To the students and staff of New College Lanarkshire, Kathleen-Anne Fannan is best known as their Student President for Community & Sustainability.
But her name will soon be scrolling among the credits of a series of high-profile film and TV projects, thanks to her emerging career as a hair and make-up artist.
Kathleen-Anne, 25, who lives in Law village near Carluke, has secured a series of jobs with a little help from her former lecturers’ contacts in the industry.
She recently worked as the hair and make-up designer on the second episode of Amazon Prime drama Cavendish during a three-day shoot at the Trades Hall in Glasgow’s Merchant City.
Cavendish, written by and starring Maddy Bryce, has grown from an eight-minute short piece written for an actor’s showreel in October 2019, into a series.
The first episode, based on English football recruit Gracie Bennett and her experience of settling into a private school in Scotland, clocked up 108,000 watch minutes in its first eight weeks on Prime.
The second episode is currently in post-production and expected to appear on Prime this summer.
Kathleen-Anne, a former pupil of St Aidan’s High in Wishaw, said: “I was recommended for the job by Emma Porter, who was my lecturer at New College Lanarkshire.
“Emma knows what she’s talking about – and I’ve learned just to say yes to everything.
“I already knew the producer of Cavendish from something else that I’d worked on in January, which I’m not allowed to mention just yet!
“I became the make-up designer – and being this young and having that opportunity was amazing. It doesn’t come around very often.”
Kathleen-Anne studied for a total of seven years at New College Lanarkshire – she studied for five years to achieve HNC Hairdressing, and for two years to achieve HND Make-up Artistry.
In November 2016, she won a prestigious gold medal in Hairdressing at the WorldSkills UK contest in Birmingham, which attracts students and apprentices from organisations all over the UK.
Kathleen-Anne first started taking classes in Hairdressing in S3 and S4 through the school-college partnership programme.
She added: “I do love make-up, but hairdressing is my passion – I love it so much. I use every bit of what I’ve learned at New College Lanarkshire in my work.”
Kathleen-Anne was elected last summer by her fellow students to the role of NCL’s Student President for Community & Sustainability.
She has been able to combine her job in the Students’ Association with freelance work on four different projects for film and TV, including a feature film and a drama for BBC.
She said: “I was only 24 when I had my first job after graduating, which was working on a movie that was a massive production. My face must have looked like that emoji with the love-heart eyes!
“Honestly, this has been such a blessing. I’ve got a job as Student President right now that I absolutely love, while at the same time I’m starting out in the career in which I’ve trained for seven years. I just feel so lucky.”
To find out more about New College Lanarkshire’s wide range of courses in Hairdressing or Make-up Artistry, please visit https://www.nclanarkshire.ac.uk/courses
