Fashion

What Makes a Quality Dress?

“Quality comes from time and patience. This is slow fashion in the best sense.

Fermare is intricately made.

The Landscape.
There has never been a better time than now for fashion lovers. The fashion industry has developed so much, that we now have an incredible array of clothing options for us to choose from. With all the options out there, which should we pick? This is actually quite a complex question, so let’s dive into it.

Bespoke haute couture clothing and ready-to-wear high fashion is seen as the pinnacle for people to aspire to. These collections of clothing are what all us normal people dream about – the level of quality and artistry is unrivalled. Unfortunately for most people, the price is just too insanely out of reach, we can only dream about such things. It’s not all bad news, with fast fashion, the accessibility to trendy, fashionable and relatively well made clothing has been opened up to almost everyone.

Fast fashion has given many the opportunity to enjoy fashion, which is an aspect of the business model that I actually really admire. The downsides to these business models, which I dislike very much, is that they are built around profit, and pushing as much products through as possible. So really at the end of the day what inevitably happens is, more of us get access to fashion, but also, more of us end up starting to buy way more than we need. 

The real truth is, fast fashion is about maximizing sales; in order for the model to work the products don’t have to be particularly the best quality, they just have to be trendy enough to  be consumed – meant to be worn for only a short period of time. To achieve this, fast fashion has to continually promote a culture of discontentment – where we are continually pursuing an unobtainable vision of fulfillment.

The fast fashion business model drives the industry towards an ‘as lean as possible’ manufacturing, procurement and logistics route; where costs are reduced as much as possible in as many places as possible. All the small cost savings eventually aggregate into huge savings over the large bulk of goods, resulting in us now being able to buy a garment at such a low price – that the true cost of the item is masked and forgotten.

The Choice.
 

So what should we buy? Are we to no longer buy from fast fashion retailers? The answer is ‘no’, it is not inherently wrong to buy from fast fashion retailers. One may argue poor working conditions for workers in the outsourced manufacturing, but that is a topic of another day and has complexities in the answer as well. When a typical consumer makes a purchase they have to juggle such factors like affordability, physical needs, enjoyment from the garment, etc.; and so really one of the major moral issues that is confronted in a purchase, is whether one is buying more than one needs – or buying out of compulsion.

What consumers face today is something extremely pernicious and difficult, we are faced with a daily barrage of ads imbedded in everything that we do online.

The marriage between social media and mass data driven marketing – creates a world where we are subtly manipulated everyday into desiring things that we did not even know we wanted. And that, together with incessant bombardment of sales and marketing tricks – we end up making buying decisions, that are in the long run and in hindsight bad decisions. Thus, in order to break from this, and make the best purchasing choices and the most moral consumer decisions – we need to start thinking about clothes differently. 

We have to start taking our time when shopping. Like when you buy a house, or a car; you research and debate with yourself and really take your time before making a decision. Understanding more about the product and demystifying what goes into making a good garment, can help you tremendously when going about doing this.

What Makes a Quality Dress.
 

One of the ways we can decide on what to buy, whether it be from a fast fashion retailer or a boutique like Fermare, is by knowing what to look for in a well made garment. The easiest and most obvious thing to check for, is the material that is used. When I make a garment, I personally look for the best quality material that fits the job and intent of my design. When I shop for material, feel and touch is a big factor. And then there is the thread density, the lustre of the fabric and stretch. When you are looking for a good quality t shirt for example, often the easiest thing to do to check for fabric quality is to hold the fabric up against the light – cheap cotton is often very thin and transparent. The transparency test does not necessarily work for all fabrics however, as certain fabrics like chiffons or georgettes are by their nature shear fabrics.

The next thing you can check for is the stitch length of seams – longer stitch lengths indicate poorer quality as manufacturers often do this to reduce costs involved in sewing time and amount of thread that is used. Smaller stitch lengths usually represent higher quality garments, as the stitch will be stronger and it will prevent gaping when pulled; but will require more thread used and more time for sewing.

Furthermore, regarding the stitching, you can check the ends of the seams, there will typically be threads that are visible and not neatly cut or hidden away. A bad quality garment will always have loose thread ends sticking out at various places that are easily visible, as it takes a lot of time to neaten such stitching. When I sew a seam, I neaten and hide the thread ends by hand, utilizing a hand needle – this is very time consuming, but I find that the results are so much more beautiful. I do the same with overlock stitches. In a low quality garment, overlock end stitches are often not finished off neatly, and it is very obvious and can often times result in threading coming loose.

Another aspect of a quality made garment is the amount of pressing that is done. With a quality dress, pressing and steaming at every single stage is necessary for a very polished and fine end product. If pressing is skipped at certain stages, this can easily be seen – such as at the end of a dart. Regarding darts, you can also see that dart-points in a quality garment are very fine and clean, and in a badly made garment they are flimsy and often exhibit big dimples. I myself press at every single stage of sewing, and use a very time consuming couture method of dart sewing, which leaves no thread ends at the dart point.

In terms of dresses with spaghetti straps, a low quality garment will have top stitching visible on the surface of the spaghetti strap – which is done as it saves time during sewing and is really a result of mass manufacturing of the straps. If you are lucky to have a quality made dress, you can instantly see the difference with the spaghetti straps in comparison. The straps should be extremely neat and well pressed, they should have slight stretch but not too much, and should be very fine in appearance – this is my personal standard that I came up with for the straps.

More expensive and fine clothing may also more likely utilize lining in the garment, or beautiful seams like the French seam – of course both depending on the desired effect and intent of the designer as well as design fabric used. 

The Conclusion.
 

So what should we take away from this; I think that every garment and retailer has its place. Like music which has fasts, and slows – pauses and rests; so too fashion has different notes and adornments necessary for a well balanced score. We cannot wear expensive boutique clothing every single day; and vice versa, wearing only cheap mass produced clothing would not give us the full experience of life. There are days for a t shirt and jeans, and there are days for a beautiful bias-cut dress. Your wardrobe should reflect all the aspects of your life, and should be filled with things you love. Just don’t overdo it with too many fast fashion clothes, that you’ll end up throwing away in a few months;)

Take your time. Enjoy the experience.

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