We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Dawn Dunning a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Dawn, so happy to have you with us today and there is so much we want to ask you about. So many of us go through similar pain points throughout our journeys and so hearing about how others developed certain skills or qualities that we are struggling with can be helpful. Along those lines, we’d love to hear from you about how you developed your ability to take risk?
I have a background in the performing arts as a kid and young teen I was auditioning and performing a-lot so I learned resilience and how to take rejection early on, I think that helped with any fear of failure. Many things in life have some level of risk and you have to realize that your desire is greater than your fear. you cant be afraid of failure its all part of the process and sometimes (often) you have to fail in order to suceed.
Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?
I have a background in fashion design and pivoted to work at an advertising/marketing agency for many years in the creative department and was lucky enough to work for people who let me develop a non traditional department within the agency that I eventually spun off into my own company. I have a female fronted creative collective, focusing on domestic garment manufacturing and production, I am lucky to have many multitalented people on my team and I am able to contract many talented creatives to work on our projects. We are currently working on curating and designing producing a store within a museum in Las Vegas called Transfix opening this spring, a magic show opening this summer in NYC at the midnight theatre as well as many other projects with great brands and clients.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
-keeping solid relationships with clients, coworkers, employees and vendors – many of my current clients are former coworkers, bosses etc -quality control – having eyes on all steps of production and making sure to deliver a quality product and meet deadlines.
-being able to problem solve and quickly change direction if needed, sometimes the way you are used to doing something isn’t necessarily the best way to do it so you always have to be open to other non traditional ideas and solutions
To close, maybe we can chat about your parents and what they did that was particularly impactful for you?
My parents let me move to NYC at 16 to go to a dance program at NYU. I was exposed to so much during those formative years it really made me resiliant and very self aware. I learned so much from trail and error my first business was a clothing line I started at 19 and while it didn’t succeed it taught me so much about business, people and what I really wanted to do with my career.
Contact Info:
- Website: dawndunning.com
- Instagram: @bazaarnoir.nyc
Image Credits
-photo of myself by Meredith Devine -march for our lives child body bag project Washington DC I produced and creative directed -photo of nun costume project that I designed and produced for peacock @ SXSW -photo of coors light plastic free mart that I designed and produced Brookyln, NY – agency ENTER
