Like the changing of the leaves and the rotation of the earth, the seasonal apparel cycle continues on. Last week saw an assemblage of representatives from the best brands, boutiques, and manufacturers in New York City as the Spring/Summer 15 season shows got into full swing.
If you’ve read our previous Market Week coverage, you’re familiar with the globetrotting death march brands take on to show their samples to buyers all over the world.
I had the pleasure of visiting a variety of trade shows and showrooms including Capsule, Liberty Fairs, Man/Woman, Premiere Vision, and Kingpins to report back on all the latest happenings within the world of raw and dry denim.
Our first installment covers the exhibitors at the Kingpins textile show, an invite-only gathering of a handful of the world’s top denim mills, dyers, and wash houses.
Collect Mills
Collect Mills is the fabric division of the larger Rampuya Co., parent company of both Momotaro and Japan Blue. Since they have two denim lines under the same umbrella, Collect often experiments in creating more unusual denims than many of the standalone mills.
Above is their hank-dyed mid-weight denim. The hand dunking of the denim yarns leads to a great variety of indigo concentrations throughout the fabric, giving it a deep color from the first wear through the end fade.
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Collect has also been fiddling with a variety of dyeing techniques to make other color warp yarns fade like indigo. See below their results in red, sky blue, and yellow.
The next denim might look familiar because it’s the same black/black sulphur weave used in Left Field’s Black Maria.
And finally is one of Collect’s heaviest denims, a slubby 18oz. sanforized fabric you’ll see on another jean later this week.
Artistic Fabric Mills
We met up with Henry Wong and Artistic Fabric Mills in Barcelona, but they’ve had a few developments since then like the above no fade denim. For all you dark denim lovers that never want to lose any indigo, the pair on the left has had one wash and the pair on the right has had thirty. Even in person, they’re practically identical.
And we’ve got an admitted soft spot for their super-concentrated Ajrak dyed denim, which translates millennia-old Indus Valley indigo dyeing techniques into a denim fabric. Henry says he’s never encountered a fabric with more crocking–we can’t wait.
Toyoshima Mills
Toyoshima has been weaving denim in Japan since 1955, but only recently have the garnered the attention of denimheads around the world. They can produce a very high quality regular selvedge denim like the 13oz. sample below.
But they can also get weird with innovative blends, like the 17% bamboo fiber selvedge denim below.
And downright crazy with this hibiscus blend denim,
It seems like an amazing heavyweight fader, but will primarily appeal to the masochistic. The thick hibiscus fibers make both faces of the fabric feel like a scouring pad.
Cone Mills
We also had the chance to catch up with North Carolina’s Cone Mills at Denim by PV in Barcelona, but they still had a few exciting samples on display from their White Oak Plant. This green core indigo denim that will subtly fade from a standard inky indigo to an aqua teal.
And dark wefts are coming back as well with this black/black selvedge.
And this shadow selvedge-esque indigo warp by black weft.
Check back soon for more of our ongoing coverage from Market Week SS15 when we dig into the brands.
