Moscot Eyewear in Store

The Moscots are finally here. Do drop by and check them out, they are well worth the time. We promise.

Wrath Arcane

"I don't even know what the trends are," says O'Neill. "I don't care if Europe's full of color or whatever. Those trends don't translate across the country. Guys want a basic silhouette."

Take a midday break.

Have a read.

There's a good article on Wrath Arcane in case some of you would like to know more background info. Check it here

Really good insight into what they're doing and how challenging it really is to start a label.

Moscot Originals - Est. 1915

We are proud to announce that KIN will now be carrying Moscot Eyewear in store. As promised, we're always looking out for the best and most sought after products out there. We're quite particular on being ahead of the curve in offering them to you. We're pretty sure all of you are noticing our efforts thus far.

Despite being around for quite some time already, Moscot's recently been getting a lot of much-deserved publicity from customers and media alike. Their current collection is absolutely on point which means that you'll most definitely be hearing a lot more about them very soon.

The vintage-inspired MOSCOT Originals collection is a nod to the classic looks of decades past.

The newly-made frames are based on styles from the MOSCOT archives from the 1930's, 40's, 50's, 60's and 70's, retaining all of the authenticity of the original frame style right down to real glass lenses in their sunglasses, traditional hardware, and lens colors that precisely duplicate the true old school colors first fabricated by the company in the 1940's. The faithfully reproduced collection, is available as eyeglasses or sunglasses, with or without a prescription, in a variety of frame and lens color combinations and sizes.

Fun fact of the day: I used to live right around the corner from their 14th Street location in New York City circa 2005. I walked past their space every day and never actually walked into the store. Had I been a bit more curious, we'd have probably been able to enjoy Moscot Eyewear as early as our first day in business.

Everyone's had something to say about Moscot; Telegraph UK has an interesting insight. So does Slamxhype and Hypebeast. Selectism quotes Secret Forts in this piece.

Moscot is stocked at these fine stores:

Smith + Butler

Tauk

Colette Paris

Studiohomme Paris

10 Corso Como

Beams Harajuku

United Arrows Japan

Liberty London

Moscot will be available by next week.

Music: DJ Third Rail

Alright so were rolling around Chicago chillin real good and we meet up with some of my good friend's old buddies from high school. Sitting at their place he's throws this on: 89.30FM, Sunday Night 12:30AM, these mother fuckers are up in a radio studio spinning live on vinyls. Talk about dedicated man! So if you like some underground hip-hop, rap, beats, and everything else you can tag along with the prior, listen to the mixes below, straight fire.





I can pick out a track every once in awhile but I don't know enough to get the whole gist of the playlist in terms of whose on there and what he's mixing. Or if you have the original playlists that'd be great too.

http://www.dj3rdrail.com/

Here are the three recordings on his site:

Music

We've had a lot of inquiries regarding the music going on in store.

Thought we'd plug in a suggestion.

If you're liking The Black Keys, you're going to enjoy lead vocalist Dan Auerbach's solo effort titled 'Keep it Hid'. This was released in February of this year. It was recorded using mainly analog and vintage equipment.

It's playing in store right now.

In the meantime, enjoy some Great Singapore Sale deals; First item's regular priced, second is at 10% off.

Enjoy the weekend!

Recommended Reading

Blogs:
Fashion Nation, a fashion blog that delves into the world of independent fashion sites, blogs, magazines and forums as well as providing insight into the local Singaporean fashion scene.






Multifaceted:
Common People, a media platform that engages creatives that reside, pass through or are working on something related to the creative field in Singapore. Content is wholly video interviews, providing an interest peak into some of the creative individuals, collectives or entities that reside in Singapore.



School of Thought, a collective behind the food joint, Food for Thought and the publishing company behind " " (Quotations) the literary magazine that is slowly making its way to eyes across Singapore. Keep a lookout for these guys to shake some more things up in Singapore.

Gitman Vintage

We're proud to say that Gitman Vintage will be one of our new labels arriving at the store this summer. It's parent company(Gitman) has roots in NYC and is based out of Ashland, Virginia and has been in operation for the last 4 decades. All Gitman products are made in America. Gitman has raised an artisan craftsmanship culture around the Ashland area for quite a number of years now specializing in shirt making where it has employed families for years.

