history repeats itself

Shirtwaists are button down, collared shirts similar to men’s shirts that women wore with skirts starting in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Before shirtwaists, many American and European women wore corsets and hoop skirts and such. Shirtwaists, or “waists,” became very popular and were sold all over the U.S. in a variety of colors and with embroidery or lace for fancier occasions. The shirtwaist was a working woman’s shirt, a symbol of freedom from domestic responsibilities as more women began to join the workforce in the early 1900s.

Also in the early 1900s, New York attracted millions of immigrants from Italy and Eastern Europe. Many of them, mainly young women, took jobs as garment workers. In the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire in 1911 Manhattan, the youngest known workers who lost their lives were fourteen. The bosses locked the doors to prevent the workers from stealing and taking too many breaks, since they did not provide restrooms in the building. The women were expected to work 12-13 hour shifts with one break, and they weren’t paid for overtime, only about six bucks a week. More than 100 people died daily in textile and garment factories in the U.S. When a fire broke out in the Triangle Factory, they couldn’t get ladders to the top floors, and because the secondary exit doors were locked, about 150 people jumped to their deaths from windows or died from smoke inhalation or burning to death. Sound familiar? It was only a couple of years ago that over a thousand people died in Bangladesh in the Rana Plaza building collapse.

A year before the fire at the Triangle factory, a strike had just ended and the bosses agreed to higher pay and shorter hours in exchange for the strikers agreeing to settle all future grievances through arbitration. During the strike, many men and women were beaten brutally and the large factory owners paid the police to look the other way, or to arrest the strikers. But, when it was all over, the garment workers had a voice, be it a very small voice, but it was a start. The strikers’ concerns about fire safety, however, were obviously not addressed.

After the fire, changes were finally realized. The state of New York did a large-scale investigation of factory safety and created a state Department of Labor, and the federal government finally passed the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938 that sets a minimum wage, a 40-hour work week, overtime pay, and prohibits child labor. It wasn’t long after that until clothing manufacturing began to shift overseas.

What did people do before they could go to a store and buy shirtwaists, before mass produced clothing? Wealthy people had clothes made by a tailor or dressmaker according to the latest fashion trends, which changed much more slowly than they do today. Less wealthy people adapted their clothing by changing the collar or sleeve according to the style. Poor people couldn’t afford to follow fashion, and would either buy clothing second-hand or dress their children in sacks and rags, or if they could afford fabric, make their own clothes. Though there is some evidence that clothing was produced on a larger scale even in ancient Rome, the popular styles in 19^th century Europe and America were corsets and fitted garments with boning, which would have been difficult to mass produce, and the sewing machine had not been invented yet. The freedom of the shirtwaist was not only that it eliminated the need for boning and corsets, (some still used them for some crazy reason), but also that it was simpler to make, could be bought and worn immediately, and could be dressed up or down, linen for office work or sturdy cotton for labor, and could be adapted easily to the latest fashion.

Even before ready to wear fashion and factory clothing production came on the scene with men’s suits and shirtwaists for women, women were doing the grunt work, and at very low wages. When people still depended on tailors to make their clothes, they were generally men. The tailor would create the pattern, cut the fabric, adjust the sizing, and send it to a woman in her home to do the hand-sewing for a very cheap rate. Historically, labor was cheaper than fabric, and that really hasn’t changed. When I think about making any kind of profit off of my sewing endeavors, I realize that if I had to pay someone a living wage to sew for me, I would make little to no profit unless I raised my prices significantly.

The irony is that this new method of mass producing fashion is marketed as a socioeconomically equalizing force by allowing women at all income levels to afford fashionable clothing in developed countries, yet it is so integral to the oppression of poor young women in the countries we depend on for clothing manufacturing.

