Nishi Selva

A post I’ve wanted to write for a while and I don’t mean to toot my own horn, but I genuinely don’t know anyone better equipped to speak on it, than from my own very messy, not easy winding path of an experience.

Firstly, a little background about me, so you know you’re in the right place.

I went to a school that didn’t really push you to do anything outside of going to a red brick university and studying something like Law or Medicine which I knew was just not for me. The school was very much about following a straight path, rather than doing something a little more outside the box or creative so I never knew those were posibilties.

I studied Business at uni, which I absolutely loved, but I didn’t know which direction I wanted to go in when i finished.

So, I waitressed for another three years after uni. I also, in this time, had a few marketing opportunities come through that I took, I did some freelance blog writing for a fashion brand but what was truely the most pivitol point is when a friend who did fashion at uni wanted me to help her with a project.

I modelled for her uni project, and I absolutely did NOT love it as it was an outdoor photoshoot and minus something degrees in the middle of December.

However, this made me realise I wanted to work in fashion and that was that.

I already knew that if I wanted to work in fashion in the UK, it was either London or Manchester, and the type of brand you want to work for is quite different in both those cities. I’ve never been a fan of London, so I just knew Manchester was where I was going to be, and I was going to figure it out once I got here.

To work in fashion without a fashion degree, getting your first job in fashion is not easy. Anyone I know who has been in the same boat would tell you the same thing.

So now you know a bit about my past, let me tell you how I got my first job in fashion, some tips, what I think would help to know.

Get as much experience as you can

So first things first, yes, a degree in fashion would help, but if you don’t have that, the second best thing to do is get as much experience as possible. Doing free work is so common at the start (even though I don’t fully agree with free work), but it gives you the right experience, and it shows potential employers that you know and understand certain parts of the industry that you couldn’t learn in any other way. Fashion is known for being tough, and I think this is why it’s so important to get experience anyway, just for yourself to really understand what you are signing up for!

I did a variety of freelance roles as well as free work, whether that’s styling, creative direction, blog writing, teaching myself skills, like starting my own YouTube channel where I learnt video editing, or during COVID when I taught myself Photoshop so that I could make cool mood boards. Even though my purpose wasn’t to get a job in fashion, all those things helped.

I think that’s also something that’s really important to remember. You don’t necessarily have to be doing something thinking, “this is going to get me a job in fashion.” If you’re interested in something, just do it, because you never know how useful it might be later.

Work out what area of fashion you actually want to work in

One of the biggest mistakes I made was not knowing what kind of job I wanted in fashion. I was applying for everything and anything because I just knew I wanted to work in the industry. And now I look back, it makes sense why I didn’t get replies to some jobs, because they do quite often require you to go to uni, for example merchandising and buying, or design or atleast have some sort of formal experince.

Whereas some other areas like e-commerce and marketing, you might not necessarily need formal qualifications. I do know people who work in buying and merchandising who also didn’t have formal education, but it is rare, from what I’ve seen. Obviously, shoot your shot, but I just knew I didn’t have that kind of background, so that wasn’t necessarily the type of job that I was getting replies for (and thank god because now i know I would have hated it!).

So my advice would be to do some research, understand what different jobs are and what they entail, because you could save yourself a lot of time. I really wish I’d done this before I started applying for absolutely everything.

Make your CV stand out

Secondly, I remember seeing my friend who worked in fashion’s CV when I worked with her, and I remember her CV being colourful and having a picture of her. It just looked so different to anything I’d ever been taught to do. I’d only ever seen CVs that were black and white and boring. So this was unusual to me, but I definitely took it on board.

If you’re trying to get a creative job, not just fashion, having a creative CV does help.

If you are trying to go into finance, IT, anything like that in fashion, I would follow the same route as you would for those types of roles. For everything else, it is a very competitive market, and you want to stand out, so having a creative CV definitely helps.

How do I know it works? At first, when I was applying for jobs in fashion, I would use my creative CV for some jobs and then I would use my normal black-and-white CV for other, and guess which one got a better response rate?

Build a creative portfolio

Something I’ve only recently started working on, I would say in the last two years, is my creative portfolio. I have no idea how I got this far in my career without doing a portfolio. It was always things I spoke about in interviews, and no one ever asked me for one. However, in this day and age, especially in the last two years, whenever I’ve been interviewing, there hasn’t been an interview where I’ve not been asked for my portfolio.

You can use Canva templates, or you can make one from scratch, but this is definitely not a step I would skip. You want to show that you’re creative through your CV and portfolio, not just through what you’ve done, but also through how you present it. The way your portfolio and CV are designed and laid out can say a lot about you, especially if you’re trying to get a job in design or marketing.

