What does a career as a fashion designer entail?
According to the U.S. Department of Labor, about one quarter of fashion designers are self-employed. This means that they have their own labels and sell designs to stores, work as freelance designers for high-profile clients, or run their own boutiques. The highest concentrations of fashion designers are in New York and California (where the field grew by 36.4% between 1998 and 2008), but if we’ve learned anything from Project Runway, it’s that great fashion design can happen anywhere. Many other fashion designers are employed by individual clients or by retail establishments. What does a fashion designer do? Put most simply, a fashion designer creates clothing and accessories. Everything you wear, from jeans to ball gowns, earrings and shoes are dreamt up by fashion designers. Fashion designers are also responsible for designing accessories that wouldn’t immediately come to mind, like luggage and iPod skins. Project Runway’s Santino has designed boxes for Camel cigarettes, and Chloe D