Gitman Vintage(American heritage inspired) is manufactured at the Ashland factories from scratch. Thread is developed in house and then used to manufacture the beautiful shirts, from start to finish, the whole process is handled in house with over decades of experience. The label takes cue from, "fabrics culled from late 1970s and early 1980s line-books (as well as current fabrications) and includes authentic details such as double-track stitching, chalk buttons and locker-loops. The collection is reissued with the original "Gitman Bros. Est 1978" label."

Our first order will be from their second season, FW2009

Debuting its second season, the Gitman Vintage Fall / Winter 2009 collection pays homage to Fall / Winter 1980. In addition to selecting perennial favorites, such as washed oxford and pinpoint, gingham check and small colorful plaids, we also selectively appropriated for this collection some of our favorites from the past: multi-toned flannels, snap Western shirts, one-of-a-kind university stripe oxfords, herringbone twills, beefy oxfords and a variety of chambrays. All available in our classic button-down, round or key collar.

Stocks should land in store mid August.
Stay tuned.

Gitman Vintage featured in Details

S***R Footwear A/W 2009

A feature on the up and coming AW collection from S***R Footwear came up on Selectism about 2 weeks ago. Some interesting styles coming up.

Click the shoe to view more photos.

A Flashback Production Post, Shenzhen – Guangzhou: Part 1

About to take the Guangzhou airport shuttle

The following paragraphs are being written from memory, pre active blog, before we decided it would be wise to document and share our journey of many paths.

Cross walk by the place we stayed at, Tianhe Bei Lu

The basic itinerary of the trip went like this:
Day 1: Arrive in Guangzhou, rest up and caught up with our friends in the city.
Day 2: Travel to Shenzhen by train early in the morning, we visited several fabric companies in the morning then had some great lunch. The remainder of the day was spent viewing our main production factory and then late afternoon to late at night was spent editing garments in the meeting room.
Day3: Back in Guangzhou, visited several fabric store/market areas.
Day4: Checked out some of the regular garment markets to see if there were any B-Grades around, suss out the production scope around there.
Day5: Guangzhou textile center, too big to describe, just huge, overwhelming.
Day6: Relaxing before we leave back to Singapore.

Throw some drinking and crazy cab rides in there as well then sprinkle some good eating and parties around too.

Train station at Guangzhou

Our production centers are in Shenzhen and Bangkok; Shenzhen is where our wovens get made and Bangkok is where our jersey pieces get made. Shenzhen plays a very important role with sifr since the majority of our first collection is wovens. I know a lot of people mention about the stigma that goes hand in hand with production in China but believe us we tried to find the best possible production for our garments without compromising one of our core values, accessibility. We’ve done our research on production in Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Philippines, and Indonesia so far. If we went with production out of Japan or Korea we’d have to move our price points up 150 –200% at the least. With currency exchange rates and cost of labor there is a reason why companies end up charging the consumer $250 onwards for a garment that is made in Japan. Southeast Asian textile and production industry exists very much so but in terms of quality control, communication and finding solid production centers we were out of luck. We’ll continue to keep searching the region as we delve deeper into our sourcing investigation leads. As our never ending sourcing quest leads us to the production center of the world at the moment, China.

Street busker with child

To be continued in Part 2.

Slipmat Contest!

We had blogged about our man Daryl joining in on a slipmat contest called, "A Nice Set" several weeks back. A project between Plus et Plus, reed space, and idN magazine. Thanks to our combined support and his own skill and hard work Daryl has come out as the contest winner in Singapore and will have his work on tour with the other 30 or so slipmats. Daryl's work will also get published in an art book in conjunction with the contest.

Thank you for spreading the love.

Drops from S***R Footwear

Dylan 10 and 11. Black and White. Tumbled synthetic leather footwear from Swear now in store.

Twitter!

We're not trying to flood you. It just seems everyone nowadays has a twitter, we're riding the wave of change. An article in Time magazine recently cited twitter had a growth of over 1200% in monthly visits during the past year.