I can’t help but think about what I’ve heard the guys (and it’s always men, it seems) high up in the fashion biz say, that it is providing economic opportunity for the people in developing countries. I would like to think that is true, and I could certainly see the potential there. I also realize that in the early 1900s, when mass production of clothing in the U.S. began, our country was accepting millions of immigrants, and the clothing and textile industries provided work for them.  But because there were so many of them and many of them were already poor, it was easy to devalue their lives, just like it is easy to devalue the lives of people we can’t see every day, working long hours, missing their families, missing out on an education, in unsafe conditions, with no promise of a future. Why can’t making clothes be a respectable, well-paying career? Even U.S. clothing manufacturers have recently been found in violation of the Fair Labor Standard Act, and American Apparel has repeatedly been targeted by Immigration Enforcement because they openly hire illegal immigrants. In some other manufacturing sectors, people get paid for labor, and overtime, and regular breaks, and they have opportunity to move up and become supervisors. Is that why Americans don’t want to sew, because those opportunities aren’t there in clothing manufacturing, or is it something else?

There are good clothing manufacturing jobs here, and some manufacturers in the U.S. have embraced automation, but there aren’t enough Americans interested in the jobs. Airtex, a textile company in Minneapolis that supplies to Pottery Barn, among others, decided to bring its manufacturing back to the U.S. for various reasons. They had been manufacturing in China, but the Chinese wages became comparable to American wages and their clients' demand for American made products made domestic production more appealing. They are trying to get young people interested in careers in textile manufacturing, but they are having more success with…wait for it…immigrants. They are building a workforce in Minnesota, training employees and paying them fair wages, and they have been able to bring back 70% of their production to the U.S. For more about Airtex, NY Times published this article in 2013 and Minnesota Business Magazine published this one in 2014. But, Airtex does not make apparel. Airtex makes a lot of stuff that doesn’t sell or change as fast as cheap clothes, and for that reason I imagine would be much easier to automate production and provide more specialized jobs that are perhaps more rewarding than sewing the same sleeve on shirts all day.

I keep coming back to the conclusion that mass production of clothing on the scale we are doing it is just not sustainable. It doesn’t matter if you made all the clothes out of recycled tires, it still wouldn’t be sustainable. After Bangladeshis get fair wages, and then another group of people die in another building collapse or fire when they move manufacturing to another country, and then they get fair wages, and then on and on, until what? And I haven’t even mentioned the environmental health impacts of growing cotton or processing leather and synthetic fabrics.

What if we all seriously limited the amount of clothing we have, and only replaced one or two things a year? The fashion industry certainly wouldn’t be so damn profitable (the communist in me comes out!) But more importantly, we might think a lot more about how those tee shirts were made and how long they’re going to last. I agree with Sarah Gilbert, that we need to buy less clothing, and be willing to pay more for good quality.

That brings me to my last bit about factory production of clothing…who were these bosses? Who were the people willing to lock doors to keep women trapped inside a building for twelve hours a day? Further, who are the people ballsy enough to say it is good for them because at least they have a job? Are the modern day bosses in Bangladesh and India the same way? The guys who ran the Triangle Factory were Jewish immigrants who had tailoring skills, so when they came to America they went to work in the garment industry. They quickly realized the potential and started their own small factory that grew until they were quite wealthy. They lived lavish lives, and could afford to hire people to beat or kill union organizers and strikers. They were arrested for manslaughter after the fire for the deaths of the people who could have escaped had the doors been unlocked, but they hired a celebrity lawyer and were acquitted. Even after they rebuilt their business, they were repeatedly cited for violating fire code, and were caught sewing on fake labels that ensured products were made in safe working conditions. 

In recent years, people who have tried to organize unions in Bangladesh have been intimidated and beaten as well, even after the Rana Plaza building collapse. The day of the collapse, bosses threatened workers who didn’t want to go into a building that had cracked severely the previous day. Of Bangladesh’s over 5,000 factories, fewer than half are regularly monitored by the companies they supply to or Bangladesh’s inspectors. And now that more inspections are underway because of pressure from retailers, many factory owners are threatening legal action for profits lost while necessary repairs are made, or just refusing to cooperate outright.  It took the Bangladeshi police two years to file murder charges against 41 people involved in the Rana Plaza collapse, including Sohel Rana, and many of them are fugitives. The clothing industry executives have huge influence in Bangladesh because it is one of the most profitable industries in the country, so just like in the U.S., politics is going to slow down progress.

