Jennifer Dickert had to knock the socks off Abercrombie &Fitch.
She didn’t want the major clothing retailer to merely notice her.
The 25-year-old Mill Creek resident wanted a job.
She was ready, after three years of studying fashion design at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, to become a fashion professional, right out of college in the worst economy of, well, her entire life.
Yeah, right.
And yet, that is exactly what the 2002 Henry M. Jackson High School graduate and rising design star did.
When the recruiter assigned Dickert an audition project, he asked for four looks based loosely on a fictional story about Jack and Kate, two college-age characters on a fall road trip to Dartmouth College.
But instead of turning in the requested four, Dickert, always one to throw herself into a project, designed two dozen pieces to create four layered looks. She even included underwear designs, thinking she might appeal to the company’s Gilly Hicks label.
Dickert also crafted an elaborate, illustrated family history of the preppy East Coast characters to show the inspirations behind her designs.
“Talent is not enough. You have to show you’re very driven,” said Dickert, who made her mother take her to the first Abercrombie &Fitch store in the region when she was in middle school. “I was pretty much just saying, ‘Hire me. Just take me.’”
Next month, Dickert will become an assistant designer at the company’s campus in New Albany, Ohio, outside Columbus.
She’ll make $50,000 a year.
“I will be immediately jumping in and doing a lot of designing,” said Dickert, who was named “best dressed” in high school. “I want to do the hands-on creative stuff really bad.”
Iliana Ricketts, the School of Fashion coordinator at the university, said the recruiter was drawn instantly to Dickert’s project.
“It stood apart from everything else on the table,” Ricketts said. “Companies want reliable, excited and talented designers, people that live for their craft.”
Dickert’s love of fashion and drawing, a self-taught skill that has played a significant role in her career, started when she was about 5 years old.
She remembers drawing elaborate gowns for Sleeping Beauty and, as she got older, wedding gowns and dresses for her friends.
“I had sketch books full of prom dresses,” said Dickert, whose mother, Cynthia Dickert, used to sew her one-of-a-kind birthday and Christmas dresses.
“She truly has a gift,” Cynthia Dickert said. “I am so proud. We’re all just thrilled.”
Despite her raw talent, Dickert attributes her success to plain old hard work and long hours.
“It’s a lot harder than you think,” she said. “You need to be able to push yourself, and you need to be OK with being pushed.”
Dickert, who yearned to follow her friends and feared she’d never find a job in the ultra-competitive fashion industry, studied for two years at the University of Washington as an architecture and anthropology major before transferring to Academy of Art University.
Though only 12 of her 105 credits transferred, she was determined to finish design school in three years, no small feat.
Dickert didn’t just make it. She excelled.
Two of her gown designs were selected for the university’s annual graduation runway show, a hard-earned privilege enjoyed by only the top students in the graduating class.
“It is an honor,” Dickert said of the runway show. “You go through a very intensive series of critiques. We went through about three cuts starting in December and the final cut was two weeks before the show.”
Dickert’s runway dresses, which showcase her love for draped, layered, luxurious fabrics, included a midnight blue satin gown with silk charmeuse swirls.
She also made a billowy chiffon and georgette gown, dubbed The Lady of the Lake. She spent $3,000 of her own money, mostly on fabric, perfecting the gowns.
Dickert, who describes her design aesthetic as “classic,” is glad she left the UW. “That was about cramming and studying,” Dickert said. “This has been about doing things. It’s almost like practicing an instrument.”
Dickert has also been busy freelancing for publications as a fashion illustrator, including a gown drawing for San Francisco’s Nob Hill Gazette in 2008.
The Washington Times asked Dickert to draw a tongue-in-cheek illustration of newspaper columnist George Will earlier this year.
Titled “George in Jeans,” the piece made fun of the conservative’s recent rant about the ubiquity of denim. Dickert’s drawing featured Will in a stance and denim style evocative of James Dean.
Though Dickert loves to draw, she’s excited to dive into the fabric room at Abercrombie &Fitch, a prospect that takes her back to her childhood shopping trips with her mother.
“I remember just looking at the fabrics,” she said. “That was my favorite part.”
Sarah Jackson: 425-339-3037, sjackson@heraldnet.com
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