Lydia

Here she talks about getting insight into the industry, but also why she chose the degree course at Goldsmiths, and what it’s like to live in South-East London.

Industry placement

I was working with a dress designer, at a studio at the Truman Brewery. Her company is called Grace Lane London, and she has two sides to the business. The first side is bespoke bridal wear, and the second side is celebrity alterations and costume design. She's got a really, really great background and experience working with all kinds of costume houses and designers. And then she's kind of branched off herself in the last couple of years and splits her time between doing the bridalwear and working with TV and film. 

I would do two to three days in the studio with her a week, and one to two days at home, depending on what was going on that week. So I had to do a minimum of six weeks, and I ended up doing about nine weeks, just because I was happy to carry on and we had both had time available.

In my initial meeting with her, we set up a six-week project for me to design and make a bespoke wedding dress to go in her vintage collection that she was doing this season. And then, alongside that, she would invite me and thread in different kind of things that she was doing each week. If she had a particular project on one week that meant going fabric sourcing, she would then take me along to that. So I had the project running to make sure that I was developing my technical skills and actually had something out of the placement, but also week to week she was introducing different opportunities as they arose for me to kind of jump onto and be involved with. 

It worked really well actually. It meant that I knew where I had to be each week and I had something to work towards, but I was getting little tasters of the industry as well. It was just a really nice kind of combination of things. It was eye-opening to see the nuts and bolts of the business – her making sure that she’s got work coming in every week and how she manages her time.

The technical side was really important because that's what I was doing my placement for. But I do have opportunities at university to focus on the technical side of things. So besides that, just being able to see the way that she runs her business and how she's gone and got the experience from having her degree, finding experience, working with different designers and costume houses. And then developing where she sits within the industry and finding what she enjoys, what she doesn't enjoy. She has to make sure she's got enough money coming in to cover her rent and things like that. So, it was eye-opening to see – her making sure that she's got work coming in every week, how she manages her time.

And she also introduced me to a few people she works with. There's another designer/maker who she works with, as well as stylists – so that was a great introduction as well. 

I definitely felt that, because we built up a relationship, that she valued my opinion. She would ask me my opinion on things, which was very nice, and it meant that I felt that I could discuss my work and how I would maybe progress into my third year with her, and she was very happy for me to continue speaking to her about that and kind of float ideas past her and get another opinion on it all.

Experience of different areas of design

The reason I chose the course at Goldsmiths was that you get to try everything, and kind of pick what you want.

If there's something you're particularly interested in, and you want to do it enough, the design course at Goldsmiths will support you in it. And so that's why I chose the course in the first place because I wasn't ready to specialise and I didn't know what I wanted to specialise in. And that’s probably still the case now! I'm not sure if I'm ready to pick something and stick with it for the rest of my career. What I really like about the Goldsmiths course is that you've got a really strong academic side to it as well. As someone who is comfortable in the educational and academic side of things, to have that and it not just to be all an aesthetic focus was what I really liked as well. So, I feel that the conceptual side of the Goldsmiths course has really pushed my practice and I've still got potential to hone in on a specialism.

Gaining insight from the years above

One of the main parts of the three-year design course I really enjoyed was working with the people above. Just having a guide to contact. The last term of our first year is spent working with the third years, helping them complete their degree show, which is really useful. I'm still in touch with the third year that I worked with. So last year when I was getting my portfolio together ready to approach people for my placement, I got in contact with my third year who had done this the year before and asked her, ‘Could you look over my portfolio for me? How did you start approaching people? Have you got any contacts that would be good for me to get in contact with?’ And so, having that extra person who's got experience of the course and knows exactly the position that you're in – but is also a step away from it – was so useful.

In our second year, when we're getting ready for our placement module, we have two weeks of lectures and seminars where they bring in students that have graduated in the last couple of years to talk about where they've gone with their practice just after finishing uni. Whether they might be working for someone else or they've decided to go freelance. So, they bring back people to talk about their practice, and also other professionals in the field. It's nice because you can kind of think, ‘Well, my practice is kind of similar to theirs, but it's not exactly the same and they've done this with it. And then this person, their practice isn't like mine, but also I like the way that they've taken their transferable skills and fit into this career’. So, you can visualise where you could potentially go after. And it's nice having that in the second year so that you can move into your third year with that potential in your mind already.

Living and studying in London

For me, Goldsmiths has been the perfect route into living in London. I don't think I would have been able to cope with living in central London. I'm from Crewe in Cheshire. So, I went to school in a tiny little village just outside of Crewe, called Nantwich.

It was the course at Goldsmiths that brought me to London. My design teacher at school – I did graphic design – he said to me: ‘If you don't go to London now you're going to have to move there after you've finished studying'. Because, obviously, the design hub is in London and you kind of need to be here to make contacts and network. 

I lived in the halls down in Camberwell in my first year. At the moment I live just by Telegraph Hill Park. It's still got that residential, safe feeling - you're not right in the city but you're only a stone's throw away from it, which is nice.

Being in New Cross, and being just 10 minutes away from London Bridge, has been really great because it means I've got the option to be in the hustle and bustle but also retreating back to this area.

There's a really nice community feel around here. There's a market on Saturday mornings, that's quite nice. There are always things going on at the Hill Café. It is a really lovely community feeling.