Made in Asia articles
These articles are only about a month old so I thought it’d be interesting to spread more views on manufactured items made in Asia.
The New York Times‘ article is particularly interesting. As China is growing exponentially as an economic power, so are the wages, and higher wages means improving (at least we’re hoping) work environments. With higher wages, outsourcing to China is no longer a cheap endeavour as manufacturers are now looking to other asian countries like Vietnam and Cambodia for labor work. However, outsourcing to other asian countries proves to still be a difficult move.
The Reuters article points that cheap labour entices designers to use more expensive fabrics and that many countries don’t seem to mind the Made in China labels as much as previously thought. Also, the article points out a very important factor where Made In labels are being faked, thus it is difficult to really know where clothes come from.
To have an opinion or no?
My trip to DC included some great insight from a relative who writes for one of the big newspapers in DC and gave me some useful advice. She told me that the senior fashion editor of the newspaper had quit the paper a few years back in favor to work for the so-called Carrie Bradshaw’s “Mecca” of all magazines - Vogue. She lasted 6 months and quit.
Her reason? Writing for a magazine had too much pressure to be positive ALL the time. If a brand’s collection is perceived as bad for the season, they simply don’t write about it at all. Instead they would focus on the brands they deemed good. Being bred from a newsroom where there needs to be a heart to the story which includes fact checking, interviews, and unraveling the truth (whether good or bad) - there wasn’t any of that at Vogue.
You may find the occasional insightful article, the most notable I’ve read recently in Harper’s Bazaar’s September 2007 issue, “Everyone’s a fashion critic” by Pulitzer Prize acclaimed writer Robin Ghivan (The Washington Post’s fashion editor). But as a whole, it’s hard to be negative in a magazine, I can vouch that as a writer for Gloss. It’s not that there’s anything to hide really, I enjoy doing interviews and all of them so far have been humble and super nice people. But after a while, it gets redundant. Newspapers have an edge that will allow you to express your opinions if given you can back up your statements.
Being a fashion editor at a newspapers does have its drawbacks. Opinions dished in newspapers can hurt brands, resulting in bans from certain fashion shows. Nobody has been spared, even the almighty Wall Street Journal, The NY Times, The International Herald Tribune, and Newsweek writers have been banned from attending shows, from Louis Vuitton to Armani, for their comments. Frankly though, kudos to these women who have the experience and most importantly - who have their eyes wide open. These women are not easily swayed by the glamour and lavish parties. Oh sure, they’ll attend the parties, but by no means would it bribe them in counting a collection as fabulous if it doesn’t live up to certain standards or capability. What makes them so qualified in critiquing you ask? Perhaps it’s because they don’t blindly follow the herd, that they don’t just gobble up what every designer has to offer. Not only that, they have experience under their belt and they haven’t abandoned their investigative journalistic skills.
Hilary Alexander, for The Daily Telegraph UK, is perhaps the exception to the investigative journalistic style for a newspaper. Although Hilary would rarely express her opinion on collections, she certainly makes up for it by concisely writing show reviews with the pen of a novelist. Her choice of words build and create fantastical atmosphere that one can only dream of how beautiful these runway shows are in real life. She’s incredibly talented on this end, and so I forgive her for lacking an opinion.
With my experience in fashion magazine writing, I feel that here you would have to stretch your creative writing skills by indulging the reader into the fantasy that fashion is portraying. That, in some respect, requires quite a good deal of skills in order to achieve this mystical world for the reader. How do you convince your readers that the latest designer you’re presenting is hot stuff and why? What makes them special? I’ve been struggling with this since I’ve started, but learned a great deal along the way. I do believe at the end of the day that my heart belongs in having an opinion on fashion and digging deeper to unravel the truth and mystery behind the fashion facade.
Image credit: Patrick McMullan for Harper’s Bazaar
Customize Your Shoes With Steve Madden
As Stacy London would say…”Shut UP!”
In a world where we could only resort to customizing Vans slip ons and some Nike runnings, Steven Madden has pushed the envelope to make it a real girl’s dream: customize your own fashionable shoe. The New York Times gives a more in depth look of the new service, so I went to Steve’s website to get a better look of what it’s all about.
The concept is simple.
