Posts filed under 'casual wear'
ClothingRegister.com is quite possibly the web’s best directory of clothing manufacturers. It’s an amazing, truly global database of factories that produce clothing and apparel and its been set up to make it simpler for people to find clothing manufacturers, and for clothing manufacturers to find it easier to locate customers.
The directory even uses sophisticated googlemap technology to help people find clothing factories all around the world. Simply visit their homepage and type in the region where you want to find a manufacture or supplier. If anything in their database matches your region, they give you full details, but if you prefer a more traditional approach they also list all the areas that have factories on their homepage with a sidebar that tells you how many factories there are in each region. Learn more at www.clothingregister.com
August 28th, 2008
It’s that time of year: some businesses are gearing up and others are laying off staff – employers are looking around for new talent and employees are looking around for a job that will satisfy them now their summer holiday is over and they are realising that it’s another whole long year before they can escape the workplace for another few weeks of sunshine. And if affects the way we dress.
When somebody shows up for work dressed differently to usual, there are two things that go through the heads of their colleagues and three things that go through the heads of their bosses. Colleagues think:
- She’s got a date with a man she wants to impress or
- He’s got an interview in his lunch break
Bosses think
- She’s got an interview
- He’s after my job and trying to look like he deserves my desk
- She’s on her way to see her bank manager for a loan
In other words, when you upgrade your work style co-workers and bosses tend to view your behaviour with suspicion rather than respect. Overdressing is tolerated in bosses, new employees and very young people but mocked as pretentious in our contemporaries or colleagues who suddenly seem to think they are better than the rest of us. A day spent perusing the advice of Trinny and Susannah or Gok Wan might make you feel great but it will demoralise your workmates if you suddenly turn up dressed differently – in fact they will think you look like a dog’s dinner!
If you want to upgrade your work clothing, do it piece by piece over a period of weeks, and never ignore the unwritten guidelines for your workplace. Take your cue from the people around you who and don’t great an unbridgeable gap between you and other people in the organization. If the boss wears a polo-shirt and chinos, your Armani suit won’t have the effect you expect it to – in fact, it could lead to you being shown the door!
Suit and tie courtesy of Janiebell
August 25th, 2008
Bernard (sometimes spelt Bernhard) Gant arrived in New York in 1914, as an immigrant from the Ukraine. His first job, as with so many immigrant men, was working in the garment industry as a collar-sewing specialist in a Manhattan factory. Within a couple of years he’d met the woman who was to become his wife: she was a button and buttonhole specialist who worked for the same company.
As he progressed from factory hand to entrepreneur Bernard Gant sold ‘fine’ shirts to private labels in America, including Manhattan Shirts, J. Press and Brooks Brothers and his sons came into the business in the 1940s to help. While they consistently sold to other companies, their shirts always bore a small red ‘G’ embroidered in an unobtrusive spot.
Their ‘preppy’ shirts became fashion must haves on university campuses across the USA in the late fifties and early sixties – worn with the collar undone and no tie, and even with the top button undone unless formal events were being attended. The Gant style included a shirt-front that buttoned down a double-truck hem, and the distinctive Gant loop at the top of the back pleat which was used for hanging up the shirt when changing for athletic events – this was the key feature that made the shirt a success – as sportsmen and their adoring fans found the loop useful, it became a fashion icon. At one point in the 1960s, Gant was the second-largest shirt maker in the world but the family sold the business in 1967 and it has changed hands several times since then – to day it is owned Pyramid Sportswear of Sweden.
Gant has avoided some of the negative connotations that have struck other brands that appeal to young men, such as Fred Perry’s right-wing fan club of skinheads, but has been associated with homosexuals who are attracted to sportsmen in the lyrics of some rock songs.
The Gant style is roomy, often even blousey, and the collars whether hard or soft, have a ‘roll’ – formal shirts have a back pleat and both formal and polo-shirts have the signature hanging loop. Gant polo-shirt collars are often a little wider and flatter lying than other brands; being noticeably more difficult to ‘pop’ or stand up than most.
Gant shirt courtesy of Gant
August 21st, 2008
Origins
The company was established by David Abercrombie in 1892 and New York lawyer Ezra Fitch was one of his regular customers – buying outdoor clothing for shooting and hunting. At the turn of the century Fitch bought a major share of the company, thus becoming co-founder and in 1904, Fitch’s surname was incorporated and Abercrombie & Fitch came into being. It was a stormy relationship - Fitch saw value in taking the company in the direction of general apparel, while Abercrombie wanted to continue selling professional clothing and accessories to professional outdoorsmen. Finally, after many arguments, Abercrombie sold his share in the company to Fitch in 1907 and returned to manufacturing outdoor goods.
Signature style
The A&F brand is defined as using ‘the finest cashmere, pima cottons, and highest quality leather to create the ultimate in casual, body conscious clothing’. Along with ‘implementing and/or incorporating time honoured machinery and techniques in order to produce the most exclusive denim ever created’, these two statements define how Abercrombie & Fitch sees its place in the market.