However the bottom line is that Oprah has a twitter, we're interested in following her. We'd like to use the term ambient awareness with our new move towards twitter, we'll know what you guys are up to and you'll know what we're up to. We've decided to take a more personal route and give our updates alongside store updates because we're just that interesting(6) (Sarcasm meter).

Here it is, the KIN Twitter!

and here is the Time article: "How Twitter Will Change the Way We Live"

Pretty heavy duty if you ask us, but hey, there was friendster, myspace, facebook and I guess twitter is the next wave.

(On a personal note I was asking myself the question, "Why would anyone want another stream of information on top of facebook, email, tv, magazines, ads, ect?" I guess my question is semi-answered by the above Time article. All I'm going to say is that there's only 24 hours in a day.)

Stay tuned for some flashback production trips!

Non-no and Popeye

Here's an older issue from November 2008 of Non-no and here is a current version of Popeye from this month, June 2009. I hope you enjoy viewing the photos or reading if you can read Kanji.

The Next Best Thing To Being Naked Is. . .

sifr essentials

sifr essentials are made from premium grade pima cotton.
As light as a feather to fight the heat and ensure extraordinary comfort.

MHI by Maharishi: "New World Order" SS09

MHI by Maharishi: “New World Order” SS09
Have a look at MHI by Maharishi. Maharishi was the originator of the military surplus look with their main collection Maharishi started in 1994. They added the second collection MHI by Maharishi in 2000 which had a more street denim look and feel to it. The Spring 2009 collection titled “New World Order” has a Greco Roman theme with MHI’s infamous attention to detail.

Rolled Cargo Shirt

Details: 100% 50s Cotton Poplin. MHI embroidery on front pocket. Custom MHI Trims and finishing. Epaulet details, deconstructed breast pockets with button snaps. Button the sleeve coupled with a button placket on the inside to help secure sleeve roll.
Sizes: xs s m l
Made in India at Maharishi Factories

Seersucker Shirt

Details: 100% Cotton Seersucker. MHI embroidery on front pocket. Custom MHI Trims and finishing. Double ply breast pocket. Deconstruction detail on elbow patch.
Sizes: xs s m l
Made in India at Maharishi Factories

MH Eye Tee

Details: 170s 100% Premium Cotton Jersey. Digital screen print. MHI piping on the inside of the shirt. No label, product label and size is screen printed along with seasonal MHI graphics for extra comfort.
Sizes: xs s m l
Made in India at Maharishi Factories

Reverso Tee

Details: 170s 100% Premium Cotton Jersey. Digital screen print. MHI piping on the inside of the shirt. No label, product label and size is screen printed along with seasonal MHI graphics for extra comfort.
Sizes: xs s m l
Made in India at Maharishi Factories

Snocord Helipants

Details: 100% Coated Italian Joy Cotton. Mahasystems snocord tech, effective for tightening and loosening waist and pegging pant legs. 6 pockets including 2 front cargo pockets and one stash pocket on the ankle. MHI embroidery on back pocket. Custom MHI Trims and finishing. Crotch reinforcement with triple needle stitch.
Sizes: xs s m l
Made in India at Maharishi Factories

Web Sweat Sno Shorts

Details: 100% 360 Sweat Cotton. MHI embroidery on back pocket. Custom MHI Trims and finishing. Snaps on the side of the short to assist with pegging.
Sizes: xs s m l
Made in India at Maharishi Factories

Monocle Popup Store

A new Monocle pop up store following LA and Paris has hit Spain. The shop stocks a range of Monocle design collaborations with the likes of Porter, Comme des Garçons, Orlebar Brown and Valextra - plus a handful of exclusive products for the LA store, including a limited-edition Monocle candle from Le Labo.

Also do pick up the new issue of Monocle(#24) that has just dropped. You can find them at your nearest good bookstore. We recommend Basheer books in Bras Basah or you can stop by your friendly Kinokuniya.

Maiden Noir: Website Launch

Maiden Noir recently launched their new website about a week ago (Been so busy, haven't been able to update blog much lately). Website includes a nice simple layout with signature Maiden graphics. Content also includes info on their background story and a lookbook for their Spring 09 collection.

Just a reminder we do have Maiden products. We still have some nice pieces from the AW/SS08 collection as well as new pieces from their SS09.

