How Ashwini Deshpande became a Digital Fashion Designer at Meta

Welcome to the first edition of How I Became... Each week I'll speak to amazing industry profashionals learning about their amazing achievements, breaking down core skills and competencies needed to thrive within the roles and their favourite resources.

This week I spoke with Ashwini Deshpande about how she became a Digital Fashion Designer currently working at Meta.

Q: So Ashwini you have a very interesting and exciting role. Being a digital fashion designer is somewhat of a new role. For anyone who has no clue what this means and entails, please do explain.?

A: A digital fashion designer designs for the metaverse. We use computer-aided design software to make 3D digital garments, using the same garment-making methods as are used in real life.

Q: What did you study and do you think your course led you to this path of becoming a digital fashion designer?

I studied BA Fashion Design and Development at the London College of Fashion.

The course was focused on physical fashion design and garment making, with a touch of business education. However, the advantage of studying at London College of Fashion is that there are so many opportunities to do this outside your course, and a lot of flexibility.

I signed up to an accelerator run by LCF’s Fashion Innovation Agency and Microsoft. Long story short, that’s how I was introduced to the world of digital fashion.

From there, I went on to join the Digital Maker Collective which is a UAL cross-college initiative, bringing together students from various disciplines who are interested in digital media.

LCF also gives its student a lot of freedom, so I took that opportunity to create a fully digital fashion collective and explore the metaverse.

Q: So you studied fashion design for your undergrad. Would you say this is an important skill to be a digital fashion designer?

A: My sewing skills aren’t great, so clearly, not so much. But it is very important to understand and have a knack for pattern cutting, to understanding drape, fit, flow, fabrics, etc. That’s one of the things I love about digital fashion- you can experiment and create incredibly cool pieces pretty quickly because sewing digitally doesn’t take nearly as long as it does irl!

Q: Did university prepare you for the skills required to be a digital fashion designer?

A: We did have an introduction to digital fashion production at university, but not much else. I think the curriculum is still at the stage where you’re introduced to digital tools but only a few will independently delve deeper. I think in a few year's time, hopefully as soon as possible, digital will be part of the core curriculum, as it is becoming a core skill needed in the industry, even in the physical fashion universe.

Q: What soft and hard skills are needed to thrive in this role?

A: Soft skills- I would personally say that because this is such a new industry, it’s important to know how to market your work and speak about it in a clear but exciting way.

It’s also a small world, digital fashion, so networking and getting to know the community is important too.

Finally, having confidence is extremely important because there’s no defined path yet in this industry. As an early bird, you need to be confident about the direction in which the industry is headed and what role you can play in it.

In terms of hard skills- learning one fashion software such as CLO3D or VStitcher extremely well is an absolute must. Beyond that, it’s good to know bits of other software that can go hand in hand with fashion software, such as Blender for 3D modelling, Substance for textures, Unity which is a game engine, Spark AR for augmented reality, etc.

Q: What core tools do you use in your role?

A: I use mostly digital fashion design software such as VStitcher but play around with other things based on what I’m trying to create.

What would you say is the most challenging part of this job?

Digital fashion is so new/recent as a concept that the answers don’t always exist, and if they do they’re not easy to come by. It’s a lot of trial and error. I often have questions about how to make a certain type of garment feature digitally or how to combine the features of different softwares to create what I’m imagining, but there’s often no one who has tried that specific thing before and has an answer, or maybe what I’m thinking of can’t be done because the technology for it doesn’t exist, so I just have to experiment figure it out.

Q: What has been the most challenging part of your career to date?

The biggest challenge in my career so far has been some of the freelance work I’ve done with clients who’ve never worked digitally before. Working with the client to help them understand what is possible and what isn’t in terms of technology, and helping them create their creative vision satisfactorily has been a challenge many times. You want to ensure they know exactly what they’re getting at the end of it, without over promising or dampening their spirit.

Q: What is the future of this role in the workplace?

I believe I’m already seeing that digital designers will occupy an important role in industries beyond fashion. Due to the wide range of skills and knowledge needed to be a digital designer, these individuals will have the opportunity to be part of more than just design- from luxury metaverse strategy to the development of technical VR capabilities. It’s exciting and new roles are being created daily in the space. There’s currently also a clear lack of 3D fashion talent so it’s a great time to get your foot in the door.

Q: What are your current favourite 3 resources?

A: Book: The Metaverse and how it will revolutionise everything by Matthew Ball (a must read!)

Podcast: I’ve recently started listening to Cathy Hackl’s ‘Future of the Metaverse’ podcast. On the fashion and sustainability side there’s Sabinna’s Consciousness Beyond the Product which is great.

Blog/Website: the Business of Fashion and Vogue Business do a great job covering fashion tech

I hope you found this interview insightful, especially for anyone considering a career in digital fashion. Have your notifications set for next week's interview.