ARTS THREAD Connecting Students to Creative Employment

Alex Brownless is interested in seeing students get ahead. A recruiter for international agency Aquent for twenty years who studied textiles at college, and began his career at WGSN, found himself constantly fielding requests about emerging talent. “Sometimes it’s like looking for a needle in a haystack when companies are seeking new designers,” he says. “But it shouldn’t be so hard.”

So, Alex responded to the crisis. Along with the ex-CEO of Hearst Europe who was also the chairman of London’s Graduate Fashion Week, Alex created ARTS THREAD, an online platform designed to bridge the gulf between graduates and industry. This unique digital resource allows students to upload their portfolios for free and interested employers to contact the student directly. The site operates across all areas of design––fashion, textile, jewelry, product and interior–– with students from hundreds of schools as far apart as Pratt to Nottingham Trent to RMIT in Melbourne, and it counts among its clients Nike, BBC, Urban Outfitters, Hermès, and Levi’s. Schools can also upload their course data and information to reach potential future students. “It’s free marketing for both the school and the student,” says Alex.

“I owe education everything”

“I owe education everything,” he explains when I ask what motivates him. “If it had not been for my brilliant educators back in the University of Derby, I wouldn’t be sitting before you today, and probably would never have ended up in fashion. And although it’s true that cream rises to the top, sometimes the cream goes off due to missed opportunities and not being in the right place at the right time. ARTS THREAD allows students from anywhere to be in the running. It levels the playing field and no matter where you are you can see the standard from other schools and compete. It’s very democratic in that way.”

This leads Alex onto an issue he speaks passionately about:

“I’m not an advocate for the current trend of league tables for schools. Schools with less money or less marketing might have great students but they can get overlooked, and each year it’s a different group of students that make up the graduating class so how can you standardize that? Smaller but very worthy schools can be damaged by these top schools lists. It can’t always be about money, because if everyone had that mindset, there’d only be a few schools on the planet and everyone would produce the same portfolios. Also parents can’t always afford the big London or NYC schools but they feel pressurized to do the best for their child. They think the school closer to home won’t do but the fact is their student can flourish there also. You can be sitting in Ohio having your portfolio viewed by a Manhattan company.”

Alex has just returned from speaking to the students at Tel Aviv’s Shenkar University. ARTS THREAD also liaises with industry leaders, to run contests offering financial rewards and mentorships for the winners, the most recent involved a denim competition set by Levi’s. He has also established links with approximately twenty Italian manufacturers, who produce for Prada and Fendi among others, and are keen to align themselves with the designers of tomorrow thus keeping alive the country’s under-threat manufacturing trsdition. Through ARTS THREAD, top graduates with a few years experience in industry, interested in launching their own company can avail themselves of access to high quality factories with appropriate pricing for their start-up business, and avenues to retail.

“It’s not about short-term gain,” say Alex. “It’s about helping students realize their dream without taking advantage of them which unfortunately is what often happens in today’s industry.” He hopes to eventually offer online workshops and boot camps that run complimentary with what schools currently provide, and with a particular focus on sustainability. “Everything must be very holistic, very democratic, that’s what the site is about. It’s all quite philanthropic, really.”

By contributing guest editor Jackie Mallon, who is on the teaching faculty of several NYC fashion programmes and is the author of Silk for the Feed Dogs, a novel set in the international fashion industry.

Images from portfolios on Artthread.com of Paola De Andrea Gutierrez, Seokwoon Yoon, Beth Ivory, Emma O’Halloran