The Harsh Realities of Networking at NZFW

Networking at Fashion Week networking is a blood bath. When you walk around the bar, you quickly realise that if you want to be in the fold, you almost have to use force—no one is going to let you in. This is an environment in which you have to sell yourself like you were the latest pair of Louis Vuitton pumps that everyone just has to have.

We are quick to give our attention to the most prestigious members of the Fashion Week coterie, the ones who receive all of the goodie bags or wear the stilettos, but there is also an army of volunteers ensuring the whole thing runs like it should. Why do it? Networking is my guess, but it's not easy.

I met one backstage volunteer who told me she had been volunteering for three years, hoping to gain industry connections, because she wanted to work in the fashion industry. It had, so far, been a fruitless three years: she hadn't made a single contact. After hearing this, I thought: why does she keep coming back?

However, here she was, hoping this might be the year she would gain the connection that led to a break and that, on the back of it, she would end up working for Karen Walker. I wondered how realistic this was—if this was something volunteers felt like they could even do, given the tight clusters at the bar and notoriously 'who-you-know' aspect of the fashion industry. Did volunteers just feel like the help? Is that what stopped our friend from making connections? If this is true, maybe Fashion Week isn't the place to for volunteers to find their runway feet.

My own networking experience at Fashion Week was a near fail. On the first morning I introduced myself to someone I had spoken with on numerous occasions, only to be met with a blank look, until I told her my name. A lot of my opportunities happened by mistake and at unexpected times: I ended up having a quick chat to fashion giant Colin Mathura-Jeffree after he pushed my wheelchair to help me on my way into a show, but I decided against approaching Anna Reeve and co: I didn't quite have the confidence. Networking isn't just hard for volunteers—it is difficult for all of us. Hence the ample supply of booze.

On Wednesday night I watched one woman staggering outside the doors. She had clearly had one too many champagnes, and then another. The security guard moved to help her. "I'm not drunk," she announced. "I have ADD." The security guard said nothing, just nodded and helped her into a taxi. Then he laughed: "Man, everybody has a problem these days. It's always someone else's fault: my mother and father didn't love me, or the piano fell on my head. Nobody can ever just say, it's them."

This, I thought, was telling of Fashion Week. After a couple of days, you learn that people are presenting the best of themselves, their best outfits, their best expressions, their best selves, but that the fashion elite are not immune from the problems we all face: they get too drunk like the rest of us, and they aren't always at their best.

This, then, is my advice for anybody wanting to make that contact or get that job: drink the champagne and force your way through the doors. Some networking opportunities will be unexpected, others won't happen at all, and some you might have the confidence to try for next time—just don't forget to line your stomach with the free crackers.

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