Vintage Miscellany – November 3, 2013

A Basket Ball Player, but not in those shoes, I’d bet!

*  I had no idea there was still a functioning 19th century silk mill in the UK.  It’s located in Whitchurch, Hampshire, and can be toured.  Thanks to The Tailor’s Apprentice for the link.

*   The Scottish textiles renaissance continues with Eribe, a company that employees handknitters.   The products are pricey, but pretty darned fantastic.

*  And the products at Brora, a Scottish cashmere maker are equally wonderful.

*   A Wisconsin company, Monterey Mills bought North Carolina’s failing Glenoit Fabrics because they wanted their jacquard looms and the expertise of their long-time employees.

*   An up-coming exhibition at The Fashion and Textile Museum, located in London, has my heart all a-flutter –  Artist Textiles: Picasso to Warhol.  It starts in January and runs through May.

*   “You are never alone at the mannequin factory.”  You’ve got to see the pictures of UK mannequin maker, Proportion>London.  Thanks to Jayne Shrimpton for the link.

*   There is a beautifully illustrated article at Collector’s Weekly on the embroidery of  the Arts and Crafts Movement.

*  It seems as if Ralph Lauren will be keeping his  promise to make the Team USA 2014 Olympic Games uniforms in the USA.  The article highlights some of the challenges facing a resurgence of textile and clothing manufacturing in the US, which relevance to the Monterey Mills story above.

*  And if he wasn’t  already getting points from the home front, Lauren has donated half a million dollars to the  Fashion Manufacturing Initiative, which “offers financial grants to New York City’s fashion manufacturing businesses looking to grow and sustain by improving machinery, expanding services, and training workers on the latest fabrication technologies and equipment.”  Now, let’s hope he starts making more of his own line in the US.

*  If you are not busy the last week in May, 2014, you might consider this fashion tour of southern Ontario.  It includes visits to several clothing and textile collections, including the  Fashion History Museum in Cambridge of which Jonathan Walford is curator.  I hope to be going, so it would be great to have some of you along.