Fashion Careers

Are you in the know about the current fashion trends? Do you have an eye for style? Do you have the drive and desire to turn your passion into a profitable and rewarding career? A career in the fashion industry may be the right path for you!

Many are attracted to pursue a career in the fashion industry due to lucrative income opportunities. Aside from that, the idea that you can succeed on your own motivates aspirants even more. As a matter of fact, about one-third of professional fashion designers are self-employed.

In general, fashion designer professionals have innate artistic and creative qualities. They use their creative gifts and artistic talents to create unique design concepts for various fashion applications. Today, fashion designer professionals are in demand in a variety of industries. Since there is a constant demand for fashion designers specializing in a particular field, most of the aspirants focus their talent in one specialized fashion area like interior designing, merchandise displays, clothing/apparel, theatre sets and many more.

In order to become an efficient fashion designer, you have to take note of these three important things:

• The primary needs of the client
• The focal point of the design
• The design's appeal to customers/consumers

You have to always equip yourself with fresh and new ideas since market and fashion trends are constantly changing.

Currently, there are a number of fashion design careers available. Some of the popular fashion design careers that you should consider are as follows:

• Visual Merchandise Designers: They are mainly responsible for designing window displays, arranging store merchandise, creating props and accents, organizing clothing placement, styling mannequins, and spearheading marketing campaigns.
• Fashion Designers: Those working as fashion designer professionals are typically tasked to create designs for clothing and apparels. Some work with popular fashion designers while others are managing their own fashion labels.
• Set Designer: As the name implies, set designers are primarily assigned to conceptualize designs needed for movies, television sets and theatre productions. Their styles and designs must always be in line with what the script or the director requires. Some set designers produce unique set design for trade shows and museums.
• Interior Designer: The main goal of interior designers is to perfectly combine form with function. Their primary function is to introduce interior concepts that will increase the beauty, safety and functionality of a particular space or area. Interior designers work in a variety of settings including retail stores, residential homes, offices, hospitals, hotels, and many more.

Training, Education, and Advancement

Educational requirement for different fashion design careers vary greatly. But, bear in mind that school is not the only requirement that you need to satisfy in order to land good job offers. Although educational background is a deciding factor for employers, applicants must also possesses good qualities in order to be efficient with their jobs. A good fashion designer would have a keen eye for detail, exceptional creative talent, superb artistic skills, and great determination.

A fashion designer aspirant must earn at least an Associate degree in order to get an entry level position. That being said, it is a must that you acquire formal training from reputable fashion designer schools. You also have to choose the right fashion designer programs that will help hone your skills and talents.

Those who want to pursue higher paying fashion designer positions should pursue a 4-year Bachelor degree program. Applicants who have earned a Bachelor degree will have more chances of locating greater-paying fashion design careers. Pursuing advanced fashion degrees will expose you to more extensive fashion trainings and more rigorous fashion design curriculums. Fashion designer aspirants who enroll in 4-year course programs will acquire additional skills in marketing, advertising, business, liberal arts, management, and many others.

Fashion designer aspirants must develop unique skill sets, good sense of style and exceptional creative qualities in order to gain the competitive edge. Participation in internship programs and working in entry level fashion designer positions will earn you the necessary experience you need to pursue advanced fashion design careers.

Job Outlook

More fashion designer jobs will continue to flourish due to the consistent need for skilled and qualified fashion designer professionals. That being said, competition will become more intense. Aspiring fashion designers should prove themselves by showing their capabilities and hidden potentials.

Those who want to stand out must satisfy higher educational degrees and should possess ingenuity and persistence. Among the different fashion designer careers, those who specialized in graphic design are projected to have higher employment growth rate. There will also be a continuous demand for interior and industrial designers. Meanwhile, visual merchandisers will just have a natural turnover due to the need to fill in soon-to-be vacant positions.

Fashion Salary

Income rate of various fashion design careers fall in different salary ranges. But majority of fashion designer professionals earn a median annual salary of around $35,000 to $75,000. Other fashion design professions receive the following annual income range:

• Graphic Designers: $20,000 to $65,000
• Interior designers: $21,000 to $71,000
• Merchandise Displayers: $15,000 to $40,000
• Set designers: $18,000 to $63,000

As professionals gain more experience, they will attract better job offers. Meanwhile, entry-level fashion designers still have higher salary rates as compared to other professions.

With formal schooling, more relevant experiences, distinct skills, and specialized trainings, fashion designer professionals will have better chances of finding more lucrative job opportunities!

As with any career, the best way to start a new career on the right foot is to get an education. A degree in Fashion Design or Fashion Merchandising can get your foot in the door of one of the many fabulous career opportunities in the rapidly growing fashion industry. Whether you are interested in fashion design production, marketing and merchandising, fashion media and promotions, or any other type of fashion career, a degree will help you learn the skills necessary to bloom in the fashion industry. Read on to see what fashion careers are available to you!

Fashion Design Production Fashion Designer Accessories Designer Fashion Merchandiser Fashion Sales Rep Showroom Sales Rep Product Manager Clothing Patternmaker Pattern Grader

Fashion Marketing/Merchandising Fashion Buyer Fashion Coordinator Retail Merchandiser Visual Merchandiser Retail Store Manager Boutique Owner

Fashion Media & Promotions Fashion Writer Fashion Stylist Fashion PR Specialist Fashion Editor Fashion Illustrator Graphic Designer Fashion Photographer

Other Fashion Careers Costume Designer Personal Stylist Model

Fashion Design Production

Fashion and accessory designers use their knowledge of design principles, techniques, and tools to create sketches and models of original garments, shoes, handbags and other fashion accessories. They often specialize in a particular facet of clothing design, such as men's, women's, children's wear, or lingerie. While some fashion designers control the entire design and marketing process, others use the services of patternmakers to create original textiles and trimmings, production managers to oversee the actual creation of the fashion line, and fashion merchandisers to introduce and establish the designs in the fashion marketplace.

Fashion Marketing/Merchandising

Fashion marketing and merchandising professionals are responsible for identifying and creating fashion trends to sell the products created by fashion designers. Drawing on their knowledge of consumer psychology and trends, they promote fashion with advertising and visual marketing campaigns. The fashion merchandising field includes jobs in both retail and wholesale sales.

Fashion Media & Promotions

The fashion industry offers a number of opportunities for creative professionals who aren't attracted to the design side. Fashion writers and editors are employed by newspapers, magazines, web sites, and other media outlets to keep consumers up-to-date on style trends. Fashion photographs, illustrators, and stylists are often employed by catalogs and magazines.

Other Fashion Careers

Other fashion career opportunities include costume design for TV, film and theater productions; personal stylist positions with high-end department stores and private clients, and modeling work for everything from newspapers ads to strutting the catwalk in Milan or Paris.

~IIFT