American Fashion Podcast

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Episode 121: And Then Tim Gunn Showed Up Nov 23, 2016

Show notes

Reshoring, an awkward word for an essential concept: bringing manufacturing back from overseas. Instrumental in this process are new agile factories, able to produce at low cost in smaller quantities. One company creating such factories, and making a major difference for a lot of emerging desingers and even established brands adapting to new market conditions, is Kathryn Hilderbrand’s Good Clothng Company, on Cape Cod and in Fall River, Massachusetts.

In the studio for this episode are Kathryn Hilderbrand and two of her advisers: a public policy expert who served in the Obama Administration, Mark Linton, and fashion industry veteran and Project Runway superstar, Tim Gunn.

“Well, I think Kathryn is beautifully addressing our biggest challenge, which is to re-shore.” – Tim Gunn

What is different about these new more agile factories? What can a home sewer learn in 12 weeks that makes them ready to sew in a factory? Is the capacity for re-shoring to the United State ready, or will it be ready?

Denovation – abandoning an idea or technology, which had formerly, perhaps wrongly, been seen as progressive.

Episode 120: 120 – Get Your Own Style, A Men Swear Episode With Will Welch Nov 15, 2016

Show notes

Will Welch

GQ Style‘s Editor-In-Chief, Will Welch, is the man at the helm of a brand new approach to a broad appeal fashion magazine for men, investing in multi-platform content with attention rivaling the printed pages. Seth Friedermann calls in from the far reaches of Eastern Pennsylvania to talk mens style, mens fashion business, and music culture.

This episode is about… How do magazines work now? How should designers think about advertising? How do men shop? What defines the current moment of menswear? Who should you listen to about what matters in the industry and trend tracking? Yes, that last one was a trick question.

References:

Male Fashion Advice section on Reddit

Episode 119: 119 – Save The Garment Center Status Report Nov 10, 2016

Show notes

Save The Garment Center

We’ve been hearing about Save The Garment Center for years, but it’s a bit difficult to gauge the organization’s progress as we see more hotels and condos replacing manufacturing and showroom buildings across the protected zone in midtown Manhattan.

“Save the Garment Center was started in 2007 as a grassroots campaign by factory owners Samanta Cortes, Anthony Lilore, Paul Cavazza and Larry Geffner. This campaign was in response to City Hall’s plans to lift the 1987 zoning laws that had protected the leases of the Garment Center fashion tenants for the past 23 years. Save the Garment Center’s initial goal was to keep the manufacturers and suppliers in New York’s Garment Center from being pushed out of the district, or having to shut down all together.” – savethegarmentcenter.org

In this episode, Anthony Lilore, Samanta Cortes, Caroda Inc. garment factory owner Ida Leigh M. Law, and Create-a-Marker Inc. owner Paul Cavazza provide an update on the organization’s progress.

Also in the studio, Flying Solo Collective founder Elizabeth Solomeina, and Artbag owner Chris Moore, whose business not only manufactures high end leather accessories for his 1130 Madison Avenue store, they also recondition and restore vintage bags and other accessories.

References:

CFDA Fashion Manufacturing Initiative (list of factories)
Maker’s Row
The Garment District NYC Fashion Directory
DG Expo
Park Avenue International
Village Tannery

Episode 118: 118 – Clothed In Cool Nov 06, 2016

Show notes

Clothed In Cool

Charles Beckwith and Seth Friedermann chat over Skype about…

How important is content creation in selling fashion?
How to think about building an e-commerce website in a more holistic sense?
Charles tries out “mass customization” and hits a wall.
How do you know that the ad agency isn’t just telling you what you want to hear?
Does trying to “stay relevant” keep you from being clothed in cool?
Who are the trendsetters today? Are they really just the same people they were yesterday?
How insane is aspiration luxury as a strategy for new and small brands?
Marketing vs. Branding… and yes, it’s important.

References:

King Content: Monster or Hero? (BoF / GQ Style)

Episode 117: 117 – Fashion Historian Patricia Mears Oct 26, 2016

Show notes

Patricia Mears is the Deputy Director of The Museum at FIT, and author of numerous Fashion Studies books.

Fashion historian Patricia Mears is in the studio with us this week, talking about The Museum at FIT, and her historical perspective on the fashion business now vs. decades past.

Topics:

Who collects clothing and other bits of fashion and preserves it in private fashion history collections or donates it to museums? What is the dollar value of rarer pieces, and has that changed in the last couple years? What is the most active hot spot for original global street style? Is there a need for multiple smart curatorial voices in fashion studies? How is fashion being absorbed by consumers and the culture today? How do we identify names of fashion design and construction geniuses whose work has now been more or less forgotten? How does Patricia Mears, fashion historian, define the characteristics of the overall collection held by the Museum at FIT?

