Ethnic Influences on Apparel Design

The definition of ethnic is something pertaining to a characteristic of a people who share a common and distinctive culture, religion, or language. You see items from other cultures in fashion all the time. For example, moccasins and feathers that are borrowed from Native American cultures. Kimonos are borrowed from Asian cultures. Many Indian prints are also seen in fashion. Some "ethnic" clothing is not worn everyday though, but maybe brought out for special occasions to dress nice.
These items come about from people traveling and seeing these items in other places and they add them to their wardrobe. It is also seen in the media and people see these fashions and like them so they become popular and are put in designers lines.
I have a pair of moccasins myself and I get a comment on them every time I wear them. Someone once said to me that they were unique shoes that no one often sees. That made me happy because I like to be as original as I can with my dress, I don't ever wear the latest trend, or even know what it is.



Belinda T. Orzada (1999), Twentieth century design: Ethnic Influences. Retrieved September 26, 2008 from http://udel.edu/~orzada/Introduction.htm

New York Fashion Week

As I have said before, I am not into fashion. Today I saw the Mark Jacob's runway show and I thought it was amazing. It literally gave me chills. I mostly only know Mark Jacobs from his adds in magazines, and I rarely pay attention to his clothes. His show was practical for most women. I enjoyed his color palette.
My usual outfit is skinny jeans and my favorite dingy, now off white, white t-shirt, but when I saw Mark Jacobs line I thought to myself that even I would like to wear some of his clothes every once in a while.
I also enjoied Oscar de la Renta's Fall 2009 collection. It has some very cute skirts and sweaters in it.






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Organic and Environmental Friendly Clothing

I think that Organic and Environmental Friendly Clothing is a good thing. It helps cut down air pollution by not using as much pesticides, water, energy, and electricity.
I have a friend who has a pair of shoes that are made from recycled tires and cotton. They are very durable and cute. I think that making environmental friendly shoes is a very good idea because people go through shoes like crazy and they just get worn out and thrown away so why not make them out of organic or recyclable materials. Making shoes out of old tires seems like they would last a lot longer then normal shoes do anyways because they would not get near as much use as they would on a car then on your feet.
I have seen in stores lately sheets that are made out of hemp or organic cotton. I bought the organic cotton kind and, although I think that organic cotton is a good thing, I ended up not being very happy with them. The fitted sheet ended up pilling up after about three washes. It was so uncomfortable I could not even sleep on them. It was definitely not worth paying $45 dollars for.
On the other hand, my favorite t-shirts come from a company called American Apparel. They are made in America and are made from organic cotton. They are the most comfortable shirts I have ever worn and come in different styles and a large variety of colors.
Organic cotton and environmental friendly items should be sold at more stores and more people should be aware that this is happening. It has been being promoted a lot more in the past few years but I still feel like so many people are not doing their part to help out. I try to recycle as much as possible and the recycling locations on campus help a lot.

My Favorite Designer

Although my major is Apparel Product Design, I do not follow the fashion world at all. I don't look at magazines and follow the latest fashion trend. My favorite outfits consist of my favorite skinny blue jeans, a tank top or t-shirt, and, if its cold enough, my favorite hoodie. I am majoring in APD because I love to sew and I figured that even though I know nothing about fashion, I can create my own.
When we were given this assignment I thought that I would at least explore some designers and see what I thought. I did not really like menswear that much. I googled fashion designers and clicked on the coolest looking name and checked out their website. I came across a woman named Nanette Lepore. Her runway looks stood out more to me then any of the other designers looks did. They were colorful and fun. Her style is inspired from traveling with her parents when she was young.