Right on, my friend and esteemed colleague. And if anyone has the right to speak on these issues you do. One of the very few out there making his own stuff, and knowing what that all means. If half of those people out there got themselves in front of a cutting table and a sewing machine and a hot iron and spent a few days finding out what creating and making clothes is really all about, then all these issues wouldn't even exist. The problem is that there are just too many fakers out there. But all that is going to change in the world that is coming up for all of us sooner than we think. Keep it up Zam, and thanks for your comment. Part 3 up now..
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Geoffrey B. Small
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(continued from above) Via Spalato: beyond the photos part 3
I HAD TO GET OUT of the license deal.
In the meantime for about a year, the licensee did everything they could to ruin me. They stopped paying me, cut all logistical support, botched the collections, and by the time it was over and the license was broken, I lost everything I had built up for over 2 decades in Boston, my clients, my name and reputation, and my ability to produce anything (I didn't even have a sewing machine of my own anymore). My wife Diana and my 2-year old twins were with me now stuck in a tiny country town in the middle of nowhere in the mainland from Venice. We couldn't get back to the US, so we had to start all over from scratch in the kitchen of the apartment we were living in on the Via dei Martiri in Cavarzere. I bought a Singer home sewing machine just like the one I had used in my parent's attic in 1979 to start my firm at the very beginning in Boston and made 2 orders for a client in Reggio Emilia who had a good store at the time called Sette (7). I delivered them to him by car in person and got paid with a couple of post-dated checks. That was more money than the licensee had given me in almost a year, and suddenly I could pay rent and buy some real groceries for the family. I was back as an independent producer and artist once again, and this time, I vowed to myself i would never lose my freedom or independence again for the rest of my working days on this earth.
That was the beginning of Geoffrey B. Small Made in Italy- an idea for an independently owned firm that would become a fully integrated Italian design and production company specialized in pure research collections and making the best clothes in the world possible today, and nothing less-- and I will never forget those days.
I too was treated like a Romanian slave or a Moldavian by that system, I know what that felt like, and I vowed to myself, my family, and my metier, that someday we would show those f_____rs another way of doing things.
I am sorry if this sounds so personal, but it is. This is a personal business and when it is done well, the personal passion, drive, and commitments bring out the very best in all of us and the metier shines bright and far for the world to see. But when the accountants and the users and the corporations take it over, and it is bad… it is really bad.
All that pain took place for me over 15 years ago but those wounds still pierce the memory and drive my motivation like a big Ferrari motorcar on steroids with its gas pedal totally pushed to the floor… Since then we have kept hard at building the dream of a different kind of design company and new kind of clothing art, one tiny step at a time. We went from 1 person and a Singer home machine in the kitchen, to 3 people working in 2 apartments then 5 people in 3 apartments all in the same building, and now we are over 10 of us in a 300 square meter (3000sq ft) laboratorio workroom space where Matteo's pictures were taken on the Via Spalato in the same town of Cavarzere Venezia.
These people are not getting paid 175 euros a month like the Romanians I shared a factory floor with years ago, or 120 euros a month like a Moldavian today. They are fully legal contracted Italian Law employees, with full health coverage, pension benefits, paid sick days, 1 year pregnancy, 2 days paid vacation for every month worked, and a minimum wage that with benefits and paid in contributions easily reaches 15 dollars an hour for even the newest youngest recruit. Next week, they get fully paid summer vacation for almost 3 weeks by law paid entirely by our firm. And on top of that, here in Italy we pay one of the highest rates of tax on business income and profits (up to 70% for individual proprietors) and sales (the VAT is a whopping 22%). But I do it to be here, and to be a real Made in Italy company. One of the final few if you will. One of the proud, the brave, and the mighty.
Are we paying more than Moldavia? Hell yes, because frankly our people are worth more, we make more money by investing in them and keeping them. This is a very serious technology company underneath the hood, and we need and are willing to pay for the best brains, hearts and hands that we can get. After all, everyday we are going up against all of the corporations mentioned previously and others like the people running them, all over the global industry. And believe me, they are all basically predatory in nature, if you get my drift.
But we fear none of them- as long as we continue to push the envelope of the Art and the value of our works further and further beyond our wildest dreams. We have no backers and our bank lends us nothing, we don't need it. Our backers are our customers, and we aim to keep it that way. I came to Italy 15 years ago for one reason: to make the best clothes in the world. After surviving the license deal nightmare, I was able with the help of my wife Diana and our young tiny family to begin the long road to pursuing that goal and building that dream. All along the way our sales growth has averaged 10-15 percent a year, until 2013 when it started to reach upwards to a phenomenal 40-50 percent a year. Our margins are strong, and our handwork technologies even more so, and we are seeking more great people to join what we believe is the greatest sartoria operation in the world today. A team of human beings of such exceptional abilities, talents and motivation to master and then push- the art and science of designing and creating clothes by hand to new horizons, of which there are few if any left in the world to compare to. Maybe the workrooms at Dior, or Chanel, but ours is an entirely new idea for an entirely new age and time. And frankly, we are only just beginning… as our most recent and upcoming collections will soon prove themselves to be.
