Talis Bell
Head of Product Design; Buying | Transforming Creative Vision into Commercial Growth |…
As the Product Design Lead, I spearheaded the launch and strategic growth of the womenswear department, establishing it as a core commercial pillar by delivering high-impact collections for major retailers including Costco, QVC, and Freemans. I balanced a visionary creative approach with rigorous technical execution, overseeing seasonal campaign concepts, fabric sourcing, and market-ready aesthetics while maintaining a strict focus on garment construction and fit precision. In my capacity as Licensing Lead for ELLE Paris, I navigated complex brand guidelines and global approval standards to ensure 100% of development deadlines were met through meticulous critical path management. By merging hands-on art direction with deep competitor research and sales data analysis, I fostered robust international supplier relationships and delivered commercially successful ranges that drove significant brand evolution.
- Design and Development: Ability to design and develop own ranges while mentoring a team. - Organisation and Administration: Ensure all collection boards, range plans, critical path, and administrative files are kept up-to-date. - Team Management: Oversaw creative direction and delegation of workload to the design team and wider business. - Project Management: Developed and implement project management tools to improve organisation and efficiency of work, resulting in all projects completed on time. - Budget Management: Responsible for managing department budgets. - Art Direction: Oversee art direction briefs and build campaigns. - Garment Quality and Fit: Led fitting sessions with garment techs and ensure fit, quality, and design are delivered. - Forecasting and Supply Chain Management: Provided future product forecasts, facilitate the creation of a new supply chain, and track and manage sampling development. - Operational Support: Provided daily operational and strategic support to the CEO and founder. - Brand Development: Contribute to the development, improvement, and implementation of brand vision and values. - Buying: Skilled in analysing consumer buying patterns, and predict future trends, managing plans for stock levels, and reacting to changes in demand and logistics. - Merchandising: Merchandise, allocate, and directed two future seasons of collections for three brands within four months, resulting in saved stock purchases. - Pricing Strategy: Implement pricing structure for B2B and B2C in multiple currencies and performed daily reviews on sales, average order value, customer lifetime value, and customer retention rate.
- Leadership and Team Management: Successfully led teams of designers at all levels, ensuring that the creative direction from the Creative Director was effectively communicated to the entire team. - Garment Quality and Fit: Collaborated closely with garment techs to ensure that fit, quality, and design were delivered in fitting sessions. - Sourcing and Manufacturing: Developed an in-depth knowledge of sourcing and manufacturing, enabling successful collaborations with Beyond Retro, Modcloth, and Top Vintage. - Budget Management: Managed budgets for Collectif menswear and bright and beautiful, ensuring that financial targets were met. - Product Design: Developed product ranges for both the commercial and alternative markets, with a strong understanding of commercial color palettes, prints, and patterns. - Project Management: Successfully planned and developed multiple projects, ensuring that deadlines were met. - Design: Proficient in both hand drawing and CAD skills, bringing designs to life in a variety of mediums.
- Team Collaboration: Collaborated with team members to select seasonal themes, make edits to lines, and create new concepts. - Business Strategy: Ensure products are in agreement with business strategy. - Fabric and Trim Selection: Select fabrics and trims. Production Sketching: Creating production sketches for development packages. - Technical Design Collaboration: Collaborate with a GT department to ensure development packages are accurate. - Product Design: Designed and developed product ranges for both the commercial and alternative markets. - Colour and Pattern Expertise: Developed a strong understanding of commercial colour palettes, print, and pattern. - Design: Demonstrated strong hand drawing skills and CAD skills, creating and visualizing ideas and producing designs by hand or using computer-aided design (CAD). - Trend Awareness: Keep up to date with emerging fashion trends as well as general trends relating to fabrics, colours, and shapes. - Sourcing: Visited trade shows and manufacturers to source, select, and buy fabrics, trims, fastenings, and embellishments. - Photoshoot Leadership: Lead seasonal campaign photoshoots, directing, styling, organizing, and managing budgets.
- Design: Demonstrate strong CAD skills, creating and visualizing shapes and print design - Product Development: Developed ranges based on themes, working with other departments such as buyers and forecasters to meet the brief. - Team collaboration: Collaborate with team members to select seasonal themes, make edits to lines, and create new concepts. - Sales and Production Liaison: Liaised closely with sales, buying, and production teams on an ongoing basis to ensure items suit the customer, market, and price points. - Garment Tech Assistance: Assisted in tech pack creation. - Sourcing: Travelled to the Far East and EU to source and visit suppliers. Research: Conducted competitive shopping trips and marketing research. - Supplier Negotiation: Negotiated with suppliers on cost. - Trade Show Participation: Showcasing EU and UK fashion trade - several of my designs were selected for their catwalk shows. - Photoshoot Assistance: Assisting on photoshoots, styling, and outfit organizing.
- Negotiation and Liaison: Skilled in negotiating and liaising with customers and suppliers. - Mood boards: Created mood boards to show to clients. - Account Management: Designed and account management for Quiz Clothing, Lipsy, and Forever 21. - Trend Awareness: Keep up to date with emerging fashion trends as well as general trends relating to fabrics, colours, and shapes. - Design: Demonstrate the ability to create and visualize ideas and produce commercial knitwear designs by hand or using computer-aided design (CAD). - Trade Show Participation: Showcase your designs at fashion and other trade shows. - Teamwork: Assisted Head of Design and Merchandising team when required.
I had the pleasure of working with Talis Bell during her time at Collectif and Bright & Beautiful, where I was both her line manager and the Managing Director of the business. I can say without hesitation that Talis is one of the most exceptional and well-rounded professionals I’ve had the opportunity to lead. Talis brought a rare combination of creative vision and commercial intelligence to her role. She consistently demonstrated an ability to bridge design, product development, and operational execution at a very high level. Her contribution went far beyond traditional design responsibilities — she played a key role in shaping product strategy, influencing pricing architecture, and driving overall business performance. As a leader, Talis inspired and elevated those around her. She managed multidisciplinary teams with clarity and empathy, while maintaining a sharp focus on delivery and standards. Her ability to streamline workflows and introduce more efficient processes had a tangible impact on the business, improving both speed to market and overall output quality. From a commercial standpoint, Talis had a deep understanding of data and performance metrics. She actively used KPIs to inform decision-making, adapting strategies in real time to maximise growth and profitability. Her work on global pricing strategy and inventory optimisation was particularly impactful, contributing to stronger margins and more effective stock management. Technically, her expertise in garment engineering and product integrity ensured that everything we produced met a consistently high standard. She combined this with a strong creative direction, leading brand-wide campaigns and ensuring a cohesive and elevated visual identity across all channels. Perhaps most impressively, Talis operated at both a strategic and hands-on level. She was as comfortable contributing at board-level discussions as she was getting into the detail of product development and execution. That versatility is incredibly rare. I would wholeheartedly recommend Talis to any organisation looking for a leader who can drive creative excellence, operational performance, and commercial success in equal measure. She would be a significant asset to any team.