Faith Johnson is Founder of Caramel Rock and runs School College Fashion Week and Petra Fashion. Her mission is to empower young people and support people into fashion creating a level playing field for all, addressing diversity in the industry, socially and culturally. Faith is a PhD fellow at the Royal College of Art. Her research is based on fashion and community development in Jamaica.

Faith studied at Central Saint Martins, and developed her career in fashion and the creative industries. Working with organisations such as the V&A, Canary Wharf Group, Rosetta Arts, and government as well as working with faculties and institutions to name a few. Faith has featured on a number of different panels and boards at an executive level in and out of the fashion and creative industry. She has also worked within manufacturing, fashion production, and curation. She has also trained and qualified as a teacher, teaching for over 15 years, and has gone on to support start-ups.

Aimee Gomez is a creative producer and educator in the fashion industry working on a variety of international events including runway shows, photo shoots and brand development.

She is the founder of The Fashion Breakdown and STEM X FASHION. The Fashion Breakdown has been running since 2018, delivering a careers advisory service and educational platform that offers advice and guidance alongside tangible hands-on workshops and work experience opportunities to help young people make informed decisions and clear pathways for their futures.

STEM X FASHION promotes and informs on the benefits and career routes into the fashion industry through the study of STEM subjects. Linking the study of STEM to an aspirational industry, such as the Fashion industry, captures the imaginations and raises aspiration of young people working with Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics focused career.

Talia Andrea is Youth Music’s NextGen Community Producer, where she leads on the programme of events and opportunities for 18-30 year olds looking to kickstart their career in the music industry.

Before starting in her role at Youth Music, she was herself a recipient of their NextGen Fund in Round 5, with which she launched FEMMESTIVAL – a music festival and concert series with all-female lineups.

Talia has received various awards in recognition of her contribution to the future of the music industry, including winning ‘Rising Star (Industry)’ at the Youth Music Awards 2024, and being named one of Access All Areas’ ’30 Under Thirty’ in the same year. Last year, FEMMESTIVAL received further funding from PRS’s Early Career Promoter Fund.

Jane Bellamy is a seasoned Talent Acquisition Manager at Universal Music Group since July 2022, bringing extensive experience in recruitment and talent consultancy within the music industry. Prior to this role, Jane served as a People & Talent Consultant at BIY People & Talent from September 2021 to June 2022, working with a diverse range of music business clients and supporting individuals in their career development. Jane's recruitment career began at Handle Recruitment, where responsibilities included Managing Consultant, Account Manager for Music, and Recruitment Resourcer from March 2015 to August 2021. Earlier experience also includes a brief tenure as a Resourcer at Handle Recruitment and a period as a stay-at-home parent. Jane holds a Master's degree in Visual and Performing Arts from Leeds Beckett University, completed in 2012.

Charlotte is in the Talent Acquisition at Sony Music. I look after the recruitment for our entry level programmes as well as other roles in the UK and international business. I am passionate about demystifying the Music Business and sharing knowledge to help people get started in their music career.

Cordi Ashwell is Director and Founder of DECORDIA LTD based in Manchester. She been working as a designer for theatre, events and music festivals for 20 years. She is dedicated to sustainable and circular practice in all areas of the business, including giving young people opportunities to break into the tough music festival industry.

Jasmine is a Programme Producer for music organisation, Sound Connections, based in East London. Jasmine supports day to day running of the charity's consultancy services and Youth Voice training events, which help music and arts/cultural organisations to develop their work with young people and to better understand their impact. Jasmine is also a practising independent artist/musician/producer/singer-songwriter, and as someone with a non-traditional path into music, she is passionate about expanding access to music and music education for all.

Damien is the founder of Indie Novella. Indie Novella is a non-profit independent publisher, bookseller and social enterprise devoted to publishing new and under-represented authors. Damien is both an Indie Novella founder and author, his heartwarming and hilarious novel Joined Up brings together disjointed families, inappropriate relationships and London's north-south divide. He also teaches on the Indie Novella writing course.

