fashion Editor at The Violet Book, which is where I am now. I still do some freelance work with Julia, and just recently started working a lot with Tom Guinness. It was definitely a conscious decision to freelance only with people whose work I really admire. Right now I’m trying to do more of my own work and working towards identifying my own style.

Circling back to your position at Russh magazine in London. Can you go into detail about your role there?

My role on the masthead was Fashion Director's Assistant. But I basically worked as Gill's first assistant in addition to Russh work. I worked on all of her shoots, which included cover shoots, main fashion shoots and extra stories within an issue. I also worked with contributors that Gill would bring on board. Production was a part of my job as well, so it was good to have my previous production skills under my belt. Gill was Lucinda Chambers first at British Vogue years ago and still does a lot of work for international Vogue’s. So we’d always be working on editorials for them as well.

So your prior experience with production ended up benefiting you?

100%. It gave me the tools to be a better assistant. When interviewing I think it gave me a step ahead as well because people like to see that on a resume. The skills learned in production are invaluable for assisting creative people, especially because it’s all about organization and structure which teaches you how to be a good assistant. It’s also important to know how to treat people on set, and especially how to deal with people who can be a bit difficult.

People skills can be the most important to have.

Yeah, you really have to be aware of what you say and when. It’s definitely something you learn with experience over time when you’re assisting. It’s important to give the stylist and the photographer physical space on set to do their thing and bring their vision to the shoot. You have to step back and let them know you’re in their eye line but not in their way.

How was Russh’s company culture?

It was literally just Gill and I, so it was a bit tricky because I always felt the distance between the office and us. The office was in Australia, and we were so far away from there, so it’s really difficult to liaise with a company you work for that’s in a different country. It’s definitely tricky to not have the physical support of a whole team, but I was still happy in that environment. Working with different time zones was a struggle though, especially with PR’s, but it was lovely working together so closely. We became really good friends as a result of working like that.

Can you tell me about your role at i-D and how was it there?

Everybody at the i-D offices are amazing. Julia calls in a lot of samples, which can sometimes be challenging but so many PR’s are incredibly supportive because her work is amazing. That definitely makes the call in process easier. There was definitely quite a lot to juggle when it came to sample trafficking. But because of it I also got to do some incredible shoots with her. I went to Senegal in Africa for a shoot, which was unbelievable. It can go down in history as one of the best shoots that I have been on. Such an eye opening experience.

How so?

It was unbelievable. I flew with a crazy amount of suitcases and met Julia who was already out there with Harley Weir who shot the story. It was just a team of us 3 girls for the shoot. They had been shooting a feature with Grace Wales Bonner for 2 days prior so Grace was with us for a day or 2 in the beginning.

Oh, I love her.

She's the best. I've been working with her recently with Tom Guinness, who styles Grace’s shows.

What is it like to work with Tom?

He’s awesome. A really nice guy. I feel really lucky, because I jumped on board with Tom at the time that he started getting really busy and gaining a lot of momentum, shooting for magazines and teams that I really like and enjoy being a part of. He's the nicest man to work with. He's so chill and laid back and incredibly talented. It makes working in a sometimes hectic environment, so much more enjoyable. His eye is really unexpected and I like watching how he puts pieces together, in a way I would never even think to do. We worked on Grace's last show, which was so good, watching her work is amazing.

I first met her in Senegal with Harley and we shot a series with Grace's graduate collection on wrestlers in Senegal right before we shot another story there as well. There were these unbelievably beautiful men; really burly men in Grace's graduate collection wrestling in this incredible pink lake in Dakar. It's pink because of the amount of salt that's in it.

So how did you get here?

I moved here in 2012 and started interning for Gus Romero, who’s mostly a commercial stylist. I didn't really know what I was doing. I just started cold emailing. I was looking at fashion internships online. Even on Craigslist where I ran into that stylist and he was really great in my evolution, and he taught me a lot of things. I eventually became his first assistant. This was while I was in school, so I was multitasking. I would assist him and then go to school from 7:00 pm to 10:00 pm everyday. After that, I got a little bored, so I started interning at V and that taught me how to work at a magazine in a professional environment with other people and not just one stylist. That was a really huge part of me getting into this industry. From V, I started freelancing more. I still worked with Gus but I was working with other people too because a huge part of being a stylist or being a stylist’s assistant is word of mouth and who you know and friends of friends because people always need help.