Well, it comes down to greed it seems, which appears to come more naturally to some people. I don't understand how Isaac Harris and Max Blanck, the "shirtwaist kings" from the Triangle Factory, or Sohel Rana could/can live with themselves. There are good people, though, and there are good things going on, so my next post will be a bit more uplifting, I hope. I want to know what the major U.S. retailers are doing to protect the basic human rights of the people making the clothes for them, and who else is in the worker’s corner. I’ll let you know what I find out…until next time!

Georgia

 For more about the Triangle Factory Fire, this was a great article: http://www.aflcio.org/About/Our-History/Key-Events-in-Labor-History/Triangle-Shirtwaist-Fire

fast fashion and teenagers

I have had a bit of a mental block, or inspiration block I suppose, so I haven’t been sewing quite as much. I’ve been thinking a lot about fashion trends since I’ve been in a mall more lately thanks to a certain person I birthed 13 years ago. I remember being 13 and loving the mall, loving walking around and admiring all of the different options that were available (which were minimal compared to the offerings of Forever 21 these days). I hate the mall now. I have become that crotchety old lady that hates seeing young girls wearing too much makeup and the sea of ugly clothes, but most of all I hate seeing things like this:

Most people (as I once did) get happy when they see this. Eight bucks for jeans? Nice! But now, I think to myself, how in the hell are jeans only eight bucks? Denim isn’t the cheapest fabric, and construction of jeans is more involved than other pants. It would cost me more than eight bucks in just materials to make a pair of jeans, so how are they able to charge so little? With all of the advertising, shipping all over the world, paying garment workers, paying retail store employees, etc, etc, where does the money come from if they’re charging eight bucks for jeans? How is this possible?

I watched a documentary called The True Cost, and it answered a lot of questions.  Or if you want a funny, shorter version, watch John Oliver break it down. But one question is left, which my daughter asked and I had no answer for. Where am I supposed to get my clothes then? The documentary includes the work of The People Tree to empower women in developing countries and provide fairly traded clothing for people who can afford it, but unfortunately they are a UK company, and from what I can tell do not supply to U.S. stores or have trendy teenager styles. If you’re wealthy, you can afford to pay a designer to make your clothes or shop at high end boutiques, but teenagers are usually on a tight budget and trying to get the most for their money.

I began looking into what options we have in the Twin Cities area for kids who are between the cutesy girls dresses and the more mature women’s styles. Fast fashion is perfect for teenagers, since their preferences change depending on the day as they begin to develop their own personal style that they are likely to keep for the rest of their lives. When they’re little they can wear the same dress two years in a row (if it still fits), but teenagers are not likely to wear the same dress for two months. Because of fast fashion, every trip to the mall brings new styles and colors, and all at disturbingly low prices so it makes it easy to throw or give away something they don’t really like anymore.

So, I haven’t found anything that I think she would like yet, but I’m not giving up. In the meantime I did find some really great shops that are making clothes locally that I would like to share. Check out my list under the "Where to shop" heading on the right (I intend to expand the list as I learn more). I also discovered Minneapolis is a kind of a hot spot for fashion and potentially textile manufacturing. I’m planning to take a closer look at these places and feature at least one in my next post.

As I talked to my daughter more, I began to realize that things have really changed in the fashion world. People used to wear certain brands as status symbols, and the style was often secondary to the prestige of the brand (example Ralph Lauren Polo). Everyone wanted that one pair of pants or that one type of shoe. Now, kids seem to want to be different, and brands like Polo or Abercrombie are not even on their radar (see this article for more on that). So can “slow fashion” work with teenagers?

I know this is going out on a limb…but what if teens had sewing machines and knew how to use them? I think we would see an outburst of creativity and innovative ideas from young people, and it would be the perfect “stick it to the man” kind of thing to do, right? So, with that I’m going to end this post, and ask you to contact me if you have or know someone who has an old sewing machine that’s just collecting dust, whether it works or not. I have a mini, tiny hatchling of a plan to subvert the fashion industry (haha, yeah right...), or just to get some teenagers psyched about making their own clothes, but I will definitely need sewing machines! I've worked on a couple of sewing machines in my life, so I think I can give them a new life!

