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Introducing Arietta The newest tailoring grade - light as air - exclusively
from You will have to experience “Arietta” to believe it! • Available in All Models
Love it? Check the
label. UNTIL recently, Bill Allayaud, who works as a director
for the Sierra Club in Sacramento, thought people who checked labels
on clothing or toys to make sure they were “Made in the U.S.A.” were everything
he But lately, he said, he is becoming one of them. “Everything I buy now, I look at the label,” said
Mr. Allayaud, 56, who
explained that the “buy American” movement — long
popular among
blue-collar union workers and lunch-pail conservatives — no longer
seemed so jingoistic, and was actually starting to come into vogue
for
liberals like himself who never before had a philosophical problem
with He said the reasons for his change of heart are many: a desire to buy as many “locally made” products as possible to reduce carbon emissions from transporting them; a worry about toxic goods made in the third world; and a concern that the rising tide of imports will damage the economy and hurt everybody. “Every time you see ‘Made in China,’ ” he said, “you think, ‘wait a minute, something’s not right here.’ ” “Made in the U.S.A.” used to be a label flaunted primarily by consumers in the Rust Belt and rural regions. Increasingly, it is a status symbol for cosmopolitan bobos, and it is being exploited by the marketers who cater to them. For many the label represents a heightened
concern for workplace and environmental issues, consumer safety and
premium quality. “It
involves people wanting to have guilt-free affluence,” Alex Steffen,
who
is the executive editor of www.worldchanging.com, a Web site devoted
to sustainability issues, said in an e-mail message. “So you
have not only With so many mass-market goods made off-shore,
American-made products, which are often more expensive, have come to
connote luxury.
New Balance produces less expensive running shoes abroad, but it still
makes the top-of-the-line 992 model — which the company says
requires 80 manufacturing steps and costs $135 — in Maine. A
favorite American Apparel, which carries the label “Made in Downtown LA” in every T-shirt and minidress, famously brought sex appeal to clothing basics that are promoted as “sweatshop free.” In the process it won the allegiance of young taste-makers. Many of the American designers now showing
collections at New York Fashion Week, which runs through Sept. 12,
will have their goods
stitched in foreign factories, a reflection of the battering of American
garment manufacturing. From 2001 to 2006, clothing production in the
United States declined by 56 percent, the American Apparel & Footwear American high-fashion designers who do make clothes domestically tend to be too small, or in the case of Oscar de la Renta and Nicole Miller, willing to pay a premium in labor costs in order to maintain strict quality control. But these brands have yet to exploit the cachet
of “Made in the
U.S.A.”
in their marketing, in the way that some non-runway labels have seized
upon. The designer Steven Alan, for one, while avoiding the Bryant
Park
tents, makes his distinctive rumpled dress shirts, which sell for $168,
in Even though it is not always justified, “there is a perception that because it is made overseas,” he said, clothing is produced to the “lowest common denominator — there is not the attention to detail.” Any move by the affluent left to conspicuously “Buy American” seems like an inversion of the internationalist sensibility that it always wore as a badge of distinction, said Robert H. Frank, an economics professor at the Johnson school of management at Cornell. These people tended to be ardent free-traders as recently the Clinton years. “They always think of themselves as more sophisticated,” Professor Frank said. “The farther away something comes from, the presumption, the better it is.” The evolving image of many American-made products as small-batch, high-craftsmanship products is true in other connoisseur-friendly industries as well. Fender, the guitar maker, builds entry-level electric guitars in Mexico, but it still makes higher-end Stratocasters and Telecasters — including its hand-made Custom Shop models, which sell for several thousand dollars — in California. In bicycles, too, Schwinn and Huffy have decamped to Asia, leaving high-end specialty companies like Trek and Cannondale alone making bikes in this country, where there is “a greater sense of craft and small scale,” said Matthew Mannelly,the chief executive officer of Cannondale. The company recently started producing its “entry level” bikes, priced $500 to $1,000, in Asia, but says it still makes the bulk of its product line — and its best bikes — in Bedford, Pa. The new prestige of “Made in America” was not lost on Elizabeth Preston, a cycling advocate in Washington. While Ms. Preston, 33 , said that politically she is as “as far left as you can go,” she nonetheless felt drawn to the Handbuilt in the U.S.A. sticker on the $1,250 Trek road bike she bought for her boyfriend a few weeks ago. Since then, she has been showing off the sticker to friends. “There’s something about the idea of the workmanship and supporting the United States’s economy,” she said. Stephanie Sanzone, a graduate student in environmental policy at George Mason University, says she has seen ample evidence that a “buy American” attitude is expanding. Ms. Sanzone, 47, who lives in Alexandria, Va., started the Web site www.stillmadeinusa.comthree years ago to list and promote Americanmade products, for environmental and economic reasons, she said. Unlike many “Buy American” Web
sites, which feature images of
weeping bald eagles or quotations from Pat Buchanan, Ms. Sanzone, a
Democrat, keeps her site nonpartisan. In the last month, she said,
traffic
has jumped fourfold, with new visitors including vegans, green
shoppers, “Free Tibet” activists and visitors from the
Web site democraticunderground.com. Many said the recall of Chinese-made
toys inspired them to act, but many also told her that they were starting
to expand their focus beyond toys.