Choose one of 45 different styles of shoe (from Uggs to high heels) and play around digitally by picking colors of the trimmings, heel, straps and buttons, from leather to faux animal prints. Prices vary from $89.95 to $169.95. You can even customize a couple of handbags too. Once your choices are made, it’ll take about 3 weeks for your shoes to arrive and to enjoy.
Here’s a shoe I designed on Steve Madden’s interface, cute no?
Though I’m sure every girl would like their shoes to be designed and created by the likes of say Christian Louboutin, but average income people can’t afford shoes at $500-$600 a pop. According to the NY Times, Steve Madden has “almost no online competition” right now, but the company may as well revolutionize online retail shoe shopping for the mainstream public. It’s like the American Apparel of shoes, buy the base, customize everything else yourself. How can you go wrong?
The concept can be pushed even further to handbags as already shown. This trend could spread to sunglasses, gloves, clothes, hats, socks, tights, and the list goes on. Of course, such customization will demand the proper resources and work force to handle the process and most likely new regulations.
Designing or modifying your own clothes is not a new concept though. In some Montreal boutiques like Mad-Ame in the Gay Village, offers their clients the option to design their own clothes with a tailor. They also sell ready to wear pieces and each can be modified to the client’s wishes. Word to the ones who don’t know, this is a lesbian clothing store. Don’t know what that is? You should check it out yourself, I personally found it pretty cool to be greeted with a slushie and have the opportunity to play Mrs. Pac-Man in the store.
Another idea for those of you shopping for the holiday season!
Lululemon Fires Back And Stands By Their Products
While shares fell shortly after the scathing article from The New York Times questioning the authenticity of Lululemon’s VitaSea line, CNW Group issued an official press release from the company stating that the line has gone through independent tests and confirmed its contents are consistent.
Lululemon has a comprehensive product testing process and partners with
SGS Group, a leading independent inspection, verification, testing and
certification company. The Switzerland-based firm conducts a battery of tests
before each season on all of Lululemon’s fabrics across all product lines,
testing for a variety of attributes including content, pilling, shrinkage, and
colorfastness.
Well…this is a tough call. It’s normal that the company fends off such accusations, so it’s a question of who is telling the truth. Is the newspaper at fault for reporting these tests? And what made them doubt Lululemon’s claim in the first place? If people can make handbags out of candy wrapper, what’s wrong with using seaweed fiber?
Whatever the case may be, in the end it’s the customer’s choice if they want to spend their money on clothes (authentically organic or not).
**Update**
Ok, my question has been answered as to what made the New York Times investigate Lululemon in the first place. The Business of Fashion pretty much gives you the 411 that it’s really all about the benjamins.
A final twist to all of this is that it was a private investor that paid for the first test which questioned the claims of the VitaSea product and it was he who spurred the New York Times to do their own test and publish the results. This investor was hoping that the test results would send Lululemon’s stock into a free-fall, enabling him to short-sell the stock and make a nice bundle of cash. Mission accomplished.
So, bringing a company down for a quick buck. Hélas, c’est la vie!
Lululemon’s VitaSea Has No Seaweed
According to The New York Times, it looks like Lululemon Athletica (famed for yoga sportswear using organic fabrics) isn’t living up to some of its claims. The newspaper issued some tests on VitaSea, a line that Lulu claims to contain 24% of seaweed fiber, which resulted in “no significant difference in mineral levels between the VitaSea fabric and cotton T-shirts.”
“Seaweeds have known vitamins and minerals, and we searched specifically for those vitamins, and we didn’t see them,” said Carolyn J. Otten, director for specialized services at Chemir Analytical Services, a lab in Maryland Heights, Mo. that tested a sample of VitaSea.
[...]
Lululemon executives said that they had not independently tested the VitaSea material to see whether it lived up to the claims on Lululemon’s tags. Instead, it trusted the claims of its suppliers, executives said.
[...]
Analysts said it is the responsibility of the companies to test all of their products.
“It’s frankly up to the companies to do sporadic product quality tests to make sure everything is being manufactured to the parameters they set,” said Sharon Zackfia, an analyst who covers Lululemon at William Blair & Co., an investment firm based in Chicago. “At the end of the day, it’s Lululemon’s name on the line.”
This is a gaffe that could harm the company’s image in which consumers rely on their brands to live up to their promises. The company flourished not because of savvy marketing campaigns, but by word of mouth. If Lululemon did in fact “lie” to their consumers about the seaweed use in the VitaSea line, it puts into question as to what else they could have lied about.