Cheers!

Production Progress: Final Speak

The third and final day at the factory was spent finishing.

Finishing is whereby the garment goes through a few steps before it is ready to be presented for review. The first step in finishing usually involves sending the garment through a wash. There are three reasons for this. First is to clean the garment. When the garment has gone through the sewing lines, it usually picks up a lot of residue/dust/etc. The pre-washed fabric also has contaminants and starch in it.

2nd is hand feel. There is a choice of various hand feels that can be achieved from washing the garment. One can choose between a regular garment wash, garment wash with softener, enzyme wash, silicone wash, etc. Even an ice wash. However, some fabrics that aren't as tightly weaved will not be able to handle the more harsh washes. We usually go with a regular 5 minute garment wash with softener for our shirting so as to achieve hand-feel and shrinkage.

Shrinkage is the third reason. Most consumers want the garments pre-shrunk so as to avoid major shrinkage when washing at home. This is also so that the garment fits the same way at home as how it fit in store.

Interesting point to note with shrinkage. This is why when drafting up a pattern, you need to take note of shrinkage and add extra so that when it does shrink after wash, it will end up at your desired size spec. For example, if the length of a cotton shirt is supposed to be 29.5 inches after washing, you need to add about 3% to the length on the pattern before washing so as to achieve that desired length. Start out with 30.385 inches to achieve 29.5 inches.

Next step after wash, we tack on buttons. The reason the buttons are put on after is because the industrial washing machines may undo the buttons during the wash.

The garment then goes through a phase of quality control whereby loose thread is removed and everything is given the once over. Picture the intense door woman outside your favorite nightclub. That's the sort of once over the garment receives.

Then it goes to pressing. There are usually three types of press. A very light press where puckering (thread pulls on a seam that cause waves) of the garment is fully retained and garment is nicely wrinkled. A semi-press where the puckering is slightly reduced and garment is not as wrinkled. Picture a shirt that's been dry cleaned but worn once after. The third is a complete press where the garment looks like it's come out of a Thomas Pink catalogue.

Sifr usually goes with the semi-press or complete press depending on the fabric. If it is a check/madras/plaid garment, you will most likely see a semi-press to retain the look consistent with that type of shirt. If it is a broadcloth shirt, you will see it completely pressed as they usually wrinkle more.

Now for a breather. Sorry for the info overload.

Packed and ready to go, the samples were brought back to Singapore for a light review session. This is where we run through all changes with the design team. We discuss changes as well as do a fit and measurement test. The reason for this is that measurements tend to differ depending on fabric choice after the garment has been washed. We have to make sure it fits according to our desired size spec.

Apologies for the lack of photographs this time around. We'll be sure to get more photographs next time. The focus was on getting the samples done.

Vans Authentic

Quick one.

Vans just sent us a small shipment of the Red Authentics. $59.

G.I. Joe: Resolute

The web series finished about a month ago in the US, so if you haven't watched these yet, I'd go make some cup noodles, grab a drink and open 11 tabs up in your browser.

G.I. Joe: Resolute is a more modern take on the series instead of the futuristic setting that was done in the original, which makes it a lot more exciting since almost all of the technology is operational or in trial stages(check the wingsuit that Snake Eyes uses, that was featured in a recent trade show in Abu Dhabi), if you're interested for more info on the Resolute series check here.



Check this link for all the episodes: G.I. JOE AMERICAN HEROES
Can't wait till the movie comes out!

Wolframaplha: Computing the Interwebs

I found this answer engine just yesterday afternoon while I was taking a break from the rigors of measuring garments and breaking salty sweats over rough sketches, Wolframalpha is AMAZING. My jaw dropped 15 seconds into the screencast on their website. Here's a blurb from the about section of their website:

Wait forget that, forget that, just go to the site and view the screen cast, it's mind blowing.

Flower Boys

For those of you that missed it, New York Magazine has a great spread on floral prints. Go through the slideshow.

An interesting comparison. Pay close attention to price, brand, extent of print, etc. The Pegleg shorts as well as the Shipley & Halmos shirt are on point. 

Found another feature on Men.Style.Com right here. I've been wanting to post this up a while ago. Stumbled upon it again very recently. And yes, not a good idea to try and adopt all trends at once.

