Vira Valko

So my name is Vira Valko. I'm working as an art director, currently doing internships in art direction, creative direction, in the fashion industry.

So basically it's planning the shoots. So art direction is about communication with the audience.

I'm working in the brand, doing an internship in the brand. And it's about communication with the audience, with people, with customers, and how they understand the brand visually.

Let's say you saw the picture on the internet and it's been set by the art director and creative director, so people understand it.

A typical day looks very busy. We usually start like very early, can be like six. It depends also on photo shoots.

So basically an art director works mostly in photo shoot sets, planning everything. It doesn't mean it will be in the studio, it can be somewhere outside. It can be that let's say morning is better for the shoot. You should be flexible working in this position. Also it's lots of meetings with the clients.

As I said, I'm doing internships, so I would say I'm mostly like an assistant to the actual art director. It's mostly deciding where it will be, like the locations, maybe the models.

You are doing casting, like modelling castings to decide who will be the best for let's say for the advertisement or maybe for, I don't know, some pictures or some campaigns. So that's basically the job.

The best thing I would say is working with different people because you really... it's like the best and the worst. It's like you know, you never know who you'll be working with and you don't always have a choice, like you can't decide who will be your client or who you will be working with in the office.

But yeah, I would say it's very cool to meet so many people and like interesting people who are working in that kind of level. And just like to understand that mindset as well.

So basically I started as a fashion designer.

I'm Ukrainian by the way. So I came to London when I was like nineteen, when the war started in 2022. And I was like kind of a bit lost, what shall I do in my life because I just left everything in my country, like everything was just destroyed.

And I had to make decisions what I'm going to do, staying as a fashion designer or trying something new, especially with the point like if you wanna open your own brand, like your own business, it's a good start.

So basically I went to a university learning creative direction, art direction. The course itself is called promotion and communication, fashion promotion and communication. And it's like the most popular way to get to this job, I would say.

Also there can be like different backgrounds as well. People can be like art director or creative director coming from graphic design, photography, stylist. But it's like good start, especially when you like wanna you know you want to go to the fashion industry but you don't know what exactly you wanna do.

It's a good way to go to fashion promotion, communication because it's about so many jobs. You can be like an editor, you can be a director, you can be like working in a magazine, I don't know, like The Devil Wears Prada kind of style, you know.

It's basically all those jobs that are behind the scenes, like not models, not designers, because it's kind of a different way. You have to know how to make clothes. but yeah it's I would say it's like a good start.

So I've been very creative since... I don't know, all my life probably. I liked all drama stuff, art.

I would say if you have an opportunity to learn how to draw, even if you are not going for fashion design, it's still very like it's a big plus.

And also I would say learning some digital skills, like if you like to do like Photoshop, Illustrator, like if you like to do something on your iPad, like drawing something, it's a very, very good skill.

And then I went to college and I learned like fashion design, kind of like how to make clothes basically. So it did help me a lot, but now I'm just like going in a different way, I would say.

The last I remember it was London Fashion Week when I was backstage, like helping to do makeup, dressing models. It was very intense, it just happens in like ten minutes or so.

But you have to be all in and understand what is going on. But it was like very, very memorable, sorry. And for the future I wanna like do more fashion shows. I would say it's fun stuff to do.

Read more, go to different places, like very unusual places.

Don't be afraid to be yourself because I would say it's the most stuff we are actually learning at university, like actually not to be afraid to tell your opinion, like even if it's different.

Because the fashion industry builds on not the majority of people, but small amount of people and they're making the trends. So you have to just build this mindset that it's not as the majority of people.