You know how it goes: the job everyone else is jealous of, the glamour, the flashbulbs popping? Think again. Sometimes the delights of working in fashion and being surrounded by beautiful things are mitigated by some pretty horrendous personalities and face-clutchingly embarrassing moments. It's hard enough being an intern these days, what with the no money tough job market and the no money rising cost of everything and the no money general thanklessness of the tasks assigned to you in these roles.

So ahead of tomorrow's publication of Lauren Weisberger's Revenge Wears Prada, sequel to the book that practically became a suit of armour for interns, dogsbodies and assistants the world over, we celebrate the steadfastness, determination, initiative and resilience of them all by remembering some of the Prada-wearing devils we've also had to deal with (in strictest anonymity, of course, because we're all still scared of them), as well as the situations that made us who we are today. No, not neurotic wrecks: strong, successful working women.

The weird Skittles task that clearly wasn't work but just an excuse for people to laugh at you
When I interned at [insert hipster publication here] I once had to go to some weird upstairs room and see how many Skittles I could eat with chopsticks in a minute. I never did see where that video ended up, but I hoovered up those Skittles like a pro.

The needy and the night bus
My old boss [REDACTED] used to make me go to parties with her just in case she didn’t know anyone there, and then totally ignore me as soon as someone she knew arrived, nor would she let me leave until she wanted to go. I was always forced to go to these parties even if they were the wrong side of town from home, and then I would be stuck at 1 am, miles away from home without any money or any way to get home.

The rising sense of panic that your Easyjet won't wait for you
[REDACTED] hated me taking time off for holidays and used to create work at the last minute to try to make me miss my flight. I once had about 300 pairs of shoes in for her for an advertising job, and she told me that she hated them all and that I couldn’t leave the office until I had the right ones in.

The one where you find out their bank balance
[REDACTED] used to make me pay in the cheques from all her advertising jobs, so I would see exactly how much money she had been paid, but she would always tell me that she didn’t have enough money to pay me, even though I know she was getting thousands.

When you overhear what they really think of you
I was completely broke as an intern. Always. But I was working at fashion magazine and so wanted to look like I knew at least a bit about clothes. In desperation, I would buy cheap dresses from Oxfam and chop off the bottom to make them shorter (and wearable), relying on my questionable sewing skills to tidy up the hem. They actually looked ok. Or so I thought. Then one day, a rather outspoken fashion journalist said – in earshot of me, ‘she looks like an old granny, she’s got threads hanging off her everywhere.’ Of course, it was crushing. I remained smiles but cried internally all afternoon. That’s a rule for life actually – never let them see you cry.

The one where you vommed your way through the returns through no fault of your own
I also got food poisoning on the last day of a very long distance trip. I was sick the whole way of the 30 hour journey back to the UK. We arrived back to London on a Friday morning (which was also my birthday) and I asked [REDACTED] if I could go home as I was feeling so ill and hadn’t slept for more than 24 hours, saying  I would come back into the office over the weekend to do the returns, as they were not going to leave the office before Monday in any case. I was told no and had to stay and do the returns in between dashes to the loo.

And the one where the vomming was all your fault
I once had to attend a fitting on a Saturday for red carpet outfits for a big family franchise. I stayed out all night, came to work, and spent the fitting throwing up in the loo with the young celebs and their mums on the other side of the bathroom wall.

The easy-enough-to-make mistake that convinced the whole office you were the stupidest person alive
Trying to interpret and decode which designer label was being said as they left a message was horribly difficult. They said Ermenegildo Zegna, I heard Denier. Yes, Sophia from Denier called. WHO? Ermmmm

The mistake that finally proved you were the stupidest person alive
As an assistant, I went on an amazing shoot in Mexico for a week. I'd never done anything like it and proved as much by managing to stand in the wrong place for every single image, meaning my own less than model-shaped shadow appeared in every shot. A bad assistant, yes, but surely a worse photographer for not noticing?

The Victorian matriarch wrong change theft test
When I was interning at [REDACTED], [REDACTED] sent me out to get her a coffee, giving me a very precise amount of money and explaining for a full five minutes that if it didn't cost that amount, I had got her needless to say very complex coffee order wrong. When the barista charged me a whole £1 less, I couldn't work out how I'd messed up so admitted to [REDACTED] that I had come away with change and gave her the pound coin. To which she said, 'well done, you've passed.'

The fact you spent your salad days cleaning up someone else's
[REDACTED] had been promoted and so was moving desk. It was down to me, as the most junior member of the team, to pack up and move their belongings. Ordinarily that wouldn’t be cause for a moan, would it? But then you’re not factoring in this editor’s fondness for tomatoes. They were everywhere. In drawers, under drawers, rolling out of bags and precariously perched on look books. Smushed, mouldy and sometimes rotten to the point of oozing liquid, I spent a lot of that day retching and wishing for the first time ever that I owned a pair of marigolds. Many, many years later I still have issues with cherry tomatoes in salads.

And the reason you reclaimed your salad days AKA 'the poo catalyst'
My moment of clarity that I’d done my time as an intern came to me in a stuffy, tiny bathroom with no windows scraping out the dog poo from the heavy-tread Burberry boots that had been soiled earlier that day on the shoot.

The thing that almost made up for it all (warning: contains '90s)
One of my first assisting jobs was tucking Dermot O’Leary and Damian Lewis into their pants. Threading their belts through the hoops and pulling it close, holding a terribly ironed shirt up against their bare backs. They were just starting out. I like to remember them flirting with me, there was something in the way they asked me for water…  

The frankly sick and dark
I am told that [REDACTED] asked her assistant to kill her cat as she thought it wasn’t going to make it through the weekend. She asked her to smother it with a cushion.  The assistant said no and took the cat home and looked after it herself.