Why we love them
There is something quintessentially American about the brand. See a ‘Crombie from half a street away and you know the style immediately. It’s not just in the distressing, although that often makes the clothes look like comfortable things you’ve had for months, even straight from the shelf, it’s in the detailing: the flat turned seams and the dropped shoulders, and the careful attention to decreasing/increasing American teen sizes that allows everybody from the skinny chick to the fat kid to find a polo-shirt that feels just right.
They even have their own slang:
- An Abercrombie zombie is a man or wom an, boy or girl who only ever wears their clothing
- An Abercrombie & Fitch witch is a woman (often a bit older than the average buying age for their lines) who wears t he brand all the time because she’s scared she’ll lose her looks and popularity if she doesn’t.
Dissenting views
They have often been criticised for sexualising young people and children, for the levels of music in their stores (it’s supposed to be 80 decibels, tests in the USA in 2006 found thirty stores playing it at 90+ decibels, which causes permanent damage to the ears) and their All-American styling which has led to discrimination cases being brought against the company by non-white, non-American people who believe they have been refused employment or promotion because they didn’t fit the brand ‘style’. So far, all cases have been settled out of court.
Abercrombie & Fitch billboard courtesy of daniel spils
August 15th, 2008
Miguel Caballero comes from a country where clothing can save your life, and he trains new employees by shooting them! Colombian-born Caballero tests his garments by firing at his staff as they model the clothing – the ultimate test of both the wearer and the clothing.
In 1992 he was studying at university during his country’s vicious civil war, and many of his fellow students in Bogota were the children of politicians and business leaders – and wore bullet-proof vests around the campus.
His clothing combines style with utility and is worn Steven Seagal, King Abdullah of Jordan and Venezuela’s president, Hugo Chavez. Caballero clothing is lighter than military style vests: a bullet-proof leather jacket weighs only 1.2 kilos. Perhaps somebody should have told Harriet Harman and then we’d never have seen her wandering around Peckham in that cumbersome stab-proof vest, because his collection includes shirts, formal blazers, raincoats, and even bullet-proof ties.
But there is one drawback - a polo-shirt that will absorb the bullets from a mini-machine gun is rather expensive … starting at £5,000 and washing instructions are extremely complex!
Mauricio Chazaro, director of Miguel Caballero Ltd, arranges the bulletproof leather jacket for display
August 11th, 2008
As Britain’s beleaguered Prime Minister faces more criticism, more Treasury money being pumped into Northern Rock and more manoeuvring from his cabinet colleagues, Hadley Freeman, deputy fashion editor at The Guardian has some advice for him. She says ‘For heaven’s sake, Gordon, take off your jacket! … buy some shirts in colours other than “starchy white”, maybe even a loose polo-shirt for your off-duty moments, ruffle your hair up a bit and don’t be afraid of showing a wrist or two. Perhaps even consider switching your facial expression from “bitter glower” to “friendly smile”.’
Would it work? It’s a certain fact that recent political stars on the world of the Western stage: Barack Obama, Tony Blair, Bill Clinton – all have the ability to dress down in their more relaxed moments without looking like a complete prat. But each has had their own moment of sartorial disaster too: the anti-Obama campaign chose to use a photograph of him in West African dress at a ceremony to suggest he wasn’t really ‘American’ while we can all remember Tony Blair’s sweaty armpits on the conference platform in that light blue shirt, can’t we? As for Clinton and clothing, well … the least said about his ability to deal with his trousers, the better! There are dozens of examples of wardrobe failure in politics – for example, William Haig wore a baseball cap to a festival and lost public confidence immediately.
But there is something important about being able to dress down without looking daft. We see our politicians much more these days, and much more often when they are off duty and supposedly relaxed, but they don’t have the right that we all have to schlep around the place in old trackies and flip-flops: they have a duty to give the impression of power even while at rest. So I echo Hadley’s call, and will go a step further: by all means sport a polo-shirt, but why not also show yourself in a hoody and reveal your inner class victim, or take to the streets in an organic sweatshirt and show that what’s closest to your heart is a bit of fair-trade and social equality in purest cotton!
Gordon Brown courtesy of fotologic
August 5th, 2008
This is the question that www.nosymbolrequired.co.uk asked.
And the answer?
Well, it was http://www.saftag.com which was given an overall rating of 5 stars, another 5 stars for item quality, 4 stars for item value and 5 stars for item fit and sizing.
Mark Wallace, who conducted the review said, ‘I have had difficulty in the past sourcing good enough organic cotton t-shirts which will hold the reputation of my company. I used anvil organic tees for a while, which were in the correct price range, however they didn’t stand the test of time. SAF t-shirts are good quality, are not prone to misshaping after washing, and are easy to print on. The feel of the fabric is far superior to any other organic cotton tee I have managed to get my hands on. The sizes are acceptable and what you would expect. The colours are vibrant and also last well when washing.
His only quibble?
He wants to know when SAF will be bringing out a yellow tee!
White organic T-shirt courtesy of SAF
