Wednesday, January 19, 2011

A Day in the Life of a Garment District Dressmaker

Jenni Avins/Thread NY

Ari Magallanes, a dressmaker from Ecuador who has worked in the Garment District for 35 years:

"I am rushing, rushing, working on a special dress for this lady. I don’t know where she’s going to wear it, but they need it tonight. It’s Prabal Gurung’s, Spring 2011. This one is black, but the production is white. This order came to me this week and we rushed to get it together. It came Tuesday, but the cutting table was busy. I got it started yesterday, and today has to be finished. Oh my god. It’s 6:00 already. They’re going to call me at 6:30 to see if it’s ready, but it’s not going to be." —from Dispatches from the Garment District, NBC New York

Read the entire feature here.

4 comments:

  1. These unsung heroes of the Garment District are always interesting to read about. Thank you.

    New York Sewer.

    ReplyDelete
  2. As someone who has only dreamed about visiting the garment district, I love reading your blogs!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I love reading about what happens behind the closed doors....

    ReplyDelete
  4. So very interesting! I assumed the one-offs were all produced in the designer's proprietary atelier, but I guess even a designer who has a name still contracts out production. The trade secret protection must be ironclad if none of those paper patterns have leaked.

    ReplyDelete

I welcome and encourage your comments. Please note that I do reserve the right to delete any comment I deem inappropriate for any reason whatsoever without consent.