The Most Beautiful Job in the World

Fashion is one of the most powerful industries in the world, accounting for 6% of global consumption and growing steadily. Since the 1980s and the birth of the neoliberal economy, it has emerged as the glittering face of capitalism, bringing together prestige, power and beauty and occupying a central place in media and consumer fantasies. Yet the fashion industry, which claims to offer highly desirable job opportunities, relies significantly on job instability, not just in outsourced garment production but at the very heart of its creative production of luxury.

Based on an in-depth investigation involving stylists, models, designers, hairdressers, make-up artists, photographers and interns, anthropologist Giulia Mensitieri goes behind fashion's glamorous facade to explore the lived realities of working in the industry. This challenging book lays bare the working conditions of 'the most beautiful job in the world,' showing that exploitation isn't confined to sweatshops abroad or sexual harassment of models, but exists at the very heart of the powerful symbolic and economic centre of fashion.

‘Lucid and chilling a remarkable analysis of how creative capitalism persuades people to work for nothing in the glamor industry.’ Andrew Ross, author of Nice Work if You Can Get it: Life and Labor in Precarious Times (2009)

‘A riveting and revelatory exposé, …[highlighting] the precarious, oft-exploited workforce propelling the fashion industry.’ Brooke Erin Duffy, author of (Not) Getting Paid to Do What You Love: Gender, Social Media, and Aspirational Work (2017)

”Mensitieri's portrayal of the underbelly of Parisian fashion labor delivers a devastating critique of the brutal exploitation behind some of the world's biggest fashion houses.’ Ashley Mears, author of Pricing Beauty: The Making of a Fashion Model (2011)