When did clothing go completely downhill?

I don't know, but I'm upset about it. And with Globalization, the same stuff is produced and sold everywhere, so you can't buy quality stuff from other countries if you don't like what your country offers.

Even Nordstrom is selling that crap, I hate micro fiber...I wear cotton, linen, or wool.

The last two pair of pants I bought said "98% cotton" but they have some odd synthetic in them that causes the fit to stretch so that I would have to wear a belt to keep them up.

I like Lululemon men's slacks.......they are durable and look very similar to natural fibers.

The 2007-2010 recession.

All of your favorite head designers got fired.

The brand (names) were sold to people who sold the real estate of physical stores.

No consumers could buy the old clothes, so quality was degrades to make things people could buy.

Now, every store is secretly Old Navy.

^^degraded

If you want quality goods, you have to be willing to pay for it. The Gap and J. Crew cater to the middle class, and in order to keep things "affordable," they've switched to lower quality textiles to keep production costs down.

I noticed Banana Republic is junk too now. It was better only 5 years ago.

It was S/S 1533…that season the Milanese really lost their touch…supply chain issues due to major smallpox outbreaks across Europe and east into Asia put a real damper on the silk trade. Flax was in again…

They ain't nothin' wrong with a pair of crocs and stretchy pants! And besides, they don't cost much.

Well the middle class no longer exists the way it once did, so now you have high end clothes that cost more than ever, or “secretly Old Navy” chain stores. There is very little in-between.

Micro- fucking,-fiber. That has something to do with it. I hate that stuff, and its only good to clean bathtubs.

It’s the quality of the cotton and the stitching too. 100% cotton used to mean something, now it’s dubious at best.

*

I actually kind of know the answer to this. Around 2006-7, right before the Great Recession of 2008, Gap had a ton of surplus inventory and due to its losses fired its CEO. The quality was never the same at any of their sister companies. Even Banana went severely downhill in quality after their monetary losses around that time

Only rich people deserve to have quality clothing. The rest can wear cake.

Old Navy didn't go downhill because they were already there.

It's been downhill for over a decade and a half. Like the poster above said, 100% cotton doesn't even mean anything now.

Paid $110 for a shirt from a high end store. 3 washings later it fell apart. I have a shirt I bought at Walmart in 1991 that still has its color and Ive worn countless times. It looks fine. Ive tried to make myself hunt for clothes in thrifts,but I just hate it. I live in thrifts,so thats not the issue,but Ive looked at clothes and more often than not,they stink. Plus they never ever have my size (2xl but I wear that size for comfort more than necessity ).Ive been on a rant lately as so many of my shirts,wich arent that old,look like Ive had them for 20 years. Ive even washed them in vinegar to try and keep the color.That doesnt work.

Try to find a way to deal with an admitted degraded situation.

For example, for the remaining brands, they DO still over quality levels. For example both H&M and Zara offer t-shirts that are flimsy garbage cotton, but they also offer t-shirts that are THICK supima cotton. At retail they are double or triple the price of the crap but they are available. I've notice similar at WalMart. For example - WalMart's hunting clothes are very sturdy. And they have a big novelty t-shirt selection and the quality ranges form pure crap to quite good. Feel the cotton. Look at the stitching. I wrapped a bunch of halloween themed t-shirts at Walmart 8 years ago - with flaming skulls and horror designs, and they have been indestructible, have not lost their shape, and the painted designs haven't cracked and disintegrated.

"wrappped" = grabbed - bought

I was in SF back in the summer and went into Amoeba Records. They had tons of great t-shirts with bands/logos that I love. But the quality of the shirts were absolute shit, you could hold them up to the light and see through them. No way was I going to pay $40 for a t-shirt that would likely get holes after a few washings. Why couldn't they just get a better quality cotton?

The big plunge was when they started to treat "microfiber" as a complete description, without specifying the fiber itself.

40-60 to 60-40 cotton-rayon (and rayon's viscose variants, like Modal and bamboo) microfiber can be fantastic... the softness of cotton, with rayon's ability to wick huge amounts of moisture away from your body and evaporate it away. The problem is... there's a HUGE difference in quality between premium-quality rayon and shit-grade rayon, and it's not particularly easy for a consumer at a retail store to evaluate the quality of rayon in a particular piece of clothing... so, as a practical matter, almost all of it ends up being shit-grade now.

