Here is the final designer in our Graduate Showcase Week series which includes interviews with 60 recent graduates to find out how they are progressing since their studies ended. London College of Fashion’s Ellie Sweeney graduated earlier this month having studied BA: Fashion Design Technology, Surface Textiles.
Sum up what you do? What makes your work different?
My work is highly experimental. I like to contrast materials such as silks and velvets with unconventional materials like foam and latex and use craft inspired techniques to create innovate fabrics.
What are you currently doing since graduation?
Im currently in the limbo stage after producing my collection and being on a high and running off adrenalin to being free and wanting to chill in the sun but worried that if i do i wont find a job!
What were the most positive aspects of your course?
The freedom to be experimental and the amount of machinery we have access to. I’m going to miss the embroidery room and the technicians.
What aspects of your course – if any – could be improved and in what way?
I would have loved the opportunity to do a placement year.
Many individuals working in the industry bypassed university and learnt on the job via assisting, etc. What are your views on this?
I think work experience teaches you the reality of the fashion industry that working in your university bubble can not.
Do you think that your particular course provided the essential skills needed to further you into your career of choice?
I’ve got to say that I’ve become a real geek about textile machinery without even realising! The course introduces you to so many machines and techniques. I feel ready to get going.
What are your views on internships and how have your experiences as an intern shaped this opinion? What about unpaid internships?
I have done quite a few internships but working at Fannie Schiavoni was my first internship and I liked it that much I stayed for almost 2 years, whilst juggling uni, and was studio manager. I learnt so much that i didn’t even realise I had to learn like how to take orders and what line sheets were! Yes it wasn’t paid, but I didn’t care because the experiences and opportunities I was given were fab! I worked at both London and Paris fashion weeks, worked on showpieces for Florence and the Machine and got to work with Vogue Korea.
In the ideal world what would be a dream position for you?
I would love to work in the textile department of a bigger brand researching and sourcing new materials and techniques being experimental and creating exciting textiles. To work for Prada would be awesome but who wouldn’t want to work for Prada!
Looking back now you have graduated, do you have any regrets and what would you have done differently?
No I don’t regret anything, I’m really glad I studied where I did.
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To see the other graduates we have interviewed visit here
