after taking down notes for all the brands that i have listed, it was time to compare and find the relevant similarities and differences between the three different market areas ____
high end ____
karen walker,
kate sylvester and
zambesi all use very expensive and good quality fabrics in their designs. take their knitted garments for example, karen walker uses cashmere in her 3/4 sleeve peach striped sweater which gives it a wonderful soft feel and by what we know about cashmere, it is one of the best wools in the industry. kate sylvester may not use cashmere in her franka slouchy cardi as it is designed to be more lightweight and trendy however, her choice to use mercerised cotton is a more high end option as it gives the cotton more strength and there is more work put into mercerising cotton than to just use plain cotton. and as for zambesi, their alpha jumper is 96% wool and 4% lycra meaning that it is super warm and has the extra lycra to give it more comfort .
i also noted when comparing the construction of the garments, the majority use binding to finish their seams which is time consuming which leads to a higher expense, this and also in particular, karen walker's tie shorts in her latest collection show an interesting use of french seaming to close off the pocket bags which eliminate the use of the threads from overlocking and the bulk of binding. this was fantastic !
another aspect of these garments is the location of where they are made. kate sylvester and zambesi are both new zealand made while some of karen walker's garments are also new zealand made. being new zealand brands and staying loyal to the new zealand economy comes at a cost but in times like these, we need to push past it to make a statement .
with that said, it would be understandable to expect the price range that these garments fall under, with excellent quality fabrics, construction techniques and not putting people through slave labour / sweatshop situations, these can explain what high end is .
click the images below to buy .
middle market ____
with middle market labels such as
witchery,
country road and
staxs, there is a little bit of a difference from the high end including the construction properties of the garments. there is significantly more use of overlocked seams in this area and the fact that most garments are made in china. the quality of fabrics is less and the price range is slightly less .
staxs didn't seem to have any cooler weather knits... so there is just a jacket in its place .
mass market ____
there are so many designs to choose from... and more get added every few weeks. i looked into
glassons,
jay jays and
supre and it is definitely 'fast fashion' in the mass market. comparing the experiences in the stores, the space of the high end is clean and well looked after whereas on the other end of the scale, walking into a mass market labelled store there are clothes everywhere. with more the five of each size sitting on the rack waiting for some unsuspecting shopper. it was so weird noticing this as i have never really thought about it before. there is also a huge sale section with mass market stores that take up almost half of the space they have inside .
but apart from that, when i looked at the construction of the garments it was evident that all the seams were either overlock finished (cheapest and fastest option)... some were french seamed in sheer fabrics and also the quality of fabrics was far from exquisite. an example can be the two tone loose knit jumper from glassons which is only 100% acrylic. it gives a sense of wool, but in terms of warmth and comfort it is not as nice as that of cashmere . . . not to say that it is bad . . .
<3
