How to become a fashion designer and where to start

If you have a desire to become a fashion designer, then this is already a clear sign that you have some kind of ability. If you have already noticed that you are interested in creating, watching the trends that appear every season, going shopping, dressing your husband and / or children, close friends and girlfriends, then you should try to become a fashion designer.

If, for example, you studied at university for some other profession and still think that you want to become a fashion designer, then this is certainly possible! We have many examples of people who have never studied at the institutes on any creative specialties, and now they work as fashion designers. Some of them opened their own brand, while others went to work for the company.

Possible ways to become a fashion designer:

1) Get a second higher education

One of these clear paths, if you already have some kind of higher education, you can get a second higher education in the specialty “Fashion Design”. Age is not important in this case. You don’t have to be 20 years old to get a second degree. As a result, after such studying, you will already start looking for a job.

2) Take online courses

Another way is you can complete online fashion design courses. Courses at the Italian School of Fashion and Style provide a good base for you to understand what is going on in this profession. We tell you step by step what comes next and how to create a collection. The course “Fashion designer” is taught by Yulia Kulakova. She graduated with a degree in fashion design.

“Since I am a practicing designer, there has not been a single day that I have not worked in my specialty. I’m getting better at it all the time.”

This is a very good indicator that we provide real knowledge that is necessary when working as a fashion designer. Because while studying at the university, Julia did not receive the knowledge that she gives in the course.

The downside of the first path (going to university) is that university has more abstract learning; there are a lot of teachers who have nothing to do with the reality of this profession.

“They let you draw abstract pictures, and you draw huge tablets with insane collections…”

Now education at the university in this specialty is becoming more and more practical than at the time when Yulia studied, but nevertheless, there is still a lack of realism in teaching, and especially in provincial cities.

For example, there are practicing teachers at the Higher School of Economics, but there are definitely no such teachers in the provinces. Therefore, at the university you will most likely learn to draw, feel the composition, you will have a sense of harmony, but it will be difficult for you to apply the acquired knowledge.

Training on the online course includes all the important stages of creating a collection, which the designer goes through over and over again when creating any collection, even a small capsule.

“When I am called as a guest designer, or I just work for a brand, I always make a collection along the path that I talk about in our course.”

3) Self-study

The third way to become a fashion designer is self-study.

“You know, it’s like a puppy that can’t swim, you throw it into the water, and in the end it had to swim.

When you really want to be a fashion designer, you throw yourself into it all and start making clothes, facing a bunch of mistakes. Gradually, maybe after 2-3 years, an understanding of the scheme that I talk about in the course comes. But you do everything on your own. This path is also good, but it takes longer.”

In Yulia’s opinion, our online course “Fashion Designer” is a large concentrated training program that will allow you to immerse yourself in this profession and learn as much as possible about it.