Thanks and have a super day!

Georgia

The Impetus / What's wrong with the fashion industry

As I mentioned in my introduction post, I have personally made a commitment to make all of my toddler’s clothing from now until she starts sneaking clothes from the mall in her backpack and changing at school. She’s now 20 months old, and I am on a roll. I have designed and discovered some great patterns, and I love that my daughter looks just as cute, or cuter than all the baby Gap kids, but her clothes weren’t made by under- (or un-)paid people in unsafe conditions in Bangladesh. This post is an explanation of why we should all make informed choices when buying clothes for ourselves and our chidren.

When I see a fancy embroidered or beaded shirt in the store, I always think, how is that only $25 (or less if it’s Forever 21 or Wet Seal)? It had to take someone forever to put all of those beads on there! Well, it really does take forever, but they can charge so little because companies who do this sort of thing pay people very little or nothing at all for their labor. We’ve all heard about the Gap scandals. As someone who is contemplating breaking in to the “fashion market,” I am curious about how this practice has persisted, despite the numerous human rights and safety violations the suppliers to major fashion brands are committing. Perhaps it is because people aren’t thinking about that when they buy clothes. They’re thinking about how they can look good with the amount of money they have to spend, which is often not that much. The average American spends very little on clothing, despite our obsession with current trends in fashion. It’s because these huge companies, like H&M and Old Navy (coincidentally the guy in charge of Old Navy used to be in a high up position at H&M), have strong armed to get the cheapest manufacturers, and they use all of the loopholes they can. So, when we buy something at the mall, we are perpetuating an industry in which people use poor people in developing countries to sell cheap clothes to you while still somehow making a humongous profit themselves.

And we’re Americans. We fought hard and long for fair labor laws in the U.S. Why are we all so comfortable disregarding the same rights of people in other countries?

This is not intended to make you feel bad if you shop at the Gap…wait, yes it is. If we all, as a unit, boycotted the Gap for one month, they would be on their knees, making all kinds of promises to customers about ethical sourcing. If we boycotted them for one year, other companies would quickly spring up (many already exist) offering socially responsible alternatives, some fraudulent and some not. It might even bring manufacturing jobs back to small towns in the U.S., like Brandi Temple has done with her little girls clothes (http://www.lollywollydoodle.com/pages/what-a-journey).

I want people to think more about shopping at places like H&M or Old Navy. When my older daughter was little, I used to say I couldn’t live without Old Navy. You could get basics for cheap, and just tune out the onslaught of mini-me gross girl clothes.  Basics are the only thing that really should be cheap(er). If a garment has lots of pockets and beltloops (little babies don’t need pockets or beltloops, by the way), and it’s cheap, that means someone was paid very, very little to make that garment. So that your baby can wear cute little cargo pants when he’s three months old, someone (probably with very small hands) had to sew each one of those little pockets on (I’ve sewed cargo pockets before, it isn’t the hardest thing but certainly isn’t a piece of cake). These are pockets that your baby will never even know existed, much less use for storing cargo. How ridiculous must that feel to the person stuck in a dilapidated factory 12 hours a day making them? Someone who can barely afford to feed and clothe their own children, much less buy them cargo pants or a shirt that says “Future Genius” (see this post for my rant on words on clothes). If I were them I would curse Americans with every stitch, while my employer expects me to be happy to have a job at all. I mean, it could be worse, right? …I have a lot more to say about that later.

So next time you’re thinking about hitting the mall or gap.com, think again. Do you really need that shirt? Can you find it locally made, or at least fair trade? Their prices are generally more expensive than the sale racks or Forever 21, but usually not much more than full price at the Gap or Banana Republic. If you’re in Minnesota, check out my growing list of local clothiers, and if you’re from somewhere else and you know of a great place in your area, let me know and I’ll add it to my list.