• Hi, I am the owner and main administrator of Styleforum. If you find the forum useful and fun, please help support it by buying through the posted links on the forum. Our main, very popular sales thread, where the latest and best sales are listed, are posted HERE

    Purchases made through some of our links earns a commission for the forum and allows us to do the work of maintaining and improving it. Finally, thanks for being a part of this community. We realize that there are many choices today on the internet, and we have all of you to thank for making Styleforum the foremost destination for discussions of menswear.
  • This site contains affiliate links for which Styleforum may be compensated.
  • We would like to welcome House of Huntington as an official Affiliate Vendor. Shop past season Drake's, Nigel Cabourn, Private White V.C. and other menswear luxury brands at exceptional prices below retail. Please visit the Houise of Huntington thread and welcome them to the forum.

  • STYLE. COMMUNITY. GREAT CLOTHING.

    Bored of counting likes on social networks? At Styleforum, you’ll find rousing discussions that go beyond strings of emojis.

    Click Here to join Styleforum's thousands of style enthusiasts today!

    Styleforum is supported in part by commission earning affiliate links sitewide. Please support us by using them. You may learn more here.

Discussions about the fashion industry thread

clee1982

Stylish Dinosaur
Joined
Feb 22, 2009
Messages
28,817
Reaction score
24,623
I think their special material first approach has benefited the brand in exposure. In today's market getting ignored or lost in the noise is a death sentence. That said, with their founders coming from the ad world their branding and story have always come first. Materials served the story. Not everyone or brand needs to have design and development at their core but I consider that being closely tied to craft and material knowledge of apparel is simply more authentic. And by that I mean better.

agree, but I would somewhat find the material angle “not real”, I can’t imagine they have access to something that fundamentally North Face couldn’t do it, whether it’s overkill or not different story etc. I’m really just interested to find out if the angle is performance then is the performance back by some reality
 

cchen

Distinguished Member
Joined
Mar 19, 2006
Messages
3,468
Reaction score
1,391
agree, but I would somewhat find the material angle “not real”, I can’t imagine they have access to something that fundamentally North Face couldn’t do it, whether it’s overkill or not different story etc. I’m really just interested to find out if the angle is performance then is the performance back by some reality

it's not about having access - any brand can access almost any materials. its about the commercial proposition. TNF wouldn't use these materials because of the cost, hence Vollebak's high prices.
 

snow

Active Member
Joined
Mar 24, 2011
Messages
25
Reaction score
10
TNF is not the comparison to make (since it’s mainly a fashion brand, just at a lower price point). As I posted earlier there’s nothing special about the materials - schoeller stuff is ‘fine’, dyneema is pretty widely used and the way they are using it is dumb as hell, etc.

you can compare the puffer to something like this:https://featheredfriends.com/collec...eathered-friends-khumbu-expedition-down-parka which is cheaper, half the weight, made in USA, and good enough for actual mountains, and decide if the design/marketing is worth the $$$. But don’t fall for the hype and think they are actual performance jackets.
 
Last edited:

zissou

Distinguished Member
Joined
Aug 15, 2008
Messages
9,351
Reaction score
8,851
Vollebak is all marketing. On the one hand, it was super interesting that they made a watch out of e-waste and talked all about sustainability. Then, they go and make a jacket with copper wire that’s the most wasteful thing I’ve ever seen. And, really, who needs a hoodie that’s supposed to last a century?? I feel like this brand was made for techbros who just want to one-up each other.
 

zissou

Distinguished Member
Joined
Aug 15, 2008
Messages
9,351
Reaction score
8,851
I think their special material first approach has benefited the brand in exposure. In today's market getting ignored or lost in the noise is a death sentence. That said, with their founders coming from the ad world their branding and story have always come first. Materials served the story. Not everyone or brand needs to have design and development at their core but I consider that being closely tied to craft and material knowledge of apparel is simply more authentic. And by that I mean better.
The reality, though, from performance and sustainability perspectives, many of their materials actually suck big time. Their textiles are massively over engineered and unsustainable. To me, the brand is the epitome of r@pe the Earth to look cool.
 
