Fausta's Blog

American and Latin American Politics, Society, and Culture

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Does Land’s End really want to become Zara?

For decades, Americans have relied on Land’s End for three things:

  1. School uniforms.
  2. Warm winter apparel, especially their wind-resistant squall jackets.
  3. Women’s swimsuits you can swim in while your butt remains covered.

Enter Land’s End’s new fashion-forward CEO, who asks, “Who would wear that?”

Read my article, Does Land’s End really want to become Zara?

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And now, a post on eyeglass frames

Face it, guys, this week’s news has been exhausting. Time to think of other things:

Glass Distinctions: Which Eyewear Frames Suit Your Personal Style?
You don’t want the same boring frames. But how much of a style risk can you live with every single day?

Eyewear can define who you are and who you want to be perhaps more than anything else a man owns. “You could have a great pair of shoes or a great suit, but people are first connecting with your face, so finding the right pair of glasses is crucial,” said designer Garrett Leight, who has followed in the footsteps of his father Larry Leight, founder of 28-year-old Oliver Peoples, by creating his own eponymous eyewear company which specializes in frames inspired by classics from the literary and film worlds.

With women, traditionally it’s been different, with the gin-soaked Anita Loos creating a mantra for generations with “Men don’t make passes at girls who wear glasses.”

Until you find the guy who does:

Here’s what I’m wearing now,

Lafont_Magnolia

And at my Facebook page, a survey:

A question to my FB friends,
Who was the best actor in all of The Godfather movies? (pick one)
1. Al Pacino
2. Marlon Brando
3. Lee Strassberg
4. Robert Duvall
5. Robert DeNiro
6. James Caan
7. Richard S. Castellano (the guy that played Clemenza)
and,
8. John Cazale (apologies for the omission!)

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Let’s talk about clothes and enclothed cognition

“Enclothed cognition”? That’s what psychologists call the premise that the clothes you wear directly affect how you think and what you do.

It turns out the study was paid for by Lululemon, which has managed a lot of free publicity because of some see-through pants, and because the CEO managed to tell the truth – that their clothes are not for the overweight:

Psychology of Lululemon: How Fashion Affects Fitness
Does expensive athletic wear actually incline us to work out? “Enclothed cognition” proposes that the clothes you wear directly affect how we think and what we do.

“It’s all about the symbolic meaning that you associate with a particular item of clothing,” Adam said. And he thinks the study’s results can be applied to many more fields, including activewear and fitness. “I think it would make sense that when you wear athletic clothing, you become more active and more likely to go to the gym and work out.”

Especially if you have spent $300+ on an outfit you could get for under $40 at Old Navy.

Let’s compare:
Lululemon:
En Route Jacket $148.00
Hustle & Bustle Tank $58.00
Astro Pant (Tall) *Full-On Luon $98.00
Total: $304.00

Old Navy:
Micro-Performance Fleece Jacket $10.00
Active by Old Navy Compression Tank $14.00
Fold-Over Yoga Pants $14.00
Total: $38.00

Yes, the prices above are as of today, and you can get almost ten Old Navy outfits for the price of one Lululemon.

“But Fausta,” you’ll say, “Lululemon’s yoga and running gear are designed for sweaty workouts (Full-On Luon fabric is sweat wicking, four-way stretch and breathable)! Old Navy’s isn’t!”

Ask yourself how many times a week/month/year you run outdoors long enough to break a sweat: that’s when you need the high-performance materials. If you work out indoors, you’ll do fine with Old Navy. At the end of your sweaty workout, you’re done, and you’ll be showering and changing anyway.

Unless, of course, you have to impress yourself and everybody else with the brand name (be it Lululemon, Patagonia, Athleta, or whatever), in which case, by all means, do. It all has to do with enclothed cognition.

However, keep one thing in mind: I don’t weigh myself, and I keep to a low-carb diet because I must, so the way I keep track of my weight is by seeing whether my non-stretchy clothes are getting tight. Once you get into the habit of wearing stretchy clothes all day, clothes that “give” (particularly around the waist), you lose track of that.

Which brings me to the question:
If you spend $300 on an outfit, would you be wearing it all day, and skipping the gym because breaking a sweat would mean changing into something less stylish? Or do you really get the activewear for working out?

Only you can answer that.

Related: Althouse goes Heisenberg and asks,

What I think would be fun to talk about is articles of clothing that you have used to alter your perceptions. And have you rejected items of clothing that you thought would skew your perceptions in ways you didn’t like? Remember to exclude the idea of how others perceive you and how their response to you will affect you. It’s just you. You and that item of clothing.

For a snowy day,

Blogging on Latin American politics shall resume later.


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Mexico: Retailers Descend on Mexico

Compare and contrast: Retailers pay millions of dollars to leave Argentina, while they’re descending on Mexico

Spurred by Relaxation of Tariffs on Clothing, Youth-Oriented Stores Head South, among them H&M, Zara, and Gap, all aimed at the younger consumer (I do shop at Zara for its classic, yet updated, style)

Encouraging the retail newcomers is the relaxation of steep tariffs on imported clothing. For more than a decade, Mexico applied antidumping duties as high as 533% on Chinese-made apparel to bolster its domestic garment industry. But in December 2011, the country eliminated the last of those transitional duties on Chinese clothing, lowering that barrier to entry. Currently the top tariff is a more palatable 25%.

“Because Mexico is a huge aspirational market, the removal of import tariffs for apparel may well be the single most-important retail event in the country in the past few years,” says a report by analysts at Credit Suisse, CSGN.VX -3.34% which estimates that clothing in Mexico was previously at least 50% more expensive than clothing in the U.S.

It’s all part of Mexico’s market-friendly policy by decreasing trade barriers.

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