monday, april 6, 1981
spring fashion supplement to the daily nebraskan
page 7
Designer .
Continued from Page 6
"The European fit looks good standing
up, but it's definitely not a comfortable
suit for businessmen," Bill Bures, manager
of the downtown Ben Simon's store, said.
Not real comfortable
"Granted they do look good, but
they're not the most comfortable thing to
wear everyday," Bures said.
Bures said men like the European fit
because of the look and style, not because
of a particular designer's name.
An exception, he added, are Calvin
Klein clothes "which sell like gangbusters."
Bures said his store was in its third good
year of selling men's designer fashions,
mainly Yves St. Laurent, and attributed it
to the fact that men are more quality con
scious than before.
"It's a sign of the times," he said. "Peo
ple are conscious of value, more so than I
have ever seen them."
Bures also said that many men were
being more careful in their shopping habits
after finding out in national magazines how
some designers are overpricing their pro
duct solely because of their name.
This is where salesmanship becomes
important, Bures said.
"We want people to buy our best made
suit," he said. "Take our word for it, we
want to give them a true value. We're not
trying to pull a fast one, we want people to
come back."
Younger men more impressed
Bures said younger people were more
likely to be impressed by a designer name.
And although students are not spending
more money on clothes than before, he
said, they are dressing up more, "in some
thing besides fatigue pants and flannel
shirts."
Tom Lintz, manager of Jason's clothing
store for men, echoed Patterson's view that
men are not buying clothes as often as be
fore but are buying better quality.
"Everybody is becoming more cost
aware," he said. "If they (designers) give
them quality, designers will be in good
shape."
"But if they try to cut quality," he
added, "you betcha' they'll go down."
Lintz said that Italian designers have
made their look more available to Ameri
can men by scaling down the style and
making it more relaxed.
For example, the shoulder area was the
main downfall of the old European fit be
cause its tight fit cut down mobility, some
thing not appealing to men who had to
move in the suit all day.
Newer fit is more comfortable
But the new European fit, Lintz said, is
not as square in the shoulders and not as
padded, making it more comfortable.
Giorgio Armani developed this style of
wear in 1975, and it was promptly dubbed
the "unstructured" look because it had no
lr ng, padding or excess fabric to get in
th way of free movement.
The merging of the old European fit and
American style of fashion has worked well,
mainly because of added comfort.
"Lots of times men will look for a name
first, but if the fit isn't comfortable they
won't buy," Lintz said.
But if you are one of those people who
don't feel like spending an entire paycheck
on a designer suit, take heart, because of
17 million suits sold in 1979, 75 percent
were priced at $100 or less.
And, if you want to achieve Armani's
"rumpled" look that Richard Gere popu
larized in the movie "American Gigolo",
you can always use the popular student's
method leave it on the floor of your
room for a week or so until it gets that
desired "rumpled" look.
ci T omas Jewelers
The
Atrium
East Park
Plaza
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