Even with cotton, it's kind of a dice-roll. I've bought 100% cotton t-shirts that seemed like they were a half-step above Bounty paper towels... but after washing with hot water & shrinking in a hot dryer, the fabric "densified" and became normal. Unfortunately, I've also done the same thing to OTHER 100% cotton t-shirts, and ended up with non-shrunken fabric that was basically a brittle Bounty paper towel.

It's the uncertainty that pisses me off the most. When you go to the store and pick up a T-shirt, you have NO WAY of knowing whether it's going to shrink predictably into "nice" cotton, or just end up being a way-too-big t-shirt that ends up in shreds after a couple of wearings anyway. For the life of me, I don't understand why those big bolts of fabric DON'T get pre-run through boiling hot water and heat-dried BEFORE cutting and sewing, so the finished product will be more or less the size it's going to be after the first wash.

I haven't bought Levi's jeans in decades, precisely because I don't have the patience to try on 10 pairs of jeans (all nominally the same style and size), have every fucking one of them fit differently, and know that it's ultimately still a roulette purchase because the way they fit at the store has almost no bearing on the way they'll fit after one or two washes. I used to LOVE Gap jeans & wore them exclusively for 25+ years, precisely BECAUSE circa 2000, you could pack for a 2 week trip & leave space for 4 pairs of jeans, stop at the Gap on the way to they airport, grab 4 pairs of jeans off the shelf in a style and size you knew fit, buy them without bothering to try them on, and get on that plane with absolute confidence that every single one of those pairs would fit exactly the same way your last 40 pairs did. Sadly, those days are now over, too. Half the time NOW, I just buy Wrangler jeans from Walmart, because they're cheap enough to deal with 50% being unwearable and wasted after washing due to unpredictable shrinkage.

Of all the stores I remember from college, I miss J. Riggings. Their clothes were shit quality, shrank, and fell apart after a few washings... but they shrank in generally predictable ways, and they were cheap enough to replace after a few months without crying too much anyway. Stylistically, they occupied the realm between edgy-Polo and tame-Hilfiger, and fit perfectly if you had an early-90s 'fratbod' (ie, you worked out, but weren't an athlete... you weren't a skinny twink, but you didn't really have a gut, either).

R22 because they are grubbing for profits and some dumb consumers don't know any better and will buy shit.

r19 have you tried one of the many places online that sell vintage clothing?

R23 Rayon is not technically a synthetic. "Microfibre" fabric is typically polyester and polyamide - not rayon. Rayon is plant based. Yes Modal is a form of rayon and modal does wick but via a different action than microfibre.

You're better off buying from second hand stores. You'll find clothing that was made years ago, when the quality was better.

R5 that’s why I rarely pay more than old navy prices. The material is crap all over.

Clothing was better made when we had unions in the USA. Now it's all done overseas in sweatshops where they pay people $5/day. I was really disappointed when a certain brand of hiking shoes that were really well made (and their factories were in Europe) decided to move to Southeast Asia. Now they fall apart pretty quickly. The thing is, the price was never reduced although they cut costs by outsourcing the labor.

R29, what brand?

I always look for the union label when I'm buying a coat, dress, or blouse.

These replies:

Are you a woman?

Does The Ritz Thrift Shop still have quality used furs?

R30 Asolo. I have a pair of low hikers that are at least10 years old, have hundreds of miles on them, and still hold up.

Pity. But there are a number of internationally available brands that still manufacture boots in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Italy.

Most Americans haven't noticed. They don't care about the quality of clothes,,,or anything, really.

Bergdorff Goodman........will never let you down..........

LL Bean and Land's End have pretty good clothes. Ben Silverman in South Carolina has excellent clothing for men.

Filson in Seattle has the most rugged men's clothing currently made. It is expensive but will last you the rest of your life. They outfitted all the Gold Rush(es)....and have never changed a thing about the way they make clothes.

Go naked op or just wear a gown.

rags

R40 that sounds good but a bit of hyperbole. For example, the denims and canvases of the Gold Rush are no longer woven.

I only recently began worrying about it with all this news about royalty stripping.

I live in modal when I'm home.

[quote]Filson in Seattle has the most rugged men's clothing currently made. It is expensive but will last you the rest of your life. They outfitted all the Gold Rush(es)....and have never changed a thing about the way they make clothes.

"...never changed a thing about the way they make clothes"

Unless you count 90% of their materials and 99% of their labor being outsourced to foreign countries with little, if any, quality control.

