The Fashion System Is Failing New Designers and Talent

Having success in fashion today feels like trying to build a pyramid — one made not just of ideas, but of people, money, structure, and timing. Over the years, I’ve learned that fashion is no longer an industry for the introverts. Maybe in the early ’90s, you could be a silent genius like Martin Margiela, and the work would eventually speak for itself. Someone would discover you.

Not anymore. In today’s chaotic, algorithmic reality — where attention spans vanish and new brands launch daily — emerging designers are expected to do it all. You need vision, yes, but you also need strategy. And that starts with management skills. From the very beginning. Because whether you’re applying to jobs, freelancing, or launching your own label, one thing is certain: no one is coming to save you.

Fashion schools still sell the dream of creativity. Sketchbooks, moodboards, craftsmanship technique, and the adrenaline of show prep — that’s the fantasy most students buy into. And to some extent, it's still true: the creative process is and should be the heartbeat of fashion. But what most students aren't prepared for is how little of their future career will be spent inside that creative bubble. 

In recent years, some of the best fashion institutions and colleges have started to include modules on entrepreneurship, branding, or production pipelines along with actual collaborations between fashion design and management students, but they're mostly theoretical or surface-level, or tacked on at the very end. It's sometimes not enough. A crash course in Excel in your final semester won’t prepare you for negotiating with manufacturers or managing invoices. It won’t help you build a team or understand why your dream job never even calls you back.

The reality is that fashion design students are often trained as artists but pushed into an industry that demands the mindset of a project manager, and the transition can be very brutal. There's no soft landing after getting a fashion design degree — only the realization that passion isn’t currency, and creativity without strategy rarely survives.

Most design programs still separate “creativity” from “commerce,” as if the two are enemies. But for today’s designer survival, they’re inseparable. Ignoring the business side doesn’t preserve the purity of the work — it makes it easier for others to exploit it. 

The graduation of fashion design used to feel like a beginning, but for many fashion students, it’s more like hitting a wall at full speed.

There’s a certain romance to starting your own label straight out of school. You leave school with a portfolio you’ve poured your soul into, only to realize that almost no one asks for it. You send it out anyway, again and again, into black holes of “info@” email addresses, getting no replies or maybe automatic rejections. You’re told to build a social media presence, but no one explains how to make that translate into paid work. You try posting your process, hoping someone will notice. No one does — or worse, the wrong people do, and they steal your ideas (yes, it happens a lot).

At some point, as a fashion designer, you take a job that’s only loosely related to fashion — maybe visual merchandising, maybe retail, maybe something entirely outside the field. It’s supposed to be temporary. But time passes. The dream starts to fade into the background as rent, bills, and burnout take over. Many designers quietly let go of the idea of launching their own brand. Not because they lack talent, but because they were never shown what it would realistically take to survive (let alone thrive) in an industry that has become addicted to just watching the same historical brands over and over.

But is the real problem just money?

Sometimes, with luck or a grant (like the ones awarded during Milan’s Camera Moda events or the one awarded byL'Oréal to one of BA CSM’s students), that dream of being a full-time fashion designer becomes a reality for some. But even when money is available, it’s rarely the full solution.

The hardest part is often everything that comes after the initial launch: gaining traction, building a real customer base, and staying visible without a massive marketing budget. Many young designers find themselves doing product development, logistics, digital content, and influencer outreach — all at once — just to stay relevant. It’s not just about making great clothes; it’s about being seen and being shared and in the right spaces by the right people.

And yet, with all the right skills, many emerging brands struggle — not because they’re not business-savvy, but because there’s also the largest portion of the system that still favors scale, celebrity, and spectacle. If you don’t believe me, just ask yourself why is it more relevant for some fashion media to talk about why Kylie Jenner commented on a TikTok to give details on her boob job surgery? 

Many fashion media and people who have big platforms that could amplify new voices often don’t, and that’s another part of the problem. Coverage is dictated by algorithms, ad budgets, and social capital. There are designers today making incredible, thoughtful work — cooler than many big brands — but they go ignored simply because they can’t pay for visibility. The saddest part? The consumer base that might support them is also overwhelmed — and broke. In a time of recession and burnout, even the most promising small labels are fighting an uphill battle. 

So when a young designer wins a grant or gets that first big opportunity, the question isn’t just “Can they afford to produce a collection?” It’s: “Will the system even give them a chance to be seen?”