Tell me, what does a fashion magazine editor actually do?

A week in the life.

Many of us, myself included, grew up with the idea of a ‘dream job’ – or at least, some idea of where we’d want to work when we grew up. But as we know, the careers we idealise in our heads (and take out debilitating student loans to pursue) often aren’t what we expect them to be.

To shed some light on the realities of the workforce, it pays to be nosy, asking people with different jobs what their day-to-day looks like. I do it all the time. But when the FJ team suggested I share the ins and outs of my job online, I have to say I panicked. I’m two months into my role as Fashion Journal‘s Features Editor, and hell, I ask myself the same question.

Interested to hear how others navigate the world? Head to our Life section.

Like most people I know who work in fashion media, this wasn’t a job I “fell into”. To be painfully sincere, I knew I wanted to be an editor since I was probably 10. In primary school, I started my own magazine called Dreamer, think TotalGirl, but local and more alt-y. Like any good fashion magazine, it had makeover stories, celebrity gossip (exclusively about Adam Brody and Ben Lummis, the winner of New Zealand Idol 2004), and lists of Cool Songs (‘Blue’ by Eiffel 65) and Cool Clothes (velcro hoodies from Glassons). Okay it wasn’t that alt-y.

Dreamer didn’t take off like I’d hoped, but I kept the dream alive. When I was 13, in my first class at high school, I vividly remember writing ‘Beauty editor for an Australian Magazine’ in my ‘What do you want to be when you grow up’ form. (Weirdly specific?).

Landing my current role was a dream come true. But I’ll be honest, until I started at FJ, I had no idea what I’d actually be doing. My first month on the job was no time for training wheels, either – we were two weeks away from our first print deadline in five years and Melbourne Fashion Week was around the corner. While my nascent months here have been far from typical, an editor’s week is regularly atypical. If I were to craft a ‘standard’ week in the job, here’s what it would look like .

Monday

9am: Every day I start by going through my inbox, the editorial inbox and the DMs on Fashion Journal‘s Instagram incase there’s anything important to action straight away. As an editor, your emails can quickly get out of control, so a good tip I learnt from Giulia (FJ’s Managing Editor) is the ‘flag, file, delete’ system. This is also when I go through pitches from freelance writers and save the strongest ones to bring up in our brainstorm tomorrow.

11am: Once important comms are done, I turn my attention to the editorial calendar – a comprehensive, beautifully colour-coded Google Sheet. What stories are planned to go up today, this week, this month? A key part of my job is to make sure there’s a nice balanced spread of content throughout the week. For example, this week we were looking too heavy on Life stories and too light on Beauty stories, so Giulia and I discussed a plan and shifted things around a bit. I’m also forward-planning for the month ahead and keeping track of the editorial budget.

1pm: While I get to write a lot in my job, a huge part of my role is, you guessed it, editing other people’s work. I love it, suits my Virgo detail-oriented brain. Aside from checking grammar, tone and structure, I help choose visuals and headlines for stories which can often take hours!

It’s a real vibe in the office when you’re days away from print deadline…

4pm: Every day around this time I check how the FJ homepage is looking and update it, choosing my top three stories to appear on our header. Visuals, as well as headlines play a part in what I choose – I’m always looking for a good mix of content (beauty, fashion, life, music) and a balance of visuals, making sure they’re eye catching.

5pm: Near the end of the day, I turn my attention to social media. I usually post a TikTok, one Instagram post, and share our new articles to Instagram Stories to encourage people to read them. For today’s TikTok I asked G Flip what they were wearing at the official launch of Melbourne Fashion Week (M/FW) this morning – Karlaidlaw mostly.

G Flip and Mayor Nick Reece at Queen Victoria Markets for the M/FW announcement.

Tuesday

11am: Every Tuesday morning we have our editorial brainstorm meeting – my favourite part of the job! I look after all our commissioned stories, so I’ll go through pitches with Giulia and Daisy, our Assistant Editor (but the whole FJ team is also there – having Molly and Georgina’s commercial eye over everything is important) and we’ll discuss which stories are the strongest, workshopping angles and thinking about visuals and interviews, too.

