The Rise and Fall of the Garment District

The fashion industry would not be able to stand without the support of workers. The backbone of the Garment District starting up was Immigration. The district started to thrive due to the millions of immigrants that came to America at the turn of the 19th Century. The majority of the immigrants were Jewish Eastern Europeans who made up about 67 percent of the skilled workforce in New York according to “The Garment District Alliance”. As they were unable to own land, many Eastern European Jews lived in cities and picked up skills in Manufacturing, sewing, and Textile production. Manufacturing was also moved closer to this district as a direct result of where the labor was.

With manufacturing moving closer this called for a rise in jobs and the creation of larger and larger factories. The rise in demand for clothes also led to a rise in demand for better working conditions. One infamous example that called for better safety within these factories was the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire. This fire was a result of exploitive working conditions and locking doors to prevent leaving work early. The locked doors prevented the approximately 600 employees from leaving the building when the fire occurred. This resulted in 146 workers losing their lives due to the lack of safety measures present in 1911. Ultimately, this tragic event helped lead the rise of the first successful garment union, the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union (ILGWU), as well as sparking industry reforms that resulted in improving working conditions and safety precautions.

The Garment District, and by extension the Fashion Industry, provide a multitude of jobs outside of just designing and manufacturing. This is ever-present in the documentation of the fashion industry. During the 1940s and 1950s, fashion journalism was able to be found in prominent newspapers which as The New York Times and The New York Herald Tribune. According to “The Gotham Center for New York City History” quoting Virginia Pope, the fashion editor of The New York Times, “The came the war, and the Paris blackout. There were no reporters from Paris. So, we did New York designer stories, and New York fashion stories”. Pope was the initiator of annual fashion shows and the main contributor to the rise of fashion Journalism. Social media aids in the growth of fashion journalism as it is becoming a main source of marketing and brand promotion for fashion designers. According to the Garment District Alliance: Business Development and Collaborative the introduction of social media marketing helps build community and strengthen the capacity of the company. As fashion moves to a greater online presence, the charm that major magazines such as Elle, Vogue, and Women’s Wear Daily’s physical magazines used to have now been changed to a website format to increase outreach.

Currently, the job market in New York’s Garment District is recovering from the pandemic. According to the Garment District Alliance 2022-2023 report “The pandemic drove a loss of nearly 18,000 jobs, a 13% reduction, in the Garment District in 2020”. The number of jobs has increased steadily as pandemic restrictions have been lifted. Regardless of the pandemic decline, New York’s bi-annual fashion show brings in a load of Jobs. Additionally, the Women’s Wear Daily states that in 2015, New York employed more than 184,000 employees, from models, photographers, event organizers, and more. As we adjust back to regular life there is the hope that the Garment District of New York continues to harbor.