Then Chris Bartley from V introduced me to CR. I was here [as a fashion intern] for about three months, and I really excelled here, and I built a really good relationship with Ben, and we stayed in touch, and he helped me get freelance positions at Harper's Bazaar, which was also a good experience. After CR I kept freelancing with other stylists and just doing my own thing.

Also throughout this whole time I was styling my own stories every time I had the chance. Then, Ben called me one day and said, "Do you want to work at CR?" I did. Now I'm here.

How did you make yourself stand out at CR as an intern?

It's weird because I had a lot of experience before I interned at CR. I was being paid to assist people on sets, so I was already working professionally in the industry. I was just here because I loved the magazine so much and believed in what the magazine stood for and I admired Carine. I think that showed a lot. My experience showed and my knowledge of who Carine is and what her aesthetic is, really showed. Also, I'm really fast. It's kind of a joke to Ben when I have a thousand things to do; I'm really good at getting them done. When I have one thing to do for the day I'm so slow at getting it done because I love being busy. Also back then there was no market team. We had 4 less employees, so it was all hands on deck. Everyone had to help pack. I'd be here until 11:00 pm sometimes. I'd skip class. Not that you should skip class but I did to help and be on set and be a part of it, and people noticed that. Especially Ben and he really appreciated it. He always kept me in mind. I guess that's kind of how I stood out because I was just always so available and always so willing to be helpful.

So how did you get to where you are today?

I have a background in Spanish linguistics, and then I moved to art history and lived in Spain for a bit. After I came back to Amsterdam and started working at an art gallery, which I loved, but I missed fashion.

So I started studying fashion design in a really theoretical way while I was getting my masters. I ended up getting an internship at Vogue Netherlands for production, so something completely different. That's producing fashion shoots and helping the fashion producer with everything. After two months the assistant of the editor in chief left, so I got to fill in her position. Then last year the position of Digital Editor was available, so I grabbed that opportunity, and I just moved up in the company. I got really lucky.

Yeah, that's amazing. When you were assisting the editor in chief, what was your day to day?

It was really just assisting her in her every need, her agenda, her appointments. I also was assisting the whole editorial team in their tasks.

How did you get to where you are today?

I studied fashion at Blanche MacDonald Center in Vancouver, Canada. It was a 12-month diploma program. During the course I developed a great relationship with one of the professors who was really inspiring to me. His name is Tyler Udall, he’s the fashion director at Blanche, and he had previously worked in London as a fashion editor at Dazed and AnOther Man. I pretty much knew that I wanted to move to London after I graduated – I really wanted to experience the fashion world in one of the major cities, so London was perfect. So I applied for a UK visa and moved almost as soon as I graduated. I was so lucky to have met Tyler, he’s really the reason I’m here in the first place, he shared his experience, was very encouraging, and connected me with a few key people.

Once I arrived, one of the people that I emailed shared some of her contacts with me as well - basically a lot of styling assistants and stylists, and one of them got back to me. It was Katie Shillingford's assistant. She just said, "Yeah. Come in for an interview. I actually need a new intern." So I did and then she took me on as her intern for 3 months.

That experience was invaluable, funnily enough, because I realized that I didn’t want to be a stylist, which I think is something that you can only learn from experiencing it. But also I learned so much in such a short space of time. It was really hard work and people could be tough, which is to be expected at a magazine like AnOther. But I think I just realized that I was a lot more interested in the whole picture, rather than specifically the clothing. I loved doing research and helping to inform some of the ideas and direction.

After that I got an internship under the Art and Fashion Director at Mario Testino's studio which was completely different than AnOther Magazine.

He has a beautiful studio in West London. It was incredible and I learned so much. The woman I was interning for was nice, yet tough, and very talented and I respected her a lot. The roles within the company are more definitive, and it's a lot more structured than the work environment that you would find at a magazine. I was in the art department, so my role was assisting with research, casting, and sending out internal newsletters to people in the company informing them of what was going on in the fashion industry and, more generally, in the world.

How big is the company?

It's pretty large actually, because he has a studio called Mario Testino +, which does art direction, production, finances, everything. All together it's a 3-story building with around 30 people.

Oh wow.