Now vs. Then:

“I think it’s going to continue to be tough. If you read some of the quotes and interviews from designers from the 20s and 30s, you’d think they were talking about today. ‘There are too many people,’ ‘there is not enough demand,’ ‘I’m trying to market my goods,’ ‘I can’t get the money from wholesalers for fabric,’ and ‘the department stores are giving me a hard time.’ I think the thing that has changed so much is access to The Internet, and that kind of aspect of social media, having a much larger voice.”

Now vs. Tomorrow

“One of the things economists are saying about manufacturing around the world is that we’re going to see a real drop in jobs. And while this election cycle is motivated by that in part here in the United States, one of the main reasons for that is automation, and that’s going to be moving ever-forward. I also think that we have to rethink how we train people coming up.”

References:

Fendi makes fashion history at the Trevi Fountain – video – (CNN)

Episode 116: 116 – The Flying Solo Retail Concept Oct 20, 2016

Show notes

Flying Solo is a new fashion store in the popular Soho designer shopping area of Manhattan, where there are many, but it is also a different store in the retail landscape. The clerks working the store in shifts are not hourly wage slaves, but the designers of the clothing on the racks and the accessories on the shelves. For someone with a large brand this would be impractical, but for an emerging designer it seems to fit like a glove.

Designers Elizabeth Solomeina and Katie Lares stayed late in the store for this brief introduction to the store and “the movement,” as they call it.

Now open at 224 Mulberry Street in Soho, the Flying Solo retail concept brings designers closer to customers, and customers closer to satisfaction.

Episode 115: Ecocult’s Sustainability Roundtable Oct 13, 2016

Show notes

Ecocult founder Alden Wicker moderates a panel of fashion sustainability leaders, featuring jewelry designer Melissa Joy Manning, Zady.com founder Maxine Bedat, Maiyet co-founder Kristy Caylor, and womenswear designer Mara Hoffman.

The panel covered a wide range of issues facing designers who are trying to manufacture using the most sustainable methods possible.

More photos and a deeper outline of the discussion will be available on the Ecocult website.

photos by Rachael Elana Photography

Episode 114: 114 – Fashion Is Freedom Author Tala Raassi Oct 12, 2016

Show notes

The story of a swimwear designer who came the long way round. “When she was 16, Tala Raassi went to a party. She talked to boys, and wore a mini-skirt. She was punished with 40 lashes and five days in jail.” That is the beginning of her story, but what happened in the following years is a story far more familiar to our audience, that of a designer trying to figure out how to get into and stay in the business of fashion.

Fashion Is Freedom Author Tala Raassi

The book, Fashion Is Freedom: How a Girl from Tehran Broke the Rules to Change Her World, outlines some of the most common problems young designers face, from working with the wrong partners, to support behind aspirations to be an artist from one parent and not the other, to starting with a t-shirt line, to getting tied up with the lower tier entertainment industry bottom feeders who promise the world and deliver less than advertised (including a certain nightclub-dwelling New York con artist currently running for President of The United States), to hitting the infamous low minimums wall, to crazy international travels with strange people and that universal human connection that transcends spoken language. Directed at women, and especially young girls, the book shows a way through dark and difficult chapters, though an interesting story for just about anyone. It is a cautionary but inspiring tale, well worth the read.

In The Studio

In the studio with American Fashion, Tala goes into more detail about how she solved certain problems, how she started writing opinion pieces about fashion clashes between the Western and Muslim world, and how she finally turned a string of bad luck into dozens of wholesale accounts around the world.

AFP Gets A New Website

This is the first episode of American Fashion Podcast published on our new revamped website on our new domain name, americanfashionpodcast.com. Our new email address is now info@americanfashionpodcast.com.

Episode 113: Bringing Billionaires Into Neiman’s – Ralph Rucci Oct 04, 2016

Show notes

Ralph Rucci Goes Into Detail

The preeminent American designer’s designer, Ralph Rucci, is back with us (swing back to episode #50 to listen to the previous recording). In this episode, Mr. Rucci updates us on his RR331 venture, the couture work he has been doing for private clients, and his plans to return to show during Paris Haute Couture.

There is also discussion of his take on the current retail environment, opinion on the exposure level of the Michael Kors brand, pre-show jitters, and Rucci’s interest in working with classic American brands like Levis and Hanes on updating staple garments. The conversation turns to his thoughts on fast fashion, making high fashion accessible, the changing seasons and schedule changes for Fashion Week, and the shift he sees coming away from darkness and toward leadership in the industry again by “kind people.”

References

Ralph Rucci Teams Up With Moda Operandi for Made-to-order Initiative (WWD)

Episode 112: 112 – How To Fund A Fashion Business Oct 02, 2016

Show notes

How To Fund A Fashion Business

Attorney Lois F. Herzeca is the author of the preeminent fashion law survival guide, Fashion Law and Business: Brands and Retailers. In this episode she talks about how fashion brands get funded and gives tips and tricks for how to make that process run smoothly, both for investors and designers.

References:

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“Well, I think Kathryn is beautifully addressing our biggest challenge, which is to re-shore.” – Tim Gunn

Denovation – abandoning an idea or technology, which had formerly, perhaps wrongly, been seen as progressive.

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