Do you think your experience with your parents helped sharpen your eye for becoming an editor?
I’ve always been a selector, an editor. I became a picker for my parents and loved the process of picking the right piece and got goosebumps when I got to the flea. That’s fashion editing. You have to look at hundreds of fashion shows and thousands of clothes to find out what is best for the person you are wearing or what you want to move forward with.
Do you have any advice for someone currently pursuing a career in the fashion industry?
Keep going longer than you think is necessary. I teach her a little class at FIT and whenever I speak I can see what she calls 15%. Overlooking the sea of 100 people, about 15 people are excited, serious and excited about the road to success in the fashion business. It may sound dated, but pay your dues, stay in it, and stay focused on your profession. But try to weave it in and listen to what your heart says, a lot of people think he needs to make 100k in his first year out of school I think, but that’s not the goal. If you chase money, you will never succeed. So think of it as what you want to do. I still like to organize my socks by color and have noticed that little things help them look better in photos. It’s not laborious, it helps the process. I really think you have to prove yourself from day one. If you want to impress fashion people, they just have to get on with it.
What has been the biggest change in fashion since the advent of social media and this digital world we live in now?
I think it helped the whole fashion culture. Now everyone can see everything. I remember when GQ.com was just launching. We had maybe six hours of meetings about whether or not we should show runway clothes. They wanted something to talk about at the bar and they wanted to talk about designers. Our numbers were off the charts when we started posting the runway online. Social media is a masterclass for everyone. People know their favorite lanes. When it comes to fashion, we’ve brought it to the forefront of the world. Stepping into democratic Price Point stores, consumers can see the influence of high fashion. I hope people understand that you can’t have a piece that looks good. Before social media, fashion used to be considered more of a snob, but now it’s more relatable. It has become a thing.