The flashes from the photographers' cameras were blinding, and the noise from the applause was deafening as Erica made her way down the runway. She knew that eventually her shows would be much larger, with crowds of hundreds and coverage from almost all of the major fashion magazines. But for her, at the age of twenty six, the small hall that held maybe a few dozen guests felt very gratifying. Her eyes filled with tears, partly from the blinding lights, partly from the emotions as the models all clapped respectfully for her along with the crowd.
She clasped hands with a few of them, men who had been with her since the beginning, those that were willing to accept partial and delayed payments just so she could get off the ground. Reaching the end of the runway, she gave a huge hug to Brian, who had been with her the longest and had told her he was retiring from the runway to start a family with his boyfriend after the next show. She would miss him dearly. He'd stuck with EW even when the paychecks had been measly or delayed, confident that the girl he'd known starting out walking the runways would be able to make something of herself as a designer as well.
Waving to the small crowd, Erica turned and made her way to the back of the stage area, slipping through the small side curtain and making her way to the back. Her assistant, a young redhead originally from Des Moines named Tina, was there to greet her and give her a congratulatory hug.
"Great show, boss."
"Thanks, Tina. You were so helpful in getting this show ready to go. Now we only have one more to get through."
It had been a tough month for Erica. For four years she had busted her butt cultivating connections, designing new collections, and playing the often cut-throat political games that was the fashion industry. She had refused to let herself get hemmed into a corner due to her background coming from the bad side of Miami or being a former model, and finally found reward as her spring collection received showings in Tokyo, London, and Milan for their fashion weeks.
Tokyo had gone amazingly well, with orders from numerous Asian department stores and boutiques to keep her main office in Miami busy for weeks with orders. So far, this London show looked just as promising, with representatives from Harrod's and other UK men's wear stores in attendance. If she could wow them in Milan as well, then EW Men's Wear was going to become a strong player in the fashion world going forward.
The end result of the month though, was that Erica felt exhausted. So far, in three weeks she had circled the globe twice, set up runway shows in two different continents, dealing with cultural and language issues everywhere she turned. It was nothing she wasn't expecting, but she was flat out ready to drop. However at the same time, she knew that if she was busy with Tokyo and London, the next show was going to be massive. That was the show that was going to get her noticed by the fashion press, and the one that would get her world-wide attention from it if it went well. Among the fashion capitals of the world, Milan, Paris and New York always stood head and shoulders above the rest. She had her foothold in with Milan; if it went well, she'd be in Paris and New York for the fall shows.
"The people from Harvey Nichols and John Lewis already sent me messages during the show," Tina continued, interrupting Erica's reverie. "I'm just waiting to see if Harrod's is going to put in an order as well, but I'm pretty sure they will. You should probably make a personal greeting to them to put that little extra touch on it. You know how these Brits enjoy having their egos stroked a bit."
Erica couldn't imagine surviving without Tina there to help her. Her assistant was that valuable on the business side of things. Erica was the idea woman, whose visual sense and subtle use of patterns allowed her to create dramatic men's clothing that still didn't look overly contrived. As she liked to say, the men still looked like men, just even more-so. Tina was the assistant who made sure she kept the business end of things running, making sure that EW stayed at least somewhat in the black. Sometimes that had been a very fine line, especially just starting out.
"Thanks, I will. Can you point me in the right direction? If you leave me on my own I'm going to end up walking into a Tube Station."