Flowers" official Weibo.
With the hit of the TV series "Flowers", finding a tailor to make clothes, which sounds a bit "ancient", has returned to the public eye again. The "Mr. Bao" in the play changed his body after wearing a custom suit, and immediately exuded a gentlemanly temperament that was different from the past, which had to be attributed to the magical efficiency brought by tailor-made. In addition to the amazement, the profession of tailor has also attracted people's attention.
Mr. Bao" in the last century.
In the 80s and 90s, going to a tailor shop to customize clothes was still the daily routine of Chinese consumers. However, with the development of industrial technology, assembly line garments have made the tailor's "slow work and meticulous work" a thing of the past, and the tailor is almost in a semi-invisible state in the current garment industry. In the face of the overwhelming occupation of market space by industrial clothing, in what form will the tailor profession be revitalized again?
"Hu Ge with the same style" with fire "Red Gang Tailor".
Mr. Bao" This set of clothes comes from the craftsmanship of the Red Gang tailor in Ningbo, Zhejiang. It is reported that the Red Gang tailors originated in the late Qing Dynasty and early Ming Dynasty, and Ningbo, as one of the earliest foreign treaty port cities at that time, gathered many "red-haired and blue-eyed" foreigners gathered here. The people of Ningbo called them "red-haired people" at that time, and the group of tailors who made clothes for these foreigners at that time gradually developed into well-known Red Gang tailors.
The Red Gang tailor is a school of great influence in the history of Chinese clothing, its founder Wang Caiyun opened the "Rong Chang Xiang Woolen Suit" (later referred to as Rong Chang Xiang) at No. 782 Nanjing East Road in Shanghai at the beginning of the last century, and the first set of "Mao suit" designed by Sun Yat-sen was born here. Not only that, the first suit in Chinese history, the first suit shop, and even the first suit theory monograph were also written by the Red Gang tailors.
Fenghua, Ningbo is the birthplace of the Red Gang tailors, and after the launch of "Flowers", the fiery effect of "Hu Ge with the same style" attracted consumers from all over the country to come here to customize suits. According to China News Network, consumers from Qingdao, Shandong Province made a special flight to Wang Xingchang's clothing store in Xikou Town, Fenghua District, to order suits; At present, the order for the same suit of "Mr. Bao" in the store is scheduled after the Spring Festival.
After the launch of "Flowers", the fiery effect of "Hu Ge with the same style" attracted consumers to customize suits through the Red Gang tailors.
Flowers" official Weibo.
It is a matter of good pleasure that traditional Chinese craftsman's craft is once again gaining attention. Wang Guanjie, director of Rong Changxiang and manager of the high-end department, said in a related interview that the store still makes 6,000 suits every year, which means an average of at least 16-17 sets per day. Undoubtedly, without a complete personnel structure and huge financial resources, such a figure would be unattainable for the average tailor.
In the era of industrialization, although traditional clothing is moving towards the stage of mass production, some well-known and long-established tailor shops are also becoming more adaptable to the current market rules. Taking Rong Changxiang as an example, in recent years, it has gradually changed from "Rong Changxiang woolen suit" to "Rong Changxiang clothing shares*** Under the capital injection, the Red Gang tailor who carries the spirit of history and inheritance still maintains a certain vitality.
The ups and downs of individual tailors
Compared with these high-end garment companies, for most consumers, those "inconspicuous" tailor shops on street corners and alleys are the closest scale for them to get in touch with tailoring and clothing. However, it is foreseeable that under the trend of the popularization of assembly line garment making and the capitalization of tailor shops, small-scale, self-employed tailor shops are encountering pressure from both sides.
Nearly 40 years into the tailoring industry, Imberon now runs his own tailor shop on Yuyuan Road in Shanghai, and at the age of 60, he can be said to have witnessed the rise and fall of the entire tailoring industry. In an interview with Jing Daily, Imberon said that tailors in the '80s were "casual workers" who would invite tailors to come to their homes for customization. At that time, there was a great demand for tailors in every household, and they almost went from house to house, "one finished and then the next". By around 2010, the number of people making clothes was slowly decreasing, and the market for tailors was severely squeezed. "At least 80% of the tailors in our hometown have been eliminated, and they will either change careers or go back, and this line of work will not be able to continue. ”
The first 10 years of the 21st century is the initial stage of China's apparel branding, according to Euromonitor data consulting company data, China's footwear and clothing market size from 2000 03 trillion yuan grew rapidly to 14 trillion yuan, with a compound market growth rate of more than 18%. With the gradual maturity of industrial mass production technology, the development space of the traditional tailoring and garment market has been hindered step by step.
