This has been some time in the making but it’s in the final push to finish it. The film maker has made an appeal for donations to help her finish. If you liked the trailer and want to see the rest of it completed, you can go here to make a donation. I did. MEN OF THE CLOTH IndieGoGo Video from Vicki Vasilopoulos on Vimeo.
Year: 2011
The internet has a way of expanding the English language and ever since discovering the tailored clothing forums I have also encountered a term that I had never heard used outside of the internet, and that was “quarters”. As in, a way of describing the shape of the front of the coat. Whereas in tailoring circles, or the ones I have always frequented, anyway, have generally referred to a “straight front” or a “cutaway front”,Read More
A few book reviews to do. The first will appeal only to the super-geeks like myself. Published in 1916, The Men’s Factory-Made Clothing Industry is a report on the cost of producing men’s clothing produced by the U.S. Department of Commerce, and can be found on Google Books. Buried within a lot of dry financial statistics is an interesting history of ready-to-wear clothing in the U.S., as well as some very interesting descriptions of theRead More
Nothing to do with clothing for once. MSNBC’s Dylan Ratigan recently went on an emotional rant worthy of Keith Olberman and the avalanche of response prompted a follow-up in which he expresses the collective rage of the American people toward Washington and the economy. He encourages the people to take to Twitter and Facebook and the blogosphere to express the fact that we are Mad as Hell and that we demand change. While I agreeRead More
A storm blew through town last night which took down some pretty big trees, and with them, the power. Mine finally came back on this morning but the office is still closed so I glanced over at “the pile”; various garments that have been collecting over the last few months waiting to be chopped up, photographed, and analyzed- maybe today I can dig in a bit and get some blogging done. I’ve been pretty busyRead More
Remember this stuff? I normally prefer smooth finishes or at least a fine, tight weave; coarser weaves seem, rightly or not, somewhat outmoded and more difficult to work with because they fray easily and don’t always take shaping as well. When I first came across this cloth from Holland and Sherry I was a bit skeptical, but it came highly recommended by someone I trust, and had been favorably compared to Minnis’ Fresco by othersRead More
Franca has shared her latest DIY project (or rather, her husband’s). Chalk sharpeners are not the easiest things to find and are certainly not cheap when you do so here is her version (if there is demand, perhaps we could encourage her husband to offer “bespoke” chalk sharpeners on Etsy 🙂 the box € 2.504 packs of 10 blades € 1.00 each total € 4various bolts € 1 Total € 7.50!! Grazie, Franca!
I think the Asolsa Lucida, or glossy buttonhole (the example above being from a Tom Ford garment), originated in the Abruzzi region of Italy as it is most commonly seen on garments made in this area. It is also very common in Paris, where it is known as the boutonnière Milanaise, though likely for the brand of gimp that was commonly used and not the city; it is worth noting that most of the grandRead More
Custom shirtmaker CEGO’s Carl Goldberg shared a few garments from his father’s wardrobe with us, one of which is a DB jacket (pants long lost) made by Gilbert Feruch, some time in the seventies, I think. I gather he was something of a futurist, and the V&A museum has a Nehru suit that he made on display. Other than that, I know practically nothing about him. What I find most interesting about this garment isRead More
The image above is the wrapper for an old spool of gimp, “vergolina” being the Italian word for gimp, and La Milanese being the brand name. I am guessing that this is how the French came to know gimp as “Milanaise”, and thus the Milanese buttonhole would have found its name. Conjecture, but likely. I’ve discussed this buttonhole a few times, mainly because I didn’t know how to do it and that was driving meRead More