I recently returned from Milan, where we were recording 2 new video courses as part of the stylistic training for our Italian Fashion and Style School.
While recording the video tutorials, the Italian stylists shared with me their observations about the fashion world in Italy and how you can build a career in the fashion business.
I propose to look at fashion in Milan from the inside through the eyes of Italians, who work there.
Fashion stylist: How does one build a career in Milan?
Stylist-personal shopper
In the fashion world in Italy, it is believed that a stylist goes through several stages in his career. The first stage is a personal stylist, image consultant or personal shopper. At this stage the stylist has enough knowledge and skills of coloring, visual correction of figure, stylistics, basics of fashion business, skills of closet making and knowledge of the main season fashion trends. This is enough to advise clients on style and make their closet. On the one hand, this is the basic step without which the stylist can not move forward, but at the same time it is not yet a fashion business. Fashion stylist in the course of his work continues to consult individual clients, only if he needs an additional income. Most stylists move on in their careers.
Stylist in design companies
The next more advanced stage is the work of a Fashion stylist with designers and design companies. And it is at this stage we can say that the stylist enters the world of real fashion. Here the stylist is involved in filming and creating catalogs, lookbooks, advertising campaigns of clothing collections. Also, the stylist thinks up sets of clothes and works with models during the shows of collections. The stylist works on projects as a freelancer and is not on the staff of the design company. This is because the stylist can look at the collection from the outside and give fresh ideas about how clothes can be presented to clients. It is a bad sign if a clothing manufacturer uses its in-house designers or stylists to create catalogs and lookbooks. In parallel at this stage the stylist makes portfolios for models, personal portfolios for actors, singers, can also work as a stylist for TV channels, for commercials and video clips.
Stylist for fashion magazines
A higher step is the work in fashion magazines, when the stylist works on shoots with photographers, celebrities and models, making still life looks for magazines. It is at this stage there is an opportunity to create creative work, and that is why this is one of the most interesting areas of work in fashion. Few stylists come to this stage, because here the stylist must in addition to other things know the skills of fashion photography, know about the process of filming, be able to select models and select their style, know the basics of graphic programs and the basics of makeup.
Curiously, a stylist working for fashion magazines in Milan is considered more professional than a stylist working for designer companies. To some extent, this is due to the fact that, for example, shooting a catalog for a designer is more technical work than creative: the stylist does not have to create a mood board or look for things for the shoot. Well-known magazines like Vogue Italia and Elle prefer to work with the same photographers and stylists, but in most other design companies and magazines there is a tendency lately: periodically change teams of creative employees, so there is always a possibility to get a job.
However, the main income a fashion stylist receives, working in clothing companies or with personal clients. You would be surprised, but fashion magazines for filming stylists are paid little or nothing at all. It is believed that if your name is on the pages of Elle Italy, for example, it’s good publicity for you, which you should be happy about without payment. To some extent this is true. Many design companies look at sessions in fashion magazines and if they like a certain stylist, they contact him and agree on a job. For example: for 1 shooting day in an Italian magazine stylist are paid 100-200 euros, and when creating a lookbook designer 1000-2000 euros.
How does a stylist get into the world of fashion in Milan?
It’s no secret that fashion is a world of creative, very creative and unusual people. In this world, there is simply no such thing as a gray workday. That is why so many people would like to work in fashion. How to get there?
In Milan, the main negotiations and looking for work in the fashion business happen through friends and acquaintances, which you get during the shows, after parties, press days, and shoots. Very rarely does someone look for a stylist through an ad in a newspaper or on a website. In the fashion world everyone more or less knows each other and offers each other work at such parties. The aspiring fashion stylist must constantly attend fashion events and create a network of his contacts, both with magazines, with showrooms, and with designers, photographers or makeup artists. He must also constantly participate in shoots and add to his portfolio. At first these shoots will be test shoots, when everyone (including the photographer, model or makeup artist) is working for free. Then, if the stylist does a good job, his stylist begins to be invited to the shoots by modeling agencies, photographers and magazines. If you are economically oriented at the beginning of your career, then the fashion world will disappoint you – this is the rule that is constantly talked about in Milan.
Although getting into and working in the fashion world in Milan is difficult enough, there is one big exception. If you are talented and do really interesting projects, both magazines and designers will definitely want to work with you. And it won’t really matter here whether you have friends or not. The problem of the fashion world in Milan is that there are a lot of talented and creative people. And with the crisis, when the number of job offers is less than the number of people who want to work, only the most talented and creative get jobs.
When I talked to Italian fashion stylists, many of them told me that the fashion world is not like a fairy tale, as some people imagine it: sometimes you work day and night at shows or shoots, clients are not always satisfied with the results, it is not always easy to find new projects, not always your creative ideas can be realized, there are difficulties in establishing contacts with magazines and showrooms, the need for constant learning and practice. Still, in my opinion, they’re a little deceitful. Briefing about a restaurant shoot, negotiating a future job at a fashion party, working as a team in a studio with creative people, the opportunity to come up with and implement creative ideas – it all seems so interesting!
And in comparison with the daily monotonous office work at the desk and computer with tables, numbers and piles of papers doesn’t such a job in fashion look if not fabulous, then absolutely unbanal and not boring?