I recently got to sit down with sophomore Hannah Harris, a Business of Beauty and Fragrance major, and speak to her about her summer internship with Metier Creative. Hannah is also a contributing beauty editor here at the Manor and discovered Metier by covering their SCAD Style event last year. She explained, “Nobody talks about the agencies behind the work. If SCAD hadn’t brought in this agency to talk, how would I even know who the agencies are?”
After following then-co-founder Stacie Brockman on Insta, Hannah discovered that Metier was looking for summer interns. Since she’d gotten to know a bit about the company, she used it to her advantage by addressing her cover letter to “The Dope Women of Metier.” A phone call in Forsyth and internship assignment later, Hannah was in New York with Metier’s small all-female team.
Oh, and did I mention she submitted her favorite memes as part of her application?
It’s important to mention that Hannah was only a rising sophomore when she landed this internship. Most companies won’t even accept anyone younger than a rising junior. This brought us to an interesting point in conversation when it came to SCAD and internships. Hannah made me realize there were a few key things about doing internships that no one talks about. The biggest thing being that if you take an internship for credit only and want it to count on your transcript, you still have to pay for it like it’s a class.
As someone who has only been to New York once for four days, it’s difficult to imagine working there for a whole summer and not knowing anyone or anything about the city. Hannah relayed her New York experience in a positive light. “It was very liberating. It was a really good time to discover what I wanted, who I was, if I could envision myself living here.”
Working at a small company like Metier allowed Hannah to work closely with the other women on lots of different projects. A lot of work was simply trolling different accounts on Instagram. Every once and a while she would ship packages to the Toronto office or deliver props to photoshoots. General work included lots of growth tracking, spreadsheets and strategy decks, even influencer castings. “You have to be in the know,” Hannah emphasizes. “School doesn’t teach you how to follow cool people.”
“On social, it’s a lot easier because I just follow all of them; I can see what they’re doing, they can see what I’m doing,” Hannah notes about post-internship and getting past the awkward “keeping in contact” exchange. “They’re actually interactive.” She also excitedly tells me that they’re still posting projects that she worked on while there, “That’s the coolest. I think that it’s really rewarding.”
When I asked Hannah if she would consider going back to work with Metier again, she didn’t hesitate. “I definitely would, I think they’re really cool,” she starts, “But at the same time I’m also really excited to explore other avenues.” Hannah liked being on the agency side, but also wants to know what it’s like on the corporate side of beauty or in a small independent beauty company. It’s clear Metier was just the start for Hannah, and that she’s going to be dope no matter where she ends up.
Written by Karmin Whipple