I began my internship on Tuesday at Absence of Paper (AoP) and was thrown straight into the deep end! I was nervous on my journey into London, not quite sure what to expect and willing the train ride to fly by, so that I could begin the next chapter of my career development.
The brand itself works to create luxury and unique white shirts of women, something that currently no other brand sole does.
It was great to see a familiar face when I arrived and was greeted by Cristina, who had interviewed me earlier on in the year. Straight away we went up to the studio and after a quick briefing on the current working status of the brand, I was set a task and went to work! My brief for the day was to help in the creation of an embroidery design. I had free reign to work on whichever software I was most comfortable with, so choose Illustrator, pleased that I already had a good knowledge on how to use this software. I was frustrated with myself to begin with, not remembering where to find some of the tools that I needed and getting keyboard shortcuts muddled up, but I pushed through this and soon everything that I needed began to come back to me. I enjoyed working on the digital designs and it was good to be having constant feedback from head office regarding the options that I was sending to them. I really enjoyed being able to work independently straight away and the task gave me a real insight into how the industry can make snap decisions and changes based on what is presented to them.
The next day was a completely different working day and I spent a large portion of it travelling around London. Instead of going into the studio in the morning, I headed straight over to Goldhawk Road on a mission to hunt down a specific fabric, matching it to the swatch I’d been given. I was pleased that it was an area that I knew, so was quick to find the correct fabric shops and felt comfortable browsing through the rolls of different fabric. One thing that pushed me outside of my comfort zone was asking the shop assistants for help and being assertive in ensuring that they were offering me to correct fabric, rather than a lower quality replica. In the end, I liked that I had this opportunity to be pushed to do something that I would normally be less comfortable with and I feel it has helped my confidence. Later on that day I went out again to fulfil more errands, travelling across London to do so. I was lucky to be given the task of going over to London Trimmings, with a list of items to look for. I was overwhelmed walking in and seeing shelving up to the warehouse roof, each stocked with every type of trimming, zip, button and more than I could imagine. I didn’t know that London Trimmings existed before then, but now that I do, it will definitely be a place that I go when I need to source any of my own trimmings.
Alongside running errands that day, I also got to be hands on with some sewing. It was only basic sewing with attaching buttons but it was good practice. I was shown a new way to sew on the buttons meaning that I didn’t have to tie any knots and the cotton tail was hidden in the material. It was good to learn a new technique and this is definitely one that I will be using in the future!
On Thursday we received samples back from the factory, meaning that my next job over the coming days was to complete QC checks. I was unsure what I was doing with this to begin with, but after going over the first one with my boss, I was able to see how it worked and exactly what to look out for. The more I did the easier I found it and I slowly got quicker at inputting the data into the amendment files. This is something that I had never really thought about doing, but I now understand why it’s such an important part of the development process.
My first week has definitely been an eventful and busy week! But I couldn’t have wanted a better start to my internship! I enjoyed being able to take on such a broad range of tasks, as it kept the week interesting and the time flew by! I have learnt so much in such a short space of time and it has made me more excited as to what I am going to learn over the coming months.
Comentários