To fit, or not - Designer Shoping for Xmas

Christmas '09 designs from: Claudia Pegus (Top); Meiling (Above)

I often wonder what happens after a beloved, independent designer like Poshe, Zadd & Eastman or Ecliff Elie shows their collections. Do the fashion masses rush to the designer's showrooms to cherry-pick their favourite pieces?

Do the fashion masses even know where the designer showrooms are?

According to the team at one popular Trinidadian designer's atelier, "The morning after we have our showings, there's always a bit of a crowd outside our place - people are ready to snap up our pieces and they email us with images of the ones they want, because they are serious about buying the collections!"

As refreshing as it is to hear, I doubt it's the case at most fashion designer studios in the Caribbean. Why? Because even though people oooh and aaaah at the mention of Claudia Pegus or KAJ, the only people who actually buy the pieces are their loyalists.

The rest of us are busy shopping in the malls, buying a $600.00 TTD dress from some supposedly 'fancy' boutique, never mind the dress actually cost no more than $10.00 USD retail (0r $63.00 TTD) in a boutique on Broadway, NYC...

Trust me when I tell you this; I've even seen some of these boutique owners negotiating their buys, right up the street from me....

Seems like people rather get ripped off, instead of just going ahead and booking an appointment with one of our top designers for a bespoke piece. For the love of God, I can't wrap my mind around why someone would pay that $600.00 TTD for a $63.00 dress, instead of getting an actual designer original for about the same price!

Anywhoo, most of the local fashion greats would have launched their S/S2010, or their Resort/Holiday collections: make the best of it, and go shopping at Meiling's Kapok store for instance, or just call her up for an appointment. She would never scoff at your interest; you don't have to be a society darling to get a piece from her.

In fact , I can bet my bottom dollar that any designer will open their studio and make a w.o.w Christmas Dinner frock for you - if you would only ask more often! And if, for some inexplicable reason (that's filled with high-nosed snobbery) a designer happens to refuse you, just let me know and I'll put them on blast.

LMN Harris.

NB Images courtesy Trinipulse.com & Meiling

Caribbean Fashion: The question of Selling.

A model from the recently held
RED RUNWAY event in Trinidad

So the fashion show has wrapped. Everyone - maybe even Au Courant! - loves your collection, and the buzz on the street is that "It's smashing!" Therefore you're a Caribbean designer with a young line that's destined for greatness, right?

Not so fast. In the crazy rush of entering the design world, you've forgotten to address a major - if not the most important - issue: Where are your pieces going to be sold and who's buying?

Let us get to the heart of the issue here. Caribbean boutiques, especially those who believe themselves to be 'high-end,' are looking down their proverbial noses at you, sussing you up and rating your pieces as "things" that no one would buy, if they were to actually hang in their boutique. And we know that's not entirely true!

You can attempt to reform them, bringing them around to the virtues of selling Caribbean designer fashions (God bless your soul) but I tend to believe that you could explore your other options. Yes! You do have options, even as a Caribbean designer!

Option 1: Do like Millhouse, Meiling, Ecliff Elie and the like, and open your own, standalone store that sells your collection. This may prove to be a bit difficult, with the cost of retail rent and all. But if you happen to have access to space in a prime location, I say go for it, but don't forget to think about all the other factors: Promotion, store layout & decor, target customers, etc.

Option 2: Try the Atelier approach; pretty tricky, if you don't have access to a clientele that's willing to pony up actual cash to buy your made-to-order pieces. And 'tanty next door' who has a blouse on an eternal layaway plan is not considered 'clientele.' If you take this route, please make sure your Atelier is not your own bedroom. If your residence is in a prime location, and you're going to be working from home, consider clearly separating your 'home area' from the 'business area.' What's better? Just looking for a separate studio space to work out of.

Option 3: My personal favourite one: Develop a wholesale business, and sell to foreign boutiques, whether online or brick-and-mortar. It's also a fairly demanding and risky route to take, but you can control how big you want your collections and production to be, how many doors you want to get into, and the kind of customers you want to sell to. This option takes the most ground work and research on stores, wholesale prices, shipping, order fulfillment and such, but tends to be the most rewarding; wouldn't it be sweet to walk into Intermix and see a Claudia Pegus or KAJ dress, hanging next to Custo? I think so!


LMN Harris

NB Image courtesy Triniscene