KEY POINTS:
The design world is a tough and competitive industry but, for those who find their niche, it can be rewarding.
Adrian Hailwood has built up a successful brand in the fashion world but says it hasn't been easy.
"It's extremely fickle. At the end of the day, you're only as good as your last collection. You're selling, so you've got to keep trying new things to improve," he says.
Hailwood designs everything from dresses, suits, knitwear, footwear and outerwear to bags and hats.
He categorises his brand as high-end boutique and street wear. But his trademark is his T-shirts, which can sell for up to $130.
"I do six to seven different prints each season. I've got my own distinctive style going on, kind of an '80s thing going on there.
"T-shirts are easy to produce, you get quite a good mark-up on them and it's a slogan for your brand.
"People wearing your images with your name on it - it's quite a good way of advertising yourself."
Hailwood is a trained illustrator and earned a Bachelor of Visual Communications from Victoria University in 1996 before moving to Auckland to work in magazines and advertising.
"I got into fashion by mistake by doing a T-shirt range for a commercial and, then from there, I got interviews in magazines and I got orders from shops."
Hailwood said drawing designs came naturally to him.
"You either can draw or you can't, I suppose. And if you can make money out of it, then it's even better.
"So it just exploded right off the block, really, with the T-shirt thing. I got in at the right time. There was a gap in the market for a designer T-shirt at that price point and it just went from there."
Hailwood has partnered with other clothing manufacturers in order to increase the volumes of his collections.
"You've got to deliver on time, your quality's got to be really good and it's the big numbers that make the money at the end of the day."
Hailwood says that fellow designer Annah Stretton has provided him with a lot of his manufacturing infrastructure.
"She's enabled me, from going from a little guy, to being able to expand quite rapidly because she's doing all the production."
The fashion industry is competitive but not really cut-throat, he says.
"I've been pretty lucky. I've had good people around me. I've had quite good support with various people in the industry who have nurtured me."
When it comes to Fashion Week, Hailwood says it's more like a convention than a competition.
"You're competing for the same buyer, so of course you want them to buy more of your range than the other one, but it's more of a convention as well. The design industry is pretty small in New Zealand."
For Fashion Week, big name clothing buyers are flown in from all over the world. Designers are jockeying for the international media attention and big bucks are shelled out.
A show for one designer will run to $30,000, including seating for 1000 people, lighting, a producer and sound engineer.
But it's the logistics of such an event that stress the designers.
"It's big, big money. I don't think people realise the behind the scenes of actually getting a garment conceptualised, into making a pattern, into producing the fabric and then making 100 of them and getting them out in time. It gets quite tricky."
But despite the glamour of Fashion Week, what's important are the sales that take place afterwards.
"There's no use doing these amazing huge, big feather boa dresses that look great on the catwalk but they won't sell. It's got to be a good balance between both.
"There are a few pieces you'll put on the catwalk that you won't put into production but, on a whole, you want 90 per cent of it to be sold and made easily."
Developing the infrastructure to make the clothing is key. "Definitely money or a production company behind you is really the only way to take it seriously."
The drawing and design work is the fun part.
"There's 100 jobs in a workroom - everything from machining or cutting and drawing up patterns or ticketing or doing advertising for it."
Hailwood says that out of the $100 that someone might spend on one of his boutique T-shirts, he makes about $16 profit at the end of the day.
"There are all these extra add-on costs. You've got a store, rent on your store, your staff, your advertising, so there's all the other stuff around it - all that stuff that goes into doing that one $100 T-shirt," says Hailwood.
For people starting out in the fashion industry, they should go for it. Hailwood still considers himself a newcomer. "Even though I've been doing it for seven years full-time, that's still relatively new on the block. But I'm just in that established stage."
People don't even really have to know how to draw to become a successful designer these days.
"You just have to have good ideas. You just have to have an understanding of your market, who you're selling to, what product sells well within that market, that kind of thing. You have to be an all-rounder."
It also doesn't hurt to know a thing or two about fabric. "You need to know how things drape and fall and how fabric should be cut. And you need a good understanding of how a garment is constructed."
But not every fashion designer will make the Fashion Week standard.
"If you've got the determination to stick it out, and if you do your homework, you look and figure out what you really want to do and what your market is, then there's a space there for you."
Even the best fashion designer will fail if they don't work out the business side of things.
"You need to be selling volumes. You need to be selling quite a lot. In terms of volume, I'll probably sell 50 or 100 of that one print.
"I'm still quite small. Some things I'll do 200-300 of, but some stuff is still relatively tiny."
Hailwood says design is only half of the business.
The other half is having the infrastructure and systems in place to deliver the clothing on time.
"You need to have a good nous of business or get someone to help you."
Making designs
* Adrian Hailwood is a trained illustrator.
* He has a Bachelor of Visual Communications from Victoria University.
* Before becoming a designer, he worked in magazines and advertising.
* He is best known for his trademark T-shirts.