I have been working in recruitment for 11 years, starting in luxury retail recruitment before moving to publishing starting with magazines. For the past three years I’ve been with HarperCollins and responsible for finding great talent, ensuring diversity and inclusion remain at the forefront of our hiring strategies, and supporting managers in building strong and successful teams.

My career in fashion/media happened by mistake, I wanted to work has a zoologist, In 1980 I went with a friend to Vivienne Westwood newly opened Worlds end shop and while he and his friend went out for a coffee I was asked to mind the shop for 10 minutes, I wore all some of these strange colourful clothes in what can only be called a pantomime of a shop , when this middle aged women walked and and started to ask me a 101 questions (this turned out to be Vivienne Westwood) and liking me offered me a job. I dropped out of school and for the next 3 years i worked with Westwood & McLaren not just as a shop assistant, but doing Media/PR for both the show/Clothes but also helping out with the band Bow wow wow.

This lead on to working for a number of publications from 1985 - 2000, when I decided to take a break from the industry. In 2010 I was asked to give a talk at the Mayors Office on ' why young people found It difficult to find employment within the Creative sector' out of the discussion I was asked to set up a project that would help and promote young talent and help open up the industry. ASBO magazine was born. the magazine works with young unemployed people from all across the UK wishing to break into the creative sector. It is a free bi-monthly magazine and is being called the new Face Magazine, it is distributed world. In 2024 we was voted best Independent magazine, with 4 of it's cover being featured in the 10 most Iconic magazine covers of 2024.

In 2025 we are looking to work more closely with schools/Universities to equipment their students to be more industry ready:

Cameron Watson is a Marketing and Audience Executive at Penguin Random House, driving impactful campaigns for #Merky Books. His work has contributed to BMS Award-winning teams and Nibbies-shortlisted projects. Cameron leads the New Writers' Prize initiative and is also a key driving force in the #Merky Books x HSBC UK Futures partnership, championing emerging talent and finding readers in unlikely places.

Adrian has an extensive career in the creative industries, from managing high profile arts organisations to delivering multi-annual creative programmes; from making innovative award winning new art work for contemporary arts centres to performances for main house stages and site specific spaces; from producing and directing films to devising large scale participatory arts projects with communities.

Adrian is the Chief Operating Officer at Hay Festival and works across the organisation to develop and deliver Hay Festival’s strategic, creative, corporate and charitable objectives.

Ben Mottershead is the founder of Studio BND (But Never Dull), a design agency dedicated to creating trusted brands. Alongside the day-to-day of BND, he lectures at the University of Hertfordshire on the BA Graphic Design & Illustration Course, and sits on the ‘creative comeback’ advisory board, an initiative which aims to help increase accessibility to the creative industries for differently-abled individuals.

As someone who lives day-to-day with ADHD it Ben most of his life to come to terms with who he is, and what I wanted to do with his life. In the process of this he was made redundant from my first three roles within the industry, and quit his last full-time role due to a mental health crisis and burnout. As a result of this, his outlook has always been to try and help others better prepare for their own futures.

Bron is a Freelance Designer specialising in Branding. She has over 5 years of industry experience and an MA in Communication Design, working primarily for purpose-led and social impact projects.

Paul is a Design Director at Elmwood, bringing a wealth of experience across 10 years in the industry working for some of the most iconic design agencies globally. Paul has worked on several award-winning projects such as the rebrand of Byron Burgers, which took home several awards in the 2023 including a D&AD Wood Pencil, Silver Award at Pentawards and a Silver Award at the Brand Impact Awards, and has been involved in other industry-leading work for brands such as Skittles, Dolmio, Stella Artois, Kelloggs, Heinz and Pret A Manger.

On top of this, Paul has hosted a number of talks, his most recent was on behalf of Pentawards at London packaging Week, which delved into importance and need for a more inclusive industry, discussing challenges encountered by Black creatives, and ways to support the community, making the industry more accessible to those from ethnic minorities.

Ryan has a BA(Hons) in Design & Technology and English teaching, and an MA in illustration. He has taught D&T in the UK, Middle East and Asia, with students gaining awards for the highest grades in the world. Having contributed to several books, presented at international conferences on creativity and design education, he now works as Director of Education for the educational charity ‘The Design & Technology Association’.