Freelance Fashion Designer's Handbook

CHAPTER 1

The Reality of Life as a Designer

Note: This book is written by a freelance designer living and working in England; laws etc may be different in other areas of the UK and in other countries.

1 Will freelance work be suitable for you?

The advantages of working for yourself as a freelance fashion designer may seem very attractive. This is a competitive market and the final decision needs to be considered very carefully while taking into account any advantages and disadvantages. It could be the perfect career path for some, but would be unsuitable for others.

During our working lives, the only thing that we can be sure of is that our situations will change. Designers may be single, married, divorced or have children that they want to spend more time with. All these personal situations will influence each designer’s career and choices. They could be affected by changes in a current job, by redundancy or by being unable to find suitable full-time or part-time work. Any of these circumstances could be the trigger to consider working on a freelance basis. On the other hand, it may well be that it is a choice that is made freely and feels right. Leaving a secure, well-paid job to pursue a freelance path can be daunting. Only you can make the final decision.

I have been working as a freelance designer for over 20 years. I decided to become freelance when I moved to a new location. Speaking from personal experience, there is nothing I would rather do. I love my work and it gives me a great deal of pleasure and satisfaction, I would not swap it for the world. I have been fortunate enough to work with some wonderful people and on some very exciting and interesting projects that I would never have had the opportunity to do if I were in full-time employment. The freelance lifestyle does suit my rather ‘erratic’ personality. I have experienced difficult times and numerous problems but these can be experienced in any working environment. For me the pluses by far outweigh the minuses.

Nina Faresin left full time employment to become freelance:

I think one of the most important things to remember is that, when you work for yourself, you need to be prepared to take on a multitude of roles. Being a good designer is not enough to make a good freelancer. Having worked for a large company for many years with resources all around, it was a bit of a shock to the system to suddenly have to become my own IT department, fabric technologist, garment technologist and sales, marketing and accounts departments. Freelancing means drawing on all your previous experience and bringing all of your skills together to provide a good service for your customer. Use your network of contacts to guide you with the parts of the job you feel less confident about and be prepared to pay for services or training to support you as a business.

Wendy Burns of Wendy Burns Designs Ltd prefers freelancing to full-time employment:

I have worked as freelancer longer than in regular employment. I don’t think there is anything better than having flexibility and variation in my work. Company politics no longer exist and if work patterns vary I can work at the weekend and take time off during the week. This is great for family life!

Marianne Smink is Dutch and has worked as a freelance fashion designer in both Holland and the UK. She moved from Utrecht, Holland seven years ago and now lives and works in London. The case study gives you her opinion on the differences between working in the Netherlands and working in London.

Case study: Working in The Netherlands and London

London, being a metropolis, is a very inspiring place for creatives; hence it attracts many artistic people from all around the world. The competition when looking for work as a freelance fashion designer is huge. Compared to the situation in the Netherlands, there are very many more design jobs advertised and also loads of agencies offering jobs. The first impression is therefore that it shouldn’t be too hard to find work; however, this is deceptive as the number of high-profile people looking for work is even higher. In the Netherlands, I was signed up with three agencies (this was almost all of them) who helped me to find assignments. If I got a phone call from one of them, asking if I was interested in a particular project, there was about a 90% chance that it would be offered to me; in the UK, the chances are probably closer to 10%. In London, if I apply for a potential assignment, there is still a fair chance I won’t even be invited for an interview. If I get to that stage, the chances are still high that the assignment will be given to another designer, so the quality of competition in the UK is higher and payment is lower. It’s difficult to compare pounds to Euros since the value fluctuates, but when I left Holland in 2004, I was on a daily rate of €320; here I had to go down to £200 per day.

Another difference is specialising in a particular area. In the Netherlands, you’re expected to be able to do everything including the design of the garment (men’s, women’s and children’s; sports, casual, smart, etc.), print design, labels, etc. In London, it is the opposite; you are expected to have a specialism, for example ‘prints’ or ‘sportswear for women’. If you say you can do it all, you are not convincing. People believe that you can only be really good if you focus on a small area. Another difficulty is that there are not many Dutch brands known here. Even if you can show work you’ve done for a certain brand, the companies here are hesitant. London-based brands easily feel that they are different from mainland Europe.

The other way around is a very different experience. If you have worked for London-based brands, it gives your portfolio in the Netherlands more value. London is seen as a highly fashionable place and if you have worked there, it must mean you are good.

My personal opinion is somewhere in between. I find London a very inspiring place and there are too many interesting places to go, things to see and do. In the Netherlands, it is a bit more of an effort to find inspiring places or things to do, especially outside the main cities, Amsterdam, Rotterdam or The Hague. I do agree that if you manage to find assignments in the UK, it does say something about the quality of your work, since it’s not easy to obtain work. On the other hand there are, just like in the Netherlands, very many companies in the UK who are very commercial, where it actually is more important to be diverse rather than highly creative and specialised. There are also a few highly creative and interesting brands in the Netherlands, just like the UK. Dutch people tend to be very down to earth and being ‘all precious’ about your creativity doesn’t get you very far. At the end of the day your designs have to sell and the taste of an average person is rather mainstream.

Things to consider

There are important questions to ask yourself. It would be useful to make a ‘for’ list and an ‘against’ list to confirm to yourself that this really is the correct choice for you. You may need to consider that if freelance work is not right for you now, it could be in the future. If you are the type of person who relies on their monthly pay packet and are in the red at the end of the month this is not a sensible decision for you. You will need to be very careful with your money and often frugal. This is not a suitable job or way of life for a person who is very ‘set in their ways’, disorganised or needs constant company.

If you are a student fresh from college or university, it would be advisable to try to gain some industrial experience if at all possible before considering becoming freelance.

Heather Benhrima of Kasbah considers that the most important qualities and skills when employing a freelance designer are:

• Trust – You need to be able to trust the designer’s instincts and sometimes be persuaded that their idea is better than yours.
• Organisational skills – A designer needs to be organised and able to follow strict timetables.
• Flexibility – A designer needs to fit in with my timetable, if possible.
• Pattern-cutting skills – This is so important to me and, I think, for most designers.
• The ability to put an outfit together from ‘scratch’ is invaluable.

Heather says:

I expect a certain level of commitment and involvement from my designer and an ability to see the design through to a perfect sample. I have had three different experiences with freelance designers. The first two designers just thought that their job was to do a few line drawings, fill in some measurements and send me the bill. This is not good value for money and for someone like me a waste of time. It took about two seasons for my freelance designer and I to settle well into our working relationship and to understand one another. Our personalities are quite different and I found my new designer’s organised and well-structured working methods an excellent foil to my quite chaotic mindset. We worked well together and, although there were a few sticky moments over the years, we settled into a very good professional and also friendly relationship.

Advantages of working freelance

To work as a freelance designer you need to be adaptable, open-minded and have the ability to get on well with others. You also need to be self-motivated, hard working, self-disciplined and above all very organised and happy to work completely alone for most of the time.

Items on your ‘for’...