Production Cont'd

Good to know some of you are actually interested in our production reports. It gives some of you more inside info and some transparency into what we're actually up to. We'll try and include as much insight as possible. Let us know if you readers would like more specific information through the comments section. What are you lot interested in?

So the rest of the Wednesday was spent at LLG to link up with the patternmaker and our production manager to sort out some of our proto samples. When we make a sample in Singapore, it's usually about 80% correct. Our trips to Jakarta usually involve fully correcting the garment so as to have it ready to show our manufacturer in China.

Moving on, we decided to create a pattern for a new style that is underway. This one required for us to get our patternmaker (PM) to whip something up from scratch. This one required my urgent attention so as to get the shape of the shirt absolutely on point. The sewing was also a little more tricky. This will be Sifr's standard relaxed fit shirt. Measurements should emulate our gusset shirts currently in store. Just with a longer tail.

I then touched base with our PM at about 12pm and spoke to him for about 15 minutes to iron out any confusions. By about 2.30 pm the pattern was done and we were cutting the fabric. Things really get moving down here and we're absolutely grateful for that.

While the fabric was being cut, I whipped out on of our proto samples that needed a lot of correcting. We created a pair of pants with a completely elastic waistband. With that said, we didn't want it to look like a pair of pajama pants. Therefore, we decided to make half of it elastic, and the other half without. We decided to throw on a button and cording on the inner part of the band. It's looking healthier now.

This style is particularly interesting. One would usually associate shirting fabric strictly with shirts. This time however, we thought that if this fabric was suitable above your waist, why not use it below. This would amount to a very comfortable, lightweight pair of pants ideal for this sickly/muggy weather. Paired with a t-shirt or a clean shirt and you've got a money fit right there. These will come in all sorts of colors and patterns. Trust us, this could be the next big thing out there for all the more practical/weather-dependent customers.

I then went to harass the factory operations manager/merchandiser/bouncer. In an effort to throw my weight around, he really showed me who the boss was down there. I was made to relinquish ownership of my eyeglass cord. I wasn't happy.

Done for the day and waiting on samples. We clocked in about 6 hours worth of solid work. All this probably amounted to about 10 days worth of work in Singapore with consideration paid to delays, lags, etc.

I'll be back with progress of 3rd day focusing on our standard relaxed fit shirt. 

We're ALMOST 2 Years Old!

We're turning 2 tomorrow.
We're going to be setting up a table and a rack on Saturday and Sunday.
All regular priced items in store are going for 20% off.

Thanks for reading our blog, much appreciation to all your comments and emails.
Drop by and say hi this weekend!

Many thanks,
KIN

Freshness Mag feature on Hirofumi Kiyonaga

Freshnessmag has been a reliable news portal on sneakers, toys, fashion and the sub-culture context that goes with it since its first days in 2003. It's reach for knowledge spans across continents and transcends the internet.

This feature on Hirofumi Kiyonaga the founder of SOPHnet, F.C. Real Bristol, and co-founder of Uniform Experiment with Hiroshi Fujiwara has brought great joy to me for the following reasons. Firstly it was in english, secondly you don't come across too many features on Hirofumi and insight into the SOPH brand. He was part of the youth culture movement that took place in Harujuku in the late 90s but not so much in the spot light right now like his counter parts: Fujiwara, Miyashita, Nigo, Takashi. SOPH is well known in its own right in the Japanese domestic market and has recently been expanding it's stockist overseas as interest picks up. Hopefully they will start doing a XL.

I won't say anymore as this feature covers a lot of info on the man himself and the labels he's behind, ENJOY!

SOPHNET: HIROFUMI KIYONAGA

We've Made Our Facebook Page!

We're finally on facebook, you can also check there for store updates, info and media tidbits.

Follow this link~

Marumushi News Map: Update

I had blogged about one of my homepages earlier last month. The news map which is created by design company marumushi has relaunched it's web url to www.newsmap.jp. Lots easier than the long link I had posted the last time.

They've updated the color scheme and some interfaces with the news map making it even more visually pleasing and interactive with the reader.

Give it a look if you haven't already.