Open Letter to the Fashion Industry

Dear Fashion Industry (those who make women's clothing),

    This letter has been a long time coming. The trends and quality of womens' fashion have taken a serious dive over the past several years.

The first thing that I recall noticing was that bottom hems on tops changed. Instead of turning the fabric under and creating a hem, clothing companies began over stitching the raw edge and calling it good. This was mostly on sportswear and more casual tops but still disturbing as there were several companies doing it on business wear as well. Did it save time, money, material costs, skilled labor costs? Probably some of each.

Next came the style of printing all tops with some urban design. And it wasn't only that the tops were printed, the printing was done over any creases/wrinkles in the cloth creating voids in the printing. It didn't look very nice but it certainly saved on ink and time when you could just slap those garments down for printing, not worrying if the fabric was laid out properly.

Following that was the changing of sizes in womens' clothing. This even made the mainstream news. Wearing a size 12? Now you fit a 10! Magically, overnight, womens' sizes were scaled up. Smaller numbers actually corresponded to bigger sizes. Honestly, guys, no matter what the number on the tag, if the clothing doesn't look good, I'm not buying it.

And how about the addition of STRETCH to everything. Don't misunderstand, a bit of give is good in swimsuits, undies, bras, and workout wear but add it to pants and you have a disaster on your hands. I've come to conclude (through trying on many items in store fitting rooms) that "muffin top" is directly correlated to the sad trend of adding stretch to denim. You see, "normal" denim is stiff, fitting, holds up against any extra pounds you may be carrying around the middle, and tends to have a higher waistline on womens' jeans. Toss in a bit of stretch and suddenly jeans don't fit the way they should. They sag. Here I thought it was a poor choice by today's youth, to wear their jeans a bit lower on the hips, muffin tops hanging out. Nope, they had no choice as all they have been offered over the past few years are stretch denim that falls down the second you put it on. Pretty telling when the back pockets of the pants are actually on your upper thighs... Stretch in denim doesn't hold up. Stretch khaki is just as bad!

Add to the above that there is no thickness to the cloth used in clothing any more. Shirts are see-thru and pants are so thin that they hide nothing. I've got a mosquito bite on my thigh that you can see the outline of through my pants, that is how thin they are. Just as the plastic water bottle has gotten thinner to reduce waste (and costs for their manufacturers), clothing has gone thin too. I don't want everyone seeing my bra through my shirt. Does that mean I should buy two shirts and wear them together to maintain a bit of modesty? Where is the sense in that?

Don't get me started on granny bottom shirts either! Not every woman has the figure to or the desire to wear a top that has a wide elastic waistband or some form of drawstring at the bottom.

Finally, the dying off of the linen or cotton shirt. What happened to business dress shirts that you HAVE to iron? Everything is made of some sort of flowy, poly, stretchy blend as if we are expected to live in athletic wear.

Please, bring back quality, well made, stylish clothing for women. Enough cutting corners and sacrificing style. I want clothing that I enjoy wearing and that looks good. Oh, and that lasts longer than 3 washings.

Thanks.