It was good to see the level that they work at. Everything is pristine and perfect. Every morning the whole team would have a meeting. “What are you up to?” “How can I help you?” Kind of thing.

That was a 4-month internship, and near the end I wasn’t really sure where to go from there. Then Katie Shillingford's assistant that I had interned for messaged me, "I'm leaving. Are you interested in potentially taking over as her assistant?" At first, I didn't respond for a day or two, and I was thinking no way - I couldn’t see myself being an assistant when I didn’t even want to be a stylist, but I spoke to my mom, of course, and my friends, and I knew that it could really be an amazing opportunity to be a part of the magazine as more than an intern, and to work with those people at such a high level. So I went for it. I did a trial run for 2 months and at the end, she asked me to be her assistant.

Was the old assistant there during your trial?

Yeah, it was a really busy time for Katie so together we prepped like 5 shoots within 2 weeks, if I remember correctly. Then I prepped one shoot totally solo, and it went really well.

Which one?

It was on location outside of Brussels with Pierre Debusschere. I didn’t go on set, but I confirmed all the samples, coordinated with PR people to organize their arrival in Brussels, and then handled the returns.

It went really well and I think she was impressed. After that she was like “Okay, let's do this.”

Can you give an overview of how you got to where you are today?

I came to London almost nine years ago after I studied fashion design in Sydney. I planned to come over for just a few years because Australia felt pretty isolated and London seemed exciting and the place to be. I first interned for the designer Roksanda Ilincic, doing sample cutting and working in the studio, followed by internships at Dazed and Confused and Vogue.

From there, I got offered an assistant position in the London office of Turkish Vogue, which had just launched. I was the Assistant to the Fashion Director for nearly two years, traveling between London and the office in Istanbul as well as travelling a lot for all the shoots. It was full on, a 24/7 job, but very exciting shooting with photographers I’d always admired like Mert & Marcus, Demarchelier, Sarah Moon and Maripol.

After I assisted stylists on a freelance basis while gradually, more and more I started to do my own thing – test shoots and small, independent magazines. One of my biggest projects is the magazine Off Black that I work on with my friends which is now on it’s 5th print issue and stocked globally.

So how did you get to where you are today?

At first, I wanted to become a fashion designer because I didn't know what else you could do in the fashion industry. Then I learned that I was more interested in images and that I didn’t want to work in a design studio, so I decided to pursue a career in styling.

I moved to Paris seven years ago for the fashion school Studio Berçot. Then I started interning at Marie-Amelie Sauveé and she ended up hiring me.

What was your role there?

I was her personal assistant, and I also assisted her on sets all over Europe. It was really interesting because I was with her every day, so I got to learn a lot. I also did a ton of image research.

Then you went on to Self Service?

Yeah I was the fashion market editor.

I was basically the person that was between the advertisers and the stylists. I worked with the stylists to give them the least amount of credits to do as possible. Then I would always check in with the stylists to make sure that they could get the samples that they wanted.

That was my main position but because the team was so small I was doing much more than that. I was finding artists that the magazine could collaborate with, working on some other projects that the magazine had on the side, and I was also doing all of the styling for the website.

How did you get to where you are today?

I was born in Texas, raised in Atlanta. I went to a small college in South Georgia, and my major was psychology. I think I knew all along I was a creative person but I think that growing up in the south you don’t have a lot of creativity around you, so I just picked psychology. My senior year in college I was like, “Alright I’m going to follow my dream, do what I want to do” so I moved home with my mom. Saved money for a year and a half, moved to New York and then started interning at Opening Ceremony. I did a styling and production internship, and I just worked my way up. Now I’m a studio coordinator/producer there.

So how did you land that job?

I did a styling and production internship at OC, and when it was finished they did not have any positions open on the production team, but they did have a position for office manager. So I took it knowing that my plan was to move back over to production. I helped the studio/production team out as much as I could to stay involved. I worked my way up from there. My current position did not exist before but as the needs of the company grew and things within our team changed, and the role was created for me. I saw what needed to be done on our team, so I made it happen, and that is how I am where I am today.

Do you think studying psychology had an impact on your career?

Yeah, definitely. I feel like I am who I am because I studied psychology. I think that I’m just naturally a people person. I just watch how people interact so I just get vibes how people are. I am able to approach them in a way that they will respond well to; I know how to talk to people and engage with them.