Grinding out a living in any old job did not appeal to Amy-Rose Goulding. Nor did waiting years to start her own fashion label, as Sarah Harvey reports.
Many people starting a fashion label take years to get up the courage to create a range and get it out there.
A "lockbox" of fashion design ideas was inside her, screaming to get out. Earlier this year, she started her label, Julian Danger; a couple of months later she had created her debut winter collection, and then she made the gutsy decision to take the collection to Air New Zealand Fashion Week.
A debut collection shown at a national fashion week is almost unheard of.
Goulding (23), of Queenstown, realises she was brave, but the gamble has paid off.
She left fashion week with the prospect of national buyers and has aspirations to take her clothes international as well.
"I wanted to come out with a bang. I thought 'why wait?"'
Goulding went up to fashion week two weeks ago and set up a stall, working 10-hour days on the Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.
Anyone who came in and out of a show would look at the stalls in the exhibition space.
She said many people asked where her shop was, and they were "really surprised" when she told them this was her debut collection.
"There were so many ideas whizzing around in my head. I wasn't satisfied doing nothing. I know it was pretty brave, but it felt like the right thing to do."
Goulding says she has always had a "passion bordering on obsession to create garments".
Originally from Nelson, she moved to Dunedin to attend the University of Otago, leaving with a bachelor of arts, majoring in design, midway through last year.
She spent an "outrageous" semester at the start of the year, driving to Dunedin once a week to attend Thursday morning pattern-making classes at Otago Polytechnic so she could put her design degree to practical use.
While doing this, she was working full-time at Angel Devine clothing store.
She describes it as opening the lockbox of ideas she obsessed over while gaining a design degree.
The label is called Julian Danger after her twin brother, Julian.
Her brother, she says, is "really outrageous". He is an adrenaline junkie, but had a "life-changing" accident which left him temporarily in a wheelchair.
Starting her own fashion label and calling it Julian Danger was a reminder for her to "follow her dreams and take a risk".
The fashion-forward range was inspired by luxurious fabrics she chose while in Hong Kong and China.
The range, The Lover's Assassin, stands out because of those fabrics and a tight, structured theme, she says.
"Some of the garments are quite out there."
The collection takes inspiration from Belgian surrealist artist Rene Magritte, whose works forced viewers to become hypersensitive to their surroundings.
The womenswear collection she calls "courageous, yet delicate" with draping silks, leather fused with knit, and dark velvet. The menswear collection is "minimal, yet creative" with a simple colour palette.
The range was designed to "appeal to everyone", from her friends through to her mother.
"I want everybody to be able to wear it."