On the other hand, from the consumer's point of view, fewer and fewer people go to a tailor to make clothes custom-made.
Zoe, who has been customizing for 5 years, shared with Jing Daily the "ups and downs" of her dressmaking process. She said that the process of garment-making is relatively cumbersome, not only do you need to go to the fabric market to choose your favorite style of fabric, but the process of communicating with the tailor and running in is also very time-consuming. Despite all the thought that goes into it, the final product is not always satisfactory. Not only that, there will be many unexpected situations in the process of garment-making, such as the texture of a certain fabric cannot be cut into the corresponding style, the color of the favorite fabric does not match your style very well after being made into a dress, and so on.
Another very practical factor is that most of today's tailors are older, and it is difficult for them to master the design and tailoring techniques to keep up with the times. Zoe mentions that old tailors are used to some fixed styles, such as shirts, blazers, and so on; The designs they make are relatively close-fitting, while some of the more modern styles, such as oversize, etc., are sometimes difficult for them to understand.
At present, most tailors are difficult to keep pace with the times due to their advanced design and tailoring techniques.
***calvin sit
In addition to the above factors, she stressed that one of the main reasons why people rarely go to garment making is that "people nowadays are a bit 'can't wait' and lack patience". "Everybody wants to get it fast, everything has to be fast, so most people probably don't want to spend that long doing it. However, according to Zoe, the beauty of garment making lies precisely in the extraordinarily precious thing that comes with delayed gratification.
From garment making to alteration
The tailors' "next stop".
On the one hand, it is the substitution of assembly line garment for tailoring technology, and on the other hand, it is increasingly difficult for consumers to build patience. The limited number of models of industrialized clothing could not fully fit the body shape of all consumers, and for tailors, the market for changing clothes quietly came.
In recent years, Imberon's tailor shop has completed the transformation from making clothes to altering clothes. Since 2010, with the deterioration of the traditional tailoring industry, Yin Bolong, who had previously "only made clothes without changing clothes", began to contact the market of changing clothes, and through word of mouth, he began to receive invitations from some large-scale event organizers in Shanghai to help some star artists change clothes, such as Ouyang Nana, Deng Ziqi, Li Yuchun and so on. Now, Imberon's tailor shop has been called "celebrity queen tailor shop" by some platforms, and there are many people who come to him to change clothes.
In recent years, Imberon's tailor shop has completed the transformation from making clothes to altering clothes.
Imberon's tailor shop Xiaohongshu.
However, Imberon also admitted: "It is more difficult to change clothes than to make clothes." "Changing clothes is a test of the tailor's craftsmanship, and it also tests the old tailors' understanding of some of the new design styles of the moment. For this reason, he has also deliberately learned new clothing pattern-making and styling skills over the years.
At the same time, with the development of social **, many young customers will generally look for a suitable tailor through the Internet for the first time when they have the need to change their clothes. Therefore, actively developing online channels is also another way for many old tailor shops to rejuvenate. Two years ago, the Impyron tailor shop registered a Xiaohongshu account, which played a great role in promoting the store's operation. According to him, there are a lot of customers who find the store through Xiaohongshu, almost all of them are young people, and ninety percent of them come to change clothes.
Imberon Tailor Shop previously registered a Xiaohongshu account.
Screenshot of Xiaohongshu.
On the whole, from the Red Gang tailor full of historical heritage to the self-employed tailor shop, the tailoring profession is still alive and well in the clothing market. They are all looking for suitable ways to adapt to the market operation in the new era - from self-employed to capital injection, from garment making to clothing modification, from neighborhood stores to online operations. Still, it is doubtful whether tailoring can be a sustainable profession, and the question is inheritance. Tailoring is not only "handicraft work", but also "hard work", even if the business of the tailor shop is good, it must be made by stitch and thread. "Young people don't want to be tailors anymore," says Imberon, "it's a craft, but no one does it anymore." ”
Written by magic
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