Skeptics say there are limits to how far the National Public Radio demographic will go as it flirts with a cause long associated with the Rush Limbaugh crowd. It is hard to imagine, say, that people who tote reusable cotton bags to Whole Foods will ditch their beloved Saabs for an American-made Chevrolet Cobalt. “People like that don’t even know where the Chevy store is,” said Ernie Boch, president of Boch Automotive in Norwood, Mass., who operates Honda, Subaru and Toyota dealerships in the Northeast. “It’s kind of like people who stay at the Four Seasons. They’ve heard of Motel 6, but they don’t stay there. It’s not part of their vernacular.” Nonetheless, the new interest from yuppies in seeking out domestically made products is evident to traditionalists like John Ratzenberger, best known as the actor who played Cliff in “Cheers,” who grew up in the factory town of Bridgeport, Conn., and is now the host of “John Ratzenberger’s Made in America,” a Travel Channel show that celebrates craftsmanship at factories. “When we started doing this show, we were accused of being “This,” he said, “goes right across the political spectrum.” 
Men and Business Rediscover the Importance of Presentation The end of summer typically marks the end to casual dress in many company offices, and this year is no different, with clear indications from some of the nations most respected businesses that they are getting serious about image. No doubt this trend will influence the way men dress not just for a few seasons, but for years to come. “The astounding success of the dot-com industry was probably a big factor in the shift away from traditional modes of business dress. However, looking like a dot-commer no long has the fashion cachet it did a short while ago,” notes John H. Daniel Custom Tailors. “We are hearing more and more from our clients who work in upper management that they are relieved that the dress-down trend seems to have come to a natural end. It would seem that reports of casual dress impacting negatively on workplace behavior and habits were well founded. We are not only hearing this from our own clients. Members of the Custom Tailors & Designers Association are reporting the same experience all over the country.” Return of Business Dress There’s little doubt that men are making business dress a priority. Surveys of business trends are indicating that the casual dress movement has been a failed experiment. Confusion, frustration, careless work habits, manners and thinking, not to mention a poor impression on customers – this is what has become of the casual dress movement. A survey conducted by the Society for Human Resource Management (New York Times June 13, 2001) found that “companies that allow casual attire fell to 87% from 95% in 1999. By then, signs of misgivings about the trend had already appeared.” In another survey last year by Jackson Lewis, an unemployment law firm, 45% of responding executives thought relaxed standards of dress promoted tardiness and absenteeism. Even politics have entered the fray, with George Bush’s directive of a conservative dress code for members of his administration. Business once again seems to require professional dress, grooming, and manners. According to the NPD Group, a market research firm (also mentioned in the New York Times article), men’s dress shirt sales have been increasing steadily over the past several years. According to custom tailors across the country, today’s men want comfort without sacrificing elegance and personality. More and more, men are turning to lightweight, softly constructed suits and sport coats in luxury fabrics such as cashmere, silk blends, and super merino woolens as lighter-weight versions of more traditional cloths. In addition, John H. Daniel Custom Tailors has noted that companies are now searching for sound guidance on how to rewrite the dress guidelines that were thrown out some time back. We are returning to a time when the leaders want to be easily distinguished from the followers. Personalized service and tailored clothing designed and made for the individual are what John H. Daniel Legendary American Tailors have been offering since 1928. |
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