The American Journal of Fashion is a publication dedicated to publishing design related material directly from industry creatives.
We are excited that you have considered submitting material to the Journal. There are a few things to consider before moving forward and some guidelines we hope will help you naviagte this process.
First, the journal is open to any human that has physical presence in the Americas(permanent or not), this includes North America, Central America, and South America.
Second, the journal is open to any submission with direct relation to the Americas(International views and critiques on fashion and design of the Americas). This can be any perspective in regards to fashion and design, but must relate to the Americas.
This is a wide net, but we hope that through this lens viewers and readers will see the contribution of fashion and design coming from this side of the world. The diversity, the community, the impact.
Further distinctions, the journal will label and differentiate between student work, professional work, and international versions of both.
If this is confusing, submit your work and go from there.
We would first like to point out that anything can be submitted, we are open to the endless possibilities of what can be considered "material" for this publication. There is no end to being creative, and we support submissions that push the concept of what we have laid out. It is up to you to explore and put something meaningful into the world.
With that being said, we have some guidelines that layout, generally, what we are looking for.
Compositions
First and foremost, we are looking for full bodies of work that incorporate all of the parts of the whole. We can call this a written design composition. These come in many forms; thesis, dissertation, essay, paper, etc. The point is for designers and creatives to submit detailed presentations of their work. We are looking for sources, inspiration, attribution, design methods, materials, sketches, images of samples, colors, bibliographies, people who contributed, quotes, etc. All complied into a digestible/viewable/readable format. These types of work are common in other design fields to varying degrees, if you need inspiration.
The Journal has a simple (working)guideline for putting together a piece of work like this. You can see it here.
Fashion Design Illustrations
The journal is looking for design illustrations for collections. This category will be presented with a brief write up with each illustration being presented individually. This category looks to show the unique and diverse ways in which designers in the industry take their ideas from something abstract to something understandable.
Non-related creative work
Designers and industry creatives are always creating. The journal is looking for submissions or nominations, for industry people who are creating non-fashion related works, i.e. works of art, written work, zines, photography, gardens, etc. The idea is to show the diversity of individuals and the ways they create when they are not working.
Other Formats
The editors also invite the submission of alternative formats such as roundtables, interviews and other material that is relevant to the journal's mission.
Art Project/Photoshoot
The Journal dedicates 5-10 pages to a proposed project. Initial proposals should be 400-words long. After evaluating the proposal the editors may extend an invitation to the artist to submit a project breif. A modest stipend for expenses is available upon request.
To help you understand specifically what types of material can be submitted, see the following lists for our major submission categories:
Fashion Illustrations(for design only).
Fashion Illustrations(non-design related)
Design related Material:
Thesis
Research essays
R&D
Samples
Business plans
Sustainability plans
Outreach programs
White Papers
Design techniques
Additive design research
Supply Chain and production research
Non-fashion design Material:
Paintings
Drawings
Poems
DIY Projects
Apartments
Recipes
Artwork in general
Gardens
To make a submission please fill out the form above. Once your request has been made we will connect with you for the major parts of your work.
All submissions should be sent to submit@americanjournaloffashion. Manuscripts should not exceed 8,500 words in length and should hew as closely as possible to Chicago Manual of Style strictures. We reserve the right to edit letters and responses selected for publication.
We will review all materials and decide if they will be published online, in the print version or both.
If your work has been selected for the Journal, we will work directly with you, to receive and make sure we have all necessary material.
If you have any questions please email us at info@americanjournaloffashion.com