Garment District: MOOD Fabrics

New York City's Garment District is known as the fashion design and manufacturing capital of the country, and some even claim to say, of the world. The Garment District draws in the most talented and most dedicated fashion industry workers, who uphold the prestige that has belonged to the Garment District since the early 20th century. The concentration of talent and of fashion businesses that belong to the Garment District make it incomparable to any other city in the United States.

If one were to take a walk through the Garment District on any given day, they would see countless numbers of fabric stores, individuals running down the streets carrying garment bags, and racks of clothing being loaded onto trucks to be shipped all over the country and world. The garment district's streets are lined with stores specific to a type of material: spandex, silk, ribbon stores, trim stores, stores that only sell buttons or zippers. These stores may seem kind of pointless to some, but for these people in the Garment District, it is their bread and butter, the essence of their work and their livelihood. These stores are not trivial to them, they contain the fabrics that will inspire them, the perfect zipper to complete their dress, the trim they need to complete their new line. So, in other words, we may not all understand the garment district, but we should all appreciate it because you may be wearing something that was created here!

Among all of these fabric and material stores, there is one store that stands out due to its high quality, reputation and fame. That store is MOOD Designer Fabrics, located in the heart of the Garment District on West 37th Street. On their very popular website, they state that, "Without question, Mood Fabrics is the number-one shopping destination for fashion fabric in the world: The NYC flagship store alone plays host to more than 1,200 customers every day."

MOOD had very humble origins, beginning as a tiny wholesale shop in the Garment District in 1993. People were steadily drawn to the owner's beautiful fabrics, and in just a short 8 years, they had to move into a bigger building, where MOOD Designer Fabrics currently resides.

But why the fame? Why is MOOD so universally recognized? The answer is that MOOD has been featured in each of the 182 episodes of the hit reality show, Project Runway. In the show, contestants are told their challenge, given a few minutes to sketch their design idea, and taken to MOOD Fabrics to get the materials needed to bring their designs to life. In every episode, you see contestants running about the store, digging through the rows and rows or fabrics, and rushing to get everything they need to create their fashion masterpieces and finish checking out in time. Tim Gunn has so famously coined the phrase, "Thank you MOOD" after saying it at the end of every MOOD visit. Due to its' Project Runway fame, hundreds of non-sewing fans enter the store every day in hopes of catching a glimpse of Tim Gunn, the infamous dog that is always running around the store, or many of the former contestants who still frequent the store for inspiration.

Personally, I am a huge Project Runway fan, and have made the stop at MOOD every time that I visit New York. But even if you are not a Project Runway junkie, I would still highly recommend visiting the Garment District and making a stop in Mood Designer Fabrics. It will give you a taste of one of Fashion's most booming scenes and give you an appreciation of a culture, the fashion culture, that you may not have had before.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time exploring the Garment District and exploring MOOD, so in the words of Tim Gunn, "THANK YOU MOOD"!