Luxury knitwear product John Smedley has long been a
favorite of Ape to Gentleman, famous for its cotton and merino wool basics,
from polo shirts to sweaters. The Derbyshire factory where all of John
Smedley's clothing is made is just five minutes from Ape's headquarters, so the
brand has a very special place in our hearts.fashionbeautypalace
Earlier this month, we stayed invited to take a shop tour
hosted by Ian Maclean,
CEO of John Smedley.
It was not only a great opportunity to see the AW17 collection, which you can
find below, but also an education in the levels of detail that John Smedley
goes to produce only the best quality of finished product. We also must time to
sit down with Ian in his office to ask him some questions (see below) about the
brand. We have learned that Ian not only has personal affection and commitment
to the brand, but everyone who works there is proud of John Smedley, and should
be. For those of you who are not castoff to with the brand, you need to take a
closer look, and if you are familiar then you know what I am talking about.techgeeksblogger
Chris Chasseaud interview
Chris Beastall Factory Photograph
CC: What makes John Smedley so good?
IM: In the factory, you see the attention to detail that
people pay when making clothes. It's a cultural thing, my colleagues who work
on clothing, from spinning to weaving to dyeing, they are all very quality
conscious. The quality of the garment prevails over many other decisions. Of
course, that means it is expensive. People don't let things slide if they think
it's not of the right quality, and all of that adds to the cost. But at the end
of the day, that's one of the fundamental issues that sets John Smedley apart
from everyone else, and I think it can only be appreciated when years later a
satisfied customer returns a garment that has been around for maybe twenty
years, and that would love it. if he fixes it, and there's no expectation that
he can do it, because we don't advertise any kind of repair process, but of
course we can. You've seen invisible repair done, the most skillful manual
process we have is to repair things, so we can do that on the garment and ship
it to the customer, and they are extremely grateful, and when we can see a
garment that has been so well cared for for so many years it really makes you
understand what we are doing at the beginning of the process to create that
result, so I think that is a really important aspect of the business that I
have. It took a long time to learn. We have people who have worked here for a
long time and generations of them who have worked here who really feel that
quality is the number one issue for them. If you go back a bit before that, it
doesn't matter what you do at the factory with the materials once you have
them, but a key part of quality is the quality of the raw material you buy to
create the garment. And again, we do our best to source the best quality raw
materials, and historically there have been two: fine merino wool and very fine
Sea Island cotton. Do you know what Sea Island cotton is?triotechdigital
CC: I think John mentioned three different types, it
would be nice to know more about them and where they source from them.
IM: When you say Sea Island cotton, people regularly think
of a sunny island with a palm tree in the Caribbean, but that's not what Sea
Island cotton is. Technically, Sea Island cotton is what they call commercial
grade cotton. So you know that there is a world market for cotton, cotton is
grown in many different places in large quantities, and when it leaves the
farms and reaches the market it is classified like anything else. You have
waste cotton at the bottom, a lot of cotton in the middle of the market, and
some cotton comes out at the top, and that is measured by fiber length,
fineness, strength, whiteness, and it appears up to above. , and historically
in this market-based process where people come in and bid for the cotton they
want for what they want to make, be it a knit shirt, a pair of jeans or
whatever, you're going to buy the cotton you need. for your garment.computertechreviews
Very tall cotton was known as Sea Island cotton. That's the
name we gave it. It was like calling a nothingness cleaner a vacuum cleaner, it
became a ter.gethealthandbeauty