Fashion Meets Confusion
We live in a diverse multi-cultural country where communication issues may arise, even more so in today’s society. I have experienced this first hand over the past decade or so working in the Fashion industry. I have had the opportunity to work through many diverse and sometimes difficult situations. These situations have helped mold me into becoming a more diverse and accepting individual.
One of my most recent and frustrating situations I have encountered happened just this summer at a multi Designer fashion photo-shoot. After completing the collection development course at SLCC Fashion Institute back in May 2013. We as a class thought it would be a good experience to organize our own fashion photo-shoot order to showcase our hard work in our portfolios. This small class was made up of ten student designers ranging in age, gender, ethnicity, religious backgrounds, sexual preference, social class and work experience. This diversity in the class made for some interested communication defects throughout this experience in a whole.
Julie, one of my friends in the class and I headed up the event and organized most of the details including; model lineup, venue, and photographers prior to the shoot. We held meetings, delegated jobs and hosted hundreds of emails and phone calls regarding logistics of the day to come.
Just days before the photo-shoot one of the girls (the youngest of the group) had dropped out of the show via a brief text message. We had assigned her the responsibility of finding hairstylist and makeup artists now of whom we needed to find replacements for. Julie and I had worked hours making arrangements, holding meetings, ironing out details and scheduling the advent. And now we were to be the new hair and makeup girls too. We had dedicated so much time and talent to this photo-shoot and were exited to get some great pictures of our collections.
The day of the photo-shoot was chaotic from the begging. We arrived at hair and makeup and all the models were already there. Julie had emailed them specific arrive times according to their photo shoot times, but their designers told them to come earlier. We had 40 inpatient models and only 5 stylists. We had assigned a girl to bring some of the product for the hair; she is from Korea and is learning English still. She was over an hour late and had brought the wrong bobby pins and cotton swabs. The instructions got lost in translation. This made the hair outcome change. Each Designer had communicated what they had envisioned for hair and makeup on a poster board we would go over it with them and then use our best to complete their look. One designer asked for a smoky look, she didn’t care what colors so Julie did dark plum and purple. The designer came back around and stated that purple was the only color she did not want, something she left out in her communication. We had to redo her make up.
I had found the perfect venue up in Midway a split location where we could all get the photos we desired. We had partnered with four photographers who had scouted our location before we had arrived. As soon as I got to our fist location we divided up the designers and had them start shooting.
Two of the designers were from another country and had perceived the hair and make-up different but had not communicated it during the make-up proses because of the formality of their language. They did not want to step in or create conflict. They felt more comfortable with me because of our friendship and did state the changes they wanted after the fact to me. I quickly got to work making the necessary changes. This set our photo-shoot back some.
In their culture they also don’t have a strong concept of time and often get lost in the work. Every Designer was aloud one to two hours for the shoot. We all were to have latest five models so we could quickly achieve our desired photos in a timely matter. One of the designers decided to go off location; she told no one and did neglect to bring her phone. She only had two models and had planned on shooting all seven looks. Her photo-shoot went over two hours and we had no idea where they were. The photographer’s phone had died so we had no communication. This was here first photo-shoot and she had not anticipated it taking as long. The photographer was also new to fashion photography and they had completely lost track of time as well. Cutting into Julie's set time.
The tension was building as the day went on and Julie and I were starting to get concerned. We were losing day light and our shoot had not started yet. I had designed a tween line for kids’ ages 7-13 years old and my models where left to roam the grounds as I helped with photo styling of the mom and tot photo-shoot. I had brought most of the props for designer’s shoots and they needed me to help style them. I had expressed my urgency to return to my models so that I could get them ready for my shoot so I left them alone in the hands of the photographer.
By the time I had returned to my models and started on their hair and make-up it was already seven pm and the sun was starting to set. Only four of the eight designers collections were being shot and one designer was stuck at another shoot modeling. Julie was visibly upset as her photographer was missing. My shoot was at the other location and I had not had time to go set it up either. We had put so much work into the prep of the day and we were the ones getting pushed to the side. Finally two of the four photographers where ready to move on to the next designer‘s photo-shoot. They quickly got to work with the best lighting of the night the “golden hour.” Julie and my photographer as well as two of Julie’s models were still missing. I had moved my models to the new location thinking I would just take my own photos as the light was dimming quickly.
I was just finishing dressing my models when two of the photographers arrived at my location. I was relieved. We had about twenty minute of sketchy light to take my shoot. My models though young were so professional and did not waste any time, they amazed me in there ability to change poses listen to direction and mold into new locations. The lighting was too dark for what I had envisioned and displayed on my mood board so we had to reimagined my shoot and communicate it quickly. We wrapped up just as the sun went down. With all our efforts I was unable to get the photos I had desired because of poor communication and bad time management earlier in the day.
I returned to the first location were Julie had just started shooting in the dark a not perceived condition for her and she was beyond words. You could tell by her body language that she was very upset and didn’t know how the photos would turn out. The day had been a tornado of miss communication and confusion.
Later that night as I replayed the day’s events in my head I was trying to find out what I did wrong and how better communication could have been used to make the day better. I had learned a lot about cultural, style and esthetic differences during this experience. I found that it is definitely a learning process and that it will help benefit me in the future when working with people from different cultures and professional backgrounds and will help me grow in both my personal and work related aspects of this ever so changing society.
Reflection On Interpersonal Theme paper
We were asked to write a paper on an communication experience we had faced in our personal or work life. I reflected on my experiences though out the years and choose the one that had the most confusion of them all. This is was coincidentally the experience that I had learned the most from. By writing your experience it helps you decode the problem and outline a solution for change. I am glad I had the opportunity to reflect on my past communication downfalls and learn from them.
