There are lots of different things for you to do before you start applying for Fashion Design Jobs.

It could be a short course, an apprenticeship, a degree or simply by making and customising pieces yourself.

You could, and perhaps should, be doing that right now!

It's not something you have to have committed to straight out of school either.

Both Ellen and Steve agree that there are lots of ways you can prepare yourself for fashion design jobs; in fact, both of them went through that process in some way shape and form before securing positions in Cardiff.

One thing is very clear though...

You must be passionate about fashion.

Steve Says

The first step is to be enthusiastic about fashion.

And there are lots of different ways you can do that... Making and customizing stuff yourself for instance.

Steve's pathway into fashion was through education.

I think that's a really good pathway for most people who are looking at understanding fashion, not just from a structural perspective, but from a consortial perspective as well.

He suggests a course, whether it be a short course, a hobby course, or obvious advice from a lecturer, a university course and do a degree in fashion design.

Getting Into Fashion

For me, I had interesting clothing from a very young age, used to dress up in old stuff and make stuff for toys, Action Man, that kind of stuff.

When I went to college the last two years of my high school, I didn't really know what to do, so I majored in arts and ceramics and legal studies and all those really diverse things, and once I left, I didn't really know where to go from there. I studied education.

I studied nursing. I did lots of different things like that. But running all the way through, that was just this love of dressing up and wanting to be different and unique and liking the way that fashion can have an immediate impact on both myself and my mood but also the way that people saw me.

I enrolled in a fashion course.

Steve was a mature student and jokes, not psychologically mature!

As part of the course, he got to do some really exciting work placements and was able, along with his partner in Corr Blimey, to show work at Fashion Week in Australia.

That really made a big difference to how I saw the industry.

It was more than just clothes. It actually has a really big impact on people's lives.

Ellen Says

Ellen echoes a lot of what Steve advises.

1. There are lots of different pathways
2. Passion

It doesn't have to be just going to university and doing a degree.

Being interested in what you're doing for a start.

Having a passion for knowing how things are made... a passion for making things better.

If you didn't already know, the fashion industry is the 2nd largest producer of waste in the World.

Everybody knows that the world isn't going to last much longer if we carry on the way that we're going, and trying to find a solution to that problem.

Ellen believes the next generation of designers has to be doing something different with diversity and sustainability.

Those are two big things that are actually coming through in the fashion industry right now.

In fact, it's something that's starting to show through in students' work.

Ellen says that students are seeing the industry changing and that it's influencing designs and thought processes.

This definitely rang true when Rich spent a whole day in Cardiff listening to their pitches.