Last edited:

cb200

Distinguished Member
Joined
Jan 30, 2010
Messages
1,418
Reaction score
1,971
agree, but I would somewhat find the material angle “not real”, I can’t imagine they have access to something that fundamentally North Face couldn’t do it, whether it’s overkill or not different story etc. I’m really just interested to find out if the angle is performance then is the performance back by some reality
I'd say some of the fabrics qualities independent of the designs they are used in are legit, but their application in the product may not add up to a performance package in terms of use case.

Same could be said with a critical eye on that puffer that was linked to. It is a sew-through baffle construction using a Pertex face fabric that has a coating/membrane that means both cold spots and thousands of perforations through the membrane that would degrade the listed waterproof properties in the spec given. So, in a hydrostatic head test the fabric could test as waterproof but in application fail due to construction choice.

That same jacket seems like it's got a hell of a lot of down in it. While that's going to make it warm it could be too much jacket for many environments and situations / use cases. Always trade offs in technical garments and applications can undermine raw materials performance.
 

gdl203

Purveyor of the Secret Sauce
Affiliate Vendor
Dubiously Honored
Supporting Member
Joined
Jun 9, 2005
Messages
45,602
Reaction score
54,392
The New York Times discovers Ssense


Press does not know how to cover online retail. Ask me how I know ?

They will gush over a little store that just opened close enough to Mulberry street because they can send a guy to take a few photos of wood floors and a vintage poster on the wall behind a rack of clothes... and write a generic blurb about a "unique assortment" of clothes, but if they can't do that, they just immediately give up. Every single serious menswear writer has at one time or another told us: I really want to do a piece on you guys, and then they have no idea how to write about an online store, so they move on to the next shiny object.

Here, there's funding, there big numbers, so there's something to talk about. So they write.
 

kjb

Distinguished Member
Supporting Member
Joined
Sep 20, 2017
Messages
2,004
Reaction score
9,404
Press does not know how to cover online retail. Ask me how I know ?

They will gush over a little store that just opened close enough to Mulberry street because they can send a guy to take a few photos of wood floors and a vintage poster on the wall behind a rack of clothes... and write a generic blurb about a "unique assortment" of clothes, but if they can't do that, they just immediately give up. Every single serious menswear writer has at one time or another told us: I really want to do a piece on you guys, and then they have no idea how to write about an online store, so they move on to the next shiny object.

Here, there's funding, there big numbers, so there's something to talk about. So they write.

I think the solution is probably to launch No Man E-coins Alone which would be accepted as the sole form of payment and boom, you’ll have to beat back the swarm of tech and fashion writers with a box of Thuya’s.

But on a more serious note that’s unfortunate that every article needs a “buzz” to get written. I would think your ethos and policies and social action would be enough but I guess not. Everything has to be a hit or the next big thing I guess. No time for the stores that want to stay small and do well.
 

gdl203

Purveyor of the Secret Sauce
Affiliate Vendor
Dubiously Honored
Supporting Member
Joined
Jun 9, 2005
Messages
45,602
Reaction score
54,392
I think the solution is probably to launch No Man E-coins Alone which would be accepted as the sole form of payment and boom, you’ll have to beat back the swarm of tech and fashion writers with a box of Thuya’s.

But on a more serious note that’s unfortunate that every article needs a “buzz” to get written. I would think your ethos and policies and social action would be enough but I guess not. Everything has to be a hit or the next big thing I guess. No time for the stores that want to stay small and do well.
I think if there's a physical location that's pretty enough to photograph, they'll do it because it's easy: publish 2 nice pics and 15 lines, done. You don't need to be Caramanica to do that. But how many articles do you see in mainstream press about Porter or other shops that are dedicated to online? Nothing unless/until there is a big event (funding/merger, etc...). Compare that to how many pieces were written on Bode opening a shop or the Aime store, etc...

It's understandable : some stuff is easier than other

Anyhow, SSense success story is super impressive
 
Last edited:

Featured Sponsor

How important is full vs half canvas to you for heavier sport jackets?

  • Definitely full canvas only

    Votes: 55 35.5%
  • Half canvas is fine

    Votes: 60 38.7%
  • Really don't care

    Votes: 17 11.0%
  • Depends on fabric

    Votes: 27 17.4%
  • Depends on price

    Votes: 28 18.1%

Forum statistics

Threads
505,203
Messages
10,579,246
Members
223,890
Latest member
2sleight
Top