Do extra things because you’re interested in them

To get my first job in fashion, it took a lot of applying for jobs. I can’t even tell you how many jobs I applied for, and the reason I got my job was because of extra projects I did on my own, not for money, but just because I was interested. I think that shows a certain level of dedication and passion, especially when you don’t have the traditional background.

My first job in fashion was in marketing, specifically influencer marketing, and I never realised how much I knew about influencers till I was in the interview. It is something that I’ve always just gravitated towards without knowing but I think I found it cringe at some point because that’s how taboo it was back then. But once I was in an interview, the things I knew and the things I was saying, I really knew my stuff, and I didn’t know how important and valuable that was till i needed it.

Put the extra hours in

I had to do a presentation for my first job, and I spent hours on this presentation. I remember coming home from my waitressing job and spending literally every waking moment to make it happen, and I’m so proud of myself for doing that, and I definitely think it paid off. You have to remember your first job will be the hardest to get, so I would definitely recommend putting in that extra effort.

Once you’ve got that first job in the industry, you have something to build from.You can talk about what you’ve done, you can put it on your CV, you can add it to your portfolio, and suddenly you’re not trying to convince someone that you could do the job, you’ve actually done it. So if you’re at that stage where you’re applying for your first job and you’re thinking, “I don’t know what else I can do,” sometimes it is just about putting in those extra hours and showing how much you actually want it.

Invest in LinkedIn

I also think something else I feel like I did too late was invest in LinkedIn. You might get lucky, but if you want the best opportunities, a LinkedIn profile that also shows parts of your work is so important.

And I don’t just mean having your job title and where you work. Show parts of your work, talk about projects you’ve worked on, share things you’re proud of and show what you’re actually doing. You want someone to be able to go onto your LinkedIn and understand who you are and what you do without having to dig around for it.

Don’t forget about the numbers

My last piece of advice is even if you’re applying for creative jobs, it’s really good to have knowledge of other aspects, like even if it’s creative, knowing your numbers, knowing statistics, knowing how to show results, how to look at data is so important, and I think this is something a lot of people forget.

Being creative is obviously important, but being able to say, “this is what I did and this is what happened because of it” is just as valuable. If you worked on a project, know what the results were. Did engagement increase? Did sales increase? Did your reach grow? Whatever it is, learn how to measure it and learn how to communicate it because employers love to see this!

Make connections

Having connections in the fashion industry is also really important, but don’t worry if you don’t have any, because it takes effort and time to make them, but you definitely can. I would look for fashion opportunities in your area, and if it’s not fashion, maybe look for specific ones to what kind of job you want to do.

So if you want to work in marketing, look for marketing networking events, and if it’s something creative, there’s a lot of creative events, or get involved in as many creative projects as possible, and that really helps as well. You don’t need to know someone important to start networking. You just need to start talking to people and putting yourself in places where other people in the industry are.

Be prepared to get your hands dirty

I promise you, getting that first job in fashion will be the hardest, but after that, it does get easier, in my opinion. I think if you want to work in fashion, also be prepared for that first job to be very Devil Wears Prada type job.

It can be quite full-on coming in at a lower level, as you are, as fashion is so hands-on. It does require you to do a lot of the nitty-gritty jobs, and across the board in every job I’ve had, I’ve always seen the people who have just started in the industry do get the nitty-gritty jobs.

At the time, I hated having to do it. I remember my first job in marketing in fashion, on my first day they had me go fold clothes in a cold warehouse, and it was just not what I was expecting and it was horrible. However, as I worked my way up and I’ve had people under me, when I had to give them not-fun jobs, I always make a point to let them know that it will build character in the industry and it will always be useful.

You will learn so much by doing these nitty-gritty tasks. So be prepared for it. It will be worth it. It might not feel great at the time, but you’ll look back and realise you actually learnt a lot from those experiences.

Final thoughts

If you want to work in fashion, I hope this has helped you understand that not having a fashion degree doesn’t mean you can’t get into the industry. It might mean you have to take a slightly different route, and you might have to work a bit harder to prove yourself at the beginning, but it is definitely possible.

For me, it was a mixture of getting as much experience as I could, doing things because I was genuinely interested in them, teaching myself skills, making myself stand out and eventually figuring out what area of fashion I actually wanted to work in. A lot of the things I did before getting my first job didn’t necessarily feel like they were going to lead anywhere at the time, but they all ended up helping me in some way.

If you have any questions about anything I’ve spoken about, feel free to message me. I’m always happy to answer if I can. Good luck, and I really hope you get that first job!

Love Nishi x