Fashionably Pete Rich D-1
Pete Rich, fashion illustrator extraordinaire, shows us how it’s done
Carving one’s own niche in an increasingly competitive job market seems like a daunting task. For an artist, the challenge most often begins with the most basic of things, pen and paper. Pete
Rich is now the newly minted book author behind My Fashion Sketchpad, published by Take Five Books under Anvil Publishing, but he had to go through a detour of studying Physical Therapy at the University of Santo Tomas before he got here.
Being an artist is innate to Pete who grew up with artistmother Marlyn, the person he credits for drawing out his creative side. After finishing his Physical Therapy course, he entered the world of fashion by way of interning in the thennumber one women’s magazine for print, Cosmopolitan Philippines. He flourished there and when celebrity stylist Liz
Uy called out for interns on her team, Pete took the chance to indulge his love for fashion and styling. But it was his confidence in pitching his own talent for drawing that brought Pete to where he is today.
“I wanted to do something that is just me, what I can do better than other people, and I thought of drawing,” said Pete. “I took up the courage to ask Liz when she was coming up with a book. I said, Liz, do you need an illustrator? Because I can draw.” Liz’s answer, “Sure, send me your stuff,” set things in motion, despite Pete not having a proper portfolio. He recalls that his drawings were mostly on friends’ notebooks and doodles. That and his “desire to be part of the project,” as Liz says in My Fashion
Sketchpad’s foreword, became Pete’s winning edge of landing the fashion illustrator credit for Liz’s StyLIZed.
He has since done fashion illustrations for two more books, Paano Ba ‘To by Bianca Gonzalez and Team Real: Your All-Access Pass Into James Reid and Nadine Lustre’s World.
My Fashion Sketchpad brought out Pete’s latent skill as a teacher, he says, because he wants the book to become a sort of guide to budding artists, aspiring next-generation artists, fashion illustrators, fashion designers, and hobbyists.
“I want this book to breed new artists, to get more people to draw, to start with handdrawn sketches in a world where digital is taking over, to feel what it is like to draw on paper and from there hone their craft,” he says.
Because he is mostly self-taught,
I want this book to breed new artists, to get more people to draw, to start with handdrawn sketches in a world where digital is taking over, to feel what it is like to draw on paper and from there hone their crafts.’
Pete hopes that My Fashion Sketchpad makes the learning process easier for artists. When he started, he had no guide in fashion illustration. It was while working on Bianca’s book that Pete realized he could bridge that learning gap. “Through her self-help book, she wanted to help the younger generation,” he says. “I decided I wanted to help the next batch of illustrators, hobbyists, and those interested in fashion.”
Pete wants the industry to grow, “To stop the mentality of looking at artists as free tickets, to draw something for free and for them not to be taken for granted. My goal is turn it into a legit industry,” he says.
Here are some lessons we picked up from Pete. 1. START WITH THE FACE. His favorite chapter in My Fashion
Sketchpad is the chapter where he tackles the face. Pete says that is where he gets to play the teacher card the most. “People always ask me about the face. Here I start with eyes, then poses, then clothes, the basics so people can experiment from there on making their own style,” he explains.
For his distinct face drawings, he says he does not draw anyone from memory but that it has become his signature look.
2. HAVE YOUR OWN STYLE.
Pete’s style is minimalist in the way he works his strokes and lines. Today, Pete is taking up Sculpture at the University of the Philippines. He hopes that this will help him develop his own style as he has mostly been self-taught. He is excited how learning the techniques and concepts of sculpture will marry with his own fashion illustration. “With sculpture, I wanted to do something for myself that is tangible and something you can place in your house,” he beams.
3. DON’T BE AFRAID TO BRANCH OUT INTO RELATED FIELDS AND EXPLORE POSSIBILITIES.
Before becoming a fashion illustrator, Pete was into styling for magazines and eventually for Liz Uy’s team. Because of this strong link to fashion, he eventually started getting into live art, portrait, and fashion illustrations for events. He has done this for luxury brands like Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Michael Kors, Marc Jacobs, Tory Burch, Cartier, and Longchamp where he would sketch the outfits or the faces of the attendees. Doing live art and fashion illustrations at events is not something your education teaches you but, as Pete exemplifies, it can become something of a market you make for yourself. He does credit Liz for his foot in the door, “I did not expect those brands to want to work with me, but Liz was instrumental in opening these doors.” He explains that someday, he hopes to illustrate more for the visual aspect of enjoying art and not be limited as a vehicle to support fashion brands.
4. TO MAKE IT AS AN ARTIST, ESPECIALLY AS A FASHION ILLUSTRATOR, BE DEDICATED AND HAVE GOOD WORK ETHICS.
Pete says that his work is mostly from word of mouth. Eighty percent of his commissioned work comes from “someone talking to someone else” about his work because his social media following is not as huge as other illustrators. He makes sure to be reliable and to deliver on the work he promises, which is how he gets other people to speak of his work for him. 5. DON’T NEGLECT THE BASICS OF PEN AND PAPER.
In the age of digital, Pete still starts everything with pen and paper, handdrawing everything. While he will try fashion animation down the line to cater to a new market, he does not want to forego this discipline.
6. LEARN FROM THE WORK OF OTHERS.
So who inspires Pete Rich? Vogue fashion illustrator David Downton, the late René Gruau who was best known for his exaggerated portrayal of fashion design, Soleil Ignacio who is a multi-disciplinary creative focusing on illustration, and painter-illustrator Valerie Chua.