Earlier this year, Campbell Dunn graduated from the University of Huddersfield with a first class honours degree in Fashion Design with Manufacturing and Promotion, and in June he took home the prestigious Graduate of the Year 2011 award at the Scottish Fashion Awards. The award encompassed a covetable prize for any new designer – a three month internship with the womenswear design team at high street giant, Marks & Spencer. The Edinburgh born designer created a Limited Collection dress for M&S which goes on sale next year, and now Dunn has been snapped up by the M&S menswear design team for the rest of the year – this should please him, as he had a strong focus on menswear design while at university.
Dunn says of the extended placement, “To be asked to continue in M&S until the end of the year within the menswear design team is an incredible honour. It is equally as exciting for me as I have always wanted to be a menswear designer. After a month working within womenswear I asked if I could complete my experience in menswear and they agreed. When they asked if I could continue until the end of the year, with the possibility of doing a freelance menswear job at M&S I could hardly resist.”
Dunn is no stranger to working with the best – he previously interned at Burberry menswear before winning Scottish Fashion Awards Graduate of the Year 2011. The Awards founder, Tessa Hartmann, said previously that Dunn was ‘one to watch for the future’. She says, “I’m not surprised that M&S have kept him on. His portfolio was excellent and he stood apart as one of the few menswear designers we have ever had in the competition. Unlike so many other competitions right now that propel individuals to superstardom, based on luck and chance, this competition is based on skill, creativity, academia and substance.”
I think Hartmann makes a very good point – Campbell Dunn is fully deserving of his award and of his job with M&S, which will enable him to define and develop the skills he learned at university, while giving him a chance to show people across the UK that he is a talented and gifted designer in his own right.
Top image: Campbell Dunn at the Scottish Fashion Awards 2011.
Bottom image: Campbell Dunn in his M&S design studio.
Images courtesy of Hartmann Media, with thanks.