12pm onwards: I try dedicate my Tuesdays to ‘getting things in motion’. So, reaching out to writers and green-lighting stories, briefing writers on stories I want to assign, as well as working on my own stories, which usually involve planning interviews or some sort of research.

5.30pm: Once work is done and social media is looked after, it’s time for a quick outfit change because it’s the Student Collections Runway show at M/FW tonight! I’m meeting our photographer Robyn down at the venue before the show to help her capture some street style images.

 

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Wednesday

9.30am: Time for our weekly analytics meeting, which is deeply nerdy, interesting and confronting (people really like nudity and sex, shocking!). As a team we go through the data and see which stories you clicked on and liked the most, basically. We compare the views to the week prior and sometimes month prior, making notes about the top performers and the lowest performers, using this to inform our editorial decisions going forward.

11am: Robyn’s photos from last night have arrived in my inbox! I want to get these published ASAP, so I’ll prep the street style article and start editing and loading images in, then share them on our Instagram right away.

12.30pm: Lunch-time. Green Refectory, the cafe right near our office in Brunswick is keeping me alive at this point. I picked up a pastry and green juice, plus a vegan roll for Giuls who is strapped to her desk today working on our print issue. During a lunch outing, one of us will often film a TikTok of what we’re wearing. Lately I’ve been giving Georgina quick, five-minute eye makeup looks after lunch, which I’ll eventually turn into a TikTok.

2pm: Quite often as an editor I’ll contribute to commercial (advertorial) content ideas, too. Sometimes that’s a quick brainstorm of potential angles or photoshoots we could do for a fashion or beauty brand, today it was writing an article about pre-loved fashion for eBay, one of our clients.

4pm: Time for a print meeting. We have one of our fashion shoots planned for this Friday, so Giuls and I are in comms with our producers checking we have everything we need. I’ll be swapping roles as makeup artist for the day (this is my other job and I’m always jumping at the chance to use these skills at FJ – although it’s not something a normal editor would do!).

6pm: It’s the Volvo Electric Runway show tonight, so I’m doing another quick outfit change in the office, into a Par Moi dress I loaned, which I’m pretty sure I want to buy. I put on my impractical silver trotters and take a tram down to the show – I’m so ready for a champagne, I love M/FW!

With Par Moi designer, Ashiya Omundsen.

Thursday

9am: Call time today for our fashion shoot with photographer Suleiman Thomas and our models, Rahma and Chi. I grabbed coffee and met everyone near Parliament to get models into glam. Today was a long day, with many outfit changes a few unexpected curve-balls (there always are) but it’s so fun getting to be out of the office and on-set with different creative teams.

Pre-loved fashion rack for our print cover shoot.

On set with photographer Suleiman and model Chi.

The following Thursday

9am: I spent this week laser-focused on print, working closely with Giulia, Daisy and our designer Kelly to finalise the pages in Issue 195. It’s a hands-on, tactile process involving mapping out the mag on the floor, reading everything with a fine-toothed comb and pinning potential cover options on the wall.

Giulia and I debating the order of our print pages – strong opinions are key as an editor, it makes the process fun!

Potential cover options were highly debated among the team, right up until print deadline.

2pm: This afternoon is particularly exciting because we have a print proof to look at! We check all the colours look right on our paper stock and nothing is cut-off or misprinted.

Checking our final print proof for any last changes.

Friday

9am: Fridays are a working from home day and as much I love the gossip and coffee runs in the office, I find I get my best writing done at home, where I can zone in, undistracted. Today I’m writing up an interview I did with musician Benee last week.

2.30pm: Remember how I’ve always wanted to be a beauty editor? Well, a huge perk of my job is getting to try out the latest beauty products and treatments. The best ones are hair treatments and anything spa-related, IMO. Today though, I’m leaving work early for a particularly unique Korean facial, which involves fish DNA and many, many needles going into my face. Stay tuned.

Trying not to scare the Uber driver on the way home from my intense facial.

For more on a career in fashion magazine editing, head here.