Natalie Hawwa `00 and Britt Cosgrove `00: The Roommates

When Natalie Hawwa `00 and Britt Cosgrove `00 met as kindergartners on the Hawken playground, they knew they were on to something good. "We`ve been best friends ever since." says Cosgrove. "We planned as seniors to finish college, move together to New York and work in fashion." Fast forward six years, and the pair are as good as their word. Despite going in different directions for their undergraduate work (Hawwa earned a journalism degree from Southern Methodist University, while Cosgrove majored in psychology at Middlebury), the two reunited as planned and are tackling the fashion industry from a common starting point: their apartment. Cosgrove works as Public Relations Assistant at Prada, where she is responsible for keeping the high-end design house bathed in media limelight. "I strategize ways to get celebrities into Prada and seen," she elaborates; she recently dressed Lindsay Lohan for an A-list party celebrating 20 years of Prada skirts, and was instrumental in selecting the Prada styles seen on-screen in The Nanny Diaries and The Devil Wears Prada. Occasionally, Cosgrove`s product placement strategies land Prada in photographs organized by her roommate. Hawwa is a photo assistant at SELF magazine, where she performs crowd-control throughout the hectic process of arranging and completing fashion spreads for the publication. In addition to coordinating the right photographers and makeup stylists for any given project, says Hawwa, "I really use my people skills. Putting a bunch of creative people into a room to make a piece of art that everyone agrees on...Well." She trails off with a laugh, but adds, "We use world-class photographers who have their own vision, and we have a community of readers we reach with our own vision, and sometimes it means I get a lot of people coffee." Living with a friend of 20-plus years is a welcome antidote to that kind of stress, as is the women`s shared Hawken experience. Soon after moving to New York, recalls Hawwa, "I had an interview at Vogue, and it was one of the scariest things I`ve ever done. I kept thinking, +óGé¼-£This is the biggest fashion magazine in the world -- what am I doing here?` and Britt reminded me that we`ve been surrounded by the best of the best since we were in kindergarten. Hawken is about building the confidence to excel in your true interests." That confidence is critical to succeeding in one of the most competitive and unforgiving industries around, confirms Cosgrove. In 2005, Cosgrove saw "something special" in an actress and mentioned the as-yet unknown celebrity to her Prada co-workers; within months the actress was making waves in a hot movie and Cosgrove was helping to dress her for Cannes. "I realized that I could just carry out my job description, or I could be proactive the way I was encouraged to be at Hawken." Hawken may take a little credit for those essential people skills, too. Though one might expect the pair to be a treasure trove of tales about the industry`s legendary infighting, Hawwa diplomatically defers on that subject: "In this industry everyone has those moments, and we`re lucky to be working with terrific people." Both women will tell you that their roommate`s coworkers are lucky, too.