Elizabeth Leigh Evans - Designer

I started on the path to becoming a designer with a 2 year Btech National Diploma at CCAD in Middlesbrough where I decided I wanted to be a fashion Journalist. Strange, considering I've never had much time for writing but that largely fuelled my decision to apply to Huddersfield University, as at the time they had the only course in the country to have a good balance of Design/Marketing/Promotion & Manufacturing. During the 3 years that followed I decided it was Design - not Journalism that I was really interested in.

I left University and my first position was assistant designer with a childrenswear company in Ardwick, Manchester, called Cooneen Textiles where I learned to use Illustrator and the basic principles of how the industry works, I learned a great deal in that first year.

I worked for several companies before becoming freelance in April of 2006, the decision was motivated largely by geography and wanting to be in charge of my own career, I live in the North East and wanted to spend the majority of my time here. I travel a lot for work but now I know that everything I do is for the benefit of my family and the future of the company. I work for many of the leading high street names either direct or through importers and I have learned and enormous amount in the last year, how to manage my own time effectively, how to keep books, not to mention working with many different product areas I hadn't previously touched on. I have covered everything, babywear, nursery products, children’s fashion, men’s and ladies fashion, nightwear, accessories and everything in between.

So what now? Well, for the next year or two I'll continue to set myself targets, make new contacts and add new clients and then in a few years hopefully I'll be in a position to consider setting up a consultancy. I'd like to take on new talent from the art colleges around the North East, I know how hard it is to find work in the fashion industry up here and sometimes you don't want to move the other side of the country, we have great courses for fashion in the North East nurturing talented new designers, let’s try and keep them here.

 All images are work examples from Ele-Design and are strictly copyrighted to Ele-Design clients.

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