Ashley McDonnell joined The Ryan Tubridy Show this morning to talk all things fashion, how sport taught her discipline and her future in the fashion world.
"I loved fashion and in Galway I didn't have a huge exposure to it, other than in media. I was always obsessed", she tells Ryan.
Read more: Galway's real-life Emily in Paris, who became Dior manager at 22
A Christian Dior exhibition in Somerset House was a key turning point for a 16-year-old McDonnell, where she saw the original drawings and illustrations from the fashion house. After that, her vision was set: she'd learn French and move to Paris to work for Dior.
"I thought the only way was through design and I had to be a fashion designer", she says, she she built a portfolio and applied to NCAD, as well as other art schools across Ireland and the UK. "I had an okay response, it wasn't overwhelmingly strong, so it made me a little bit less confident in my design skills."
From there, she started looking at the major luxury brands and groups, mapping out where the main players had studied in France. "The power of Google search, LinkedIn and just stalking people online", she laughs.
"I was able to go through all of the information of all of the brands and see where did they come from, what did they do."
Her first step was to become fluent in French, before pursuing her education in DCU and later in NEOMA Business School Paris. She followed this up with a masters, which is deemed necessary for jobs in fashion in France, which she did as a double masters with HEC, one of the schools that kept coming up in her research, and UCD Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School.
Her first day in Paris, however, was far from picture perfect. "Everything went against us, we got fined on the Métro somehow, I fell in a pothole in the Champs Elysée – does that even exist? I don't know. I was like, maybe this was a bad life decision, but after 48 hours I was like, okay, this is my city."
So how would she describe Paris to someone who has never been there? "I would say, don't listen to all of the clichés because a lot of them can be quite negative. If you say 'bonjour' to everybody you meet, you'll have ten times more fun because French people love when you speak French to them. It's an outdoor museum in terms of the architecture, in terms of the creativity, the design. It's just absolutely beautiful."
Once working with LMVH in Paris, McDonnell focused on digital luxury strategy, launching "hundreds, if not thousands" of campaigns. One such campaign she's launched recently is for Paco Rabane's latest fragrance, Phantom, which comes in the body of a robot and is the first connected fragrance in the world.
Coming from Ireland proved to be a big plus in her favour, as she says the country has a reputation for being tech-focused and innovative, thanks to its association with companies like Google and Facebook.
"I love my job, I actually can't believe it's a real job", she tells Ryan. "But that's the exciting thing, and it's why I'm really happy to be here today as well, to let Irish people know that this exists and we can go and live these lives, like all the French and Italians have known about for a long time.
"But in Ireland we don't have that history of working in the luxury industry, therefore it's hard to know how to navigate."
To listen to the full interview with Ashley , click here.
