Choices by the Yard : Fabrics: Linens. Cottons. Tweeds. ‘Environmentally friendly’ materials. And those pastels! The recent L.A. textile show previews just how spring 1995 will look.
Popping into dozens of showrooms, they scrutinized hundreds of variations on the stripe and dot. They touched the denims, nylons and tweeds. They talked, they pondered, they nibbled (candy, cookies, pretzels, pistachios). Then they took the free swatches or ordered sample yardage.
“The follow-up comes later,” explained California Mart spokesman David Stamper.
In many ways, the atmosphere at the recent Los Angeles International Textile Show came closer to a country fair than to a business affair. Along with colorful displays of spring ’95 fabrics and colorful people--apparel-company owners, designers and marketing teams from 16 states--there were sideshows, door prizes and a heavy dose of euphoria.
The serious browsing seemed to cast a rosy glow on the garment industry. Eventually, all those yards and yards of fabric could tempt consumers--in goods ranging from christening gowns and camisoles to hats, handbags, jackets, jeans, pajamas, pareus, swimsuits, slip dresses, ties, T-shirts and trousers.
The Russians, ensconced in a huge corner space with a labyrinth of private showrooms, seemed especially happy. Edward Gurevich, chief operating officer for Igra-Tekhnika America (ITA), said the numbers were looking good. With six sounding like Gurevich’s lucky figure, he mentioned a deal for “6 million yards of denim” and another for so much linen that the mill “has nothing to sell for the next six months.”
Boris Treyzon, ITA’s American-educated, Los Angeles-based managing director, said the corporation represents 18 Russian mills, some of them with 300-year-old factories. The textiles have already been sold to fashion leaders such as Ralph Lauren.
But why? “You can’t get anything newer than Russian fabrics and the price points are substantially less,” Treyzon explained, pointing with pride to handmade laces, “ecologically pure” linen, 18th-Century cotton Jacquard patterns and a lack, so far, of quality or delivery problems.
While exhibitors such as DuPont and ITA showed their wares behind closed doors or high-walled cubicles, others worked in bustling, fishbowl settings. Numbers, the kind you get in a busy bakery, would have been a good idea at Rag Race Sales, where people queued up for swatches of nylon and terry cloth that might become anything from active wear to luggage.
The pace was slower at Eco-Tex, where the draw was “environmentally responsible” fabrics made with Tencel, a natural cellulosic fiber. Los Angeles designer and sportswear company president Leon Max, who had already attended two European textile shows, was among the lookers.
Unlike some local executives who dropped in for a short visit, Max was planning to spend a day at the show. He saw it as “a great way to get an overview.” And a good way to check out the competition: “If we find a fabric is going to be very popular, we might not use it.”
Dressed in a three-piece khaki suit and pastel-striped shirt, Max was one of the more formally attired visitors. The typical male uniform tended to be a white oversized shirt worn with jeans or casual trousers. Women favored something tiny, such as a parochial-plaid skirt, short shorts or a black suspender dress over a white T-shirt. And life didn’t seem worth living without a hard-body, tan legs, a chic backpack and sexy black suede mules.
Not everyone went along with the program. Baron Bodnar, the 23-year-old owner of Original Weedwear, carried a cellular phone and looked decidedly out of place with his shaved head, oversize shorts, bandanna-print shirt and zoot-suit chain wallet--all Original Weedwear products sold in surf, skate and snowboard shops. Some of them quite far away.
“We’re big in Germany and Japan,” Bodnar said, adding that the company’s typical customer is 15 to 25 years old. “But we have some 40-year-olds who want to feel kind of wild.”
Just how wild things might get next spring was the subject of two slide-show fashion forecasts. Pat Tunsky, president of the eponymous New York-based trend reporting firm, predicted a “baby-doll backlash,” Kool-Aid colors, pastels, a ton of white, futuristic shapes in silver, “second-skin” dressing and alfresco sweaters (meaning you still have to work on your midriff).
It was a similar story when Ellen Sideri, president of ESP Inc., presented the Peclers-Paris trend report. She added more proof of the pastels, silver, vests against bare skin and sexy architectural shapes to come. Sideri was also big on bobby socks with heels, the “lingerie mood,” cosmetic colors and the revival of “calendar pinups.”
Tsveta Yvanova, a free-lance designer with Design Concepts, thoroughly enjoyed the Peclers show. But it was only a show. And after it was over, she was back to reality, looking for fabrics to please “middle America.”
“We need this, but we laugh at what they say,” Yvanova explained. “Half of the things would only sell in a very few places.
“Fashion is like food. There are all the fancy dishes, but you have to make the basic things people need. And the less fashion, the longer it will stay in their wardrobes. I love pastels,” she added wistfully, referring to the forecast. “But they don’t sell. So I’m doing brights.”