It's all about a revaluation of the intelligent human being and what he or she is truly worth in this industry and in this world. That is why I find the move to produce in an environment like Moldavia by one of our most successful and esteemed colleagues from the commercial point of view to be so disappointing for the metier, the community, and the customer that I must speak up about it and the reasons why. I am sorry to be so persistent on it, but having been a victim of such decisions and a witness to what those decisions do to the people affected by them and the type of product and work and effects on the society and the community around us that results, I cannot stand by and watch silent like so many others may. I will speak up about it and why, and I will continue to lobby my esteemed and yes, respected, colleague(s) to find the courage to stand up to the system and change their decisions and strategies and do better for themselves and for all of us on this planet and this race we call ourselves as humanity. Leading designers can have an influence and play a role where our industry and even our society is headed towards. I know this from personal experience, and I believe that designers whose names appear on successful commercial brand labels with worldwide distributions should reflect seriously on their positions as spokespeople and role models in a society today that places such unprecedented attention and interest on fashion and its related interests.
As a designer, I must stress that this is not a new 'bandwagon thing' for me- as we are now seeing amongst so many suddenly recently relabeled "sustainability-conscious, environmentally-concerned, ethically-aware" designers, brands and global multinational corporations (who just happen to specialize in fast fashion or luxury clothing financial merger & acquisition). Sorry, but we wrote the book on this kind of stuff. We have been doing sustainable hand made clothes-making since 1979, recycled design & production since we showed it in Paris in 1993, activist-themed collections for decades in Paris including our political message and commercially-suicidal anti Iraq invasion, Napoleonic, Medieval, and anti-nuclear collections- even supporting the Occupy Movement when it was extremely unpopular to do so (for evidence see our thread here on SZ back in 2012).
So when the videos below were filmed almost 4 years ago we were already well on our way to building the world's leading model for sustainable design and ethical creation and manufacture. In fact, without us, most of these characters in the industry now would never even have thought about or be talking about this kind of thing today at all if they could help it in the first place. You can trace it right to the foreword page I wrote for Sass Brown's "ECO-DESIGN" book, where most of them are quoting their numbers and their new mission statements from today.
But we are sick and tired of talking about things.
Quietly, steadily, just as we have been doing for the past three and a half decades, we just work at it. We don't talk about it. We prefer to do it. Day and night, in the workrooms here at Cavarzere and our incredible GBS key supplier partners all across Italy, in our world presentations in Paris, and with the sales staffs and on the selling floors of our exclusive authorized dealer partners around the planet- we continue to work at it- not just creating the most beautiful clothes in the world we possibly can, but also building a dream... of a new kind of company and a new kind of art for the 21st century. And before it's too late, to show to a new generation of customers and practitioners in the field, that yes indeed, there is a better way play this game, for everyone involved.
With many thanks to SZ for giving us the platform, to each of you for reading and hopefully understanding, and to Alan Grazioso and Cengage for the documentary and release permission to show his wonderful documentary work on us from 2012 here below...
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thank you
Thanks Arkady, DudleyGray and Torchiere, it's an honor and a pleasure to have you read the posts and have your comments. And thanks to everyone else who has been reading us lately. It was an emotional thing to go through it all over again and write about it, but again, I do think that if enough members on the forum become aware of things, then make their feelings known, smart companies out there will listen up and start making some changes. And if that happens, well it sure was worthwhile. SZ is an important medium right now, let's keep it that way. I am planning a very quick round-the-world trip with stops in Berlin, Shanghai, LA and NY, if any of you are in these towns, maybe we can get a chance to meet each other, if not as always thanks again, and remember to never give up. Best wishes, Geoffrey & the Team
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Geoffrey,
Many thanks for your exceptionally written--and heartbreaking--accounts of the industry.
I come from a former textile town (Fall River, MA) where, of course, all the jobs left in the 70s to lands far away. They called it the Spindle City, but that moniker has long outlived its relevance.
I try to buy from much smaller labels these days to do my part to make a difference, however small. It's not always easy and it's certainly not cheap but it's something I feel is important.
This weekend, in fact, I will be purchasing my first GBS piece (the glen plaid blazer) from Eth0s and am extremely excited to do so.
Keep up your amazing work and thank you for sharing with us all.
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Mr. Small, I tried on one of your coats at Hotoveli a few weeks back, right around when the sales associate informed me it had arrived. It was a bit of a transcendent experience just to turn around in it in front of the mirror -- almost as wonderful as the experience of reading your insightful and heartfelt commentary. This world needs more people like you.
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that was the most interesting, informative, and vital thing i've ever read on sz. i'm a huge fan and greatly appreciate your efforts and commitment.
and i'm thankful that you take the time to engage with us directly. its very respectful and respectable.
now if only i could see or handle a gbs garment firsthand...dying and coming back gives you considerable perspective
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/\ Come to New York in two weeks and you can not only see the garments but the man himself... Stay tuned.Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months - Oscar Wilde
StyleZeitgeist Magazine
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Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months - Oscar Wilde
StyleZeitgeist Magazine
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thank you again
Dear Law, Lowrey, Voltbird, Faust, cjbreed, nic tan, and TabulaRasa thanks so much for your posts and comments. TabulaRasa thank you as well for your recent purchase, please let us know how the jacket works. I am on the run to the airport now, but want to quickly thank everyone in Berlin at Darklands and in Shanghai at Eth0s for their wonderful, kind hospitality and welcome during my visits to both (including meeting quite a few SZ members and readers along the way). I will be making a brief stop in Los Angeles at Noodle Stories in the next few days, and of course, am very much looking forward to the upcoming SZ event at Hotoveli on the 27th and my first visit to NYC in a very, very long time. Thank you all again, I look forward to seeing and meeting some more of you soon in LA and New York and keeping both the discussion and the practice of our Art alive. With deepest and kindest regards, Geoffrey for the Team
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