As You Were: Sheep say we're being fleeced

I subscribe to mail from only a handful of brands, and not necessarily where I shop. One is Sheep Inc., the British maker of woolen knits. (Shown, Sheep merino overshirt.)  I especially like their indoor/outdoor overshirt (aka sweater-jacket), a transitional weather staple.

Photo: Sheep Inc.

Sheep's occasional "Notes" often include tart critiques of the fashion world. "Value", they say in "Rethinking Value in Fashion", "has become the most flexible lie in fashion's vocabulary." Read their unstinting appraisal of the v-word here.

Two points stuck like a burr to a ram's coat:

1. We conflate aesthetics with substance. We assume expensive means better.

Sometimes expensive is better,  as in my 25-year old cashmere still in great shape, and other times, it's a scam. Even in pricier brands like Vince and All Saints, fabric quality is inconsistent.

2. Value can be conjured. Marketing and media are shaping our understanding of value more than material science ever has. Sheep say brands have "mastered the optics of virtue without the substance."

They castigate both the high and low brands: the three-for-the-price-of-two basics made offshore, and also the $400 tee shirts that are no better than mid-priced versions. They say, "In both cases, the consumer is being played. The trick is simple. One side flatters your thrift. The other flatters your taste. Neither guarantees a better product."

Re-defining value

How to exit this swamp of fetid fashion-speak?  First, put "value" under a microscope. For our mothers and grandmothers, "value" meant the item was durable; it could be handed down. Beauty was subjective, but a straight seam was a fact. Unless it was a wedding dress, you never bought something to wear once.

Mom inspected inspect every inch of a blouse, and turned it inside out as well. If it did not deliver, she would bring it back; merchants honoured returns because they valued repeat customers. 

She respected the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval, because the magazine's lab tested a product within an inch of its life, and even assessed whether its advertising claims were accurate. These days, GH limits apparel testing to outerwear, sleepwear, activewear, intimates, shoes and bags—and we're not talking Prada.

In the current press, those "Top Ten (Whatever)" pieces simply regurgitate Amazon customer feedback or are biased, paid reviews. Where are the professionals? Pretty much nowhere; it's up to us. In case your mother was splitting the atom instead of assessing coat linings, here is a Guardian article that hits the essentials.

Sheep say that we have been taught to accept low quality. They expand "value" beyond what Mom would have recognized. She did not consider sustainability, nor was she particularly concerned with the welfare of the animals, but would endorse their making of "(garments) that ask to be re-worn, not replaced." 

Sheep have sheared away the fuzzy language propagated by the majority of aspirational brands, and charge them with marketing mainly social status via "exclusivity" and celebrity product placement. Status trumps quality, vanity trumps value.

 Sweater sense/cents

For an upcoming trip, I could use a sweater jacket. J. Crew, who lean heavily on their heritage image, are selling a good-looking version, which I considered until I checked the fabric: 70% polyamide, 30% lambswool, dry clean only. (Price, $CAN 265.) 

The Sheep overshirt is $CAN 660, but they say you never have to wash it, just air. (I'd have to protect it from moth larvae, who lust for pure wool sprinkled with hints of human body.) If heavily soiled, it is hand-washable. I thought, "Might ewe go on sale?" 

Left, J. Crew; right, Sheep Inc.

Then I remembered an eighteen-year old Eric Bompard sweater-jacket stored in a zip bag—well, hello there! I'll have to work with the colour, called "rye"—it was bought when I was a redhead—but it's a beaut, with its buttoned cuffs and slit sides.

When I was an acquisitive twenty-something, the idea of buying a sweater-jacket that would last for twenty-plus years was unthinkable; who on Earth would want that? The irony is that in the '70s, wool knits in the bridge lines I depended on (Anne Klein, Evan Picone, Liz Claiborne) were 100% natural fibre.   

I don't need to buy anything, but will watch for Sheep's sales; I'd like to see for myself if their pieces peek above the herd. 

Anyone wearing Sheep? (Yes, that sounds surreal.) Please tell us whether they are indeed wooly wonders.