Filson is yet another formerly great American brand that is producing garbage while still charging "made for life" prices. And idiots will still buy it up just for the name.

Our clothing and shoes have been heavily subsidized; it’s been one of my biggest joys for over 20 years.

People expect the same prices as 2002. Robots and cheaper fiber have made that possible.

Look for...

NAFTA

How can one tell if garments for sale on apps like Vinted are legitimately oldschool quality material? Have found a few pieces that catch my eye and look good, but though the seller/description claim things like '100% wool' I have no way to verify this. Tips and tricks welcomed.

I'm sorry but everything "vintage" for sale online is a TOTAL CRAP SHOOT. Many things are being sold by IGNORANT or DISHONEST people desperate to make a buck. A lot of these people know nothing about their products. THEY WANT CASH. For many it's a job. I gave up because they are 50% dishonest and add to that 25% who are STUPID and have no eye for anything and can't even answer a question accurately. That is 75% misrepresentation of what they are selling.

If you know of a quality reseller, they will know their prices. And in fact quality vintage is astronomically expensive online.

If you want vintage the only option is wading through the flea markets and thrift shops and touching and seeing things with your own eyes.

[quote] I live in thrifts,so thats not the issue,but Ive looked at clothes and more often than not,they stink.

I love thrift stores, but now I live in an area with no good thrift stores.

Anyway, try putting the shirt (or whatever) in a plastic bag. Place the plastic bag in the freezer. Supposedly, freezing will kill the smells.

I don't bring anything from a thrift into my home unless it's sealed in plastic. The first opportunity it is laundered and dried.

I gave up buying unwashable woolens in thrifts 15 years ago.

There is a boom in bedbugs around the world. You do not want bedbugs as the bonus with a 2 dollar "bargain".

I've had good luck buying stuff on eBay. Not clothing, but small leather goods.

I have been doing searches for silk items on eBay and if / when I find something I like, I will buy. Usually, the seller will show the tag that says "100% silk" or whatever. I do machine wash silk (delicate cycle) and it doesn't last as long, that way. But, I figure you guys are looking for natural fibers.

I feel your pain, OP. Brands are liberally blending crappy polyester and acrylic with natural fibers and charging a lot for it.

There’s another stupid practice: vanity sizing. It’s something that has been common in women’s clothing for decades, to soothe the egos of obese fraus who wanted their size to be a smaller number. It has become ubiquitous in men’s clothing, too.

About 15 years ago, I could wear a small or a medium, depending on the brand. I’m pretty much the same weight these days and can fit into an extra small now. There are no standards, no consistency. It’s ridiculous.

Look for the union label.

Jump down...

R51 I use first dibs, they have amazing vintage, from all over, and they don't just let anyone sell garments through their website. I've also used the site to find vintage sellers bc they usually have separate independent stores with more inventory and information.

R51 Also do your research on brands labels in relation to their manufacturing period. 90s Geoffrey Beene uses a serif typeface for the label name, but 60s manufactured pieces will use a clean sans-serif typeface on the label.

Although either of those examples would be better made than almost anything today.

A popular label with DLers...

It's Ben Silver r39.

and you can get any color as long as it's....

You can’t buy a “fully fashioned” sweater anymore. The sleeves are sewn on. And in women’s clothes the patterns are never matched. Full retail for the higher end brands is more than custom made would cost. I don’t get it.

[R34] I honestly love you...

[quote] Full retail for the higher end brands is more than custom made would cost. I don’t get it.

Higher end brands = designer labels, I'm assuming. People are brainwashed into having designer labels, no matter what the quality.

The average American can't afford any better, the buying power has been reduced so much in the last forty years.

R60 That's also useful for mid-tier brands, because places like Gap have changed their logo over the years.

I have some older Banana Republic things that have lasted me for years. If you turn the items inside-out (which I do when I wash them), you can see that they're well-made. The odd thing is that the hems (blind stitching or whatever it's called) seem to come undone. Not a big deal to sew up a hem, but it's odd that they went cheap on something so easy.

I haven't bought anything recently from BR, though.

Whatever happened to cotton-ramie blends? I had an awesome sweater back in high school that was cotton-ramie that had lots of bulk, but wasn't particularly warm (which, in Florida, was actually a huge selling point... we like nice things too, we just never get to actually wear them).