First, I have to commend the Koreans for not being so boring with their swimwear designs and for taking chances.Though some of these suits are quite "horsey" or a bit "loud" to my cultural tastes, these silkscreen designs technically rival in execution those t-shirt designs by Christian Audigier, Affliction, or whatever trendy t-shirt you see selling on Melrose or Ventura Blvd. these days.
Executing ornate silkscreen apparel designs such as you see to the right, and to make it symmetrical so that it lines up nicely from one edge of the pattern to the other is really hard to do and these companies are apparently very good at it.
The average suit is made of "80/20" as they say in the garment industry. I recently just learned what that means; It is slang for 80%-nylon, 20%-Lycra and it is really cheap to purchase.
The retail price for 80/20 is $8.00 a square meter. It's probably $3.00 a square meter or less if you buy in bulk. (Does somebody know the exact bulk rate?)
This Nylon/Lycra fabric will be the "standard issue" material for competition swimsuits in 2010. In some cases a swimsuit company may treat their jammers or briefs with Teflon but Teflon breaks down in chlorine and the only suits that will benefit from this value added treatment will be the ladies swimsuits since they obviously utilize more surface material then the men.
With the same fabric as a de facto standard, will any suit be faster than any other? I say no! Consequently, I suspect it will price point, the artwork and durability of the suits that will determine who the new leaders will be. Therefore, when it comes to price point, access to Asian garment districts in Cambodia and Vietnam, and the courage to take chances with a silkscreen printer, who is to say that the Koreans are not in the game now?
I think the industry has been turned upside down and shaken violently by FINA and their silly tech-suit regulations. I think there is no swimsuit leader in competitive swimming at the moment. Perhaps that is why Nike is back in the swimsuit business because the market has been sent back in time to 1980?
Ironically enough, it is Speedo that got hurt the most by this upheaval for several reasons: They have no presence in the triathlon world which means no tech-suit offering, wetsuit offering, and other gear. They have lost there technological foothold as well since a mandated pattern and fabric specification has been determined for all by FINA. They are paying a fortune for world class athletes to help them sell swimsuits that cost $30-to-$75 each versus $150-to-$550 for a tech-suit.
The featured suit above and to the right comes from a company called Silverspin who sells their product through Aqus.kr: [Link]
4 comments:
This is just leopard print lycra, from what I can tell. It goes for about $10/yard (60" wide) at online fabric shops like this:
http://www.spandexhouse.com/products.asp?pg=3&id=82&pname=Animal%20Print
As for the amount of coverage, the patterns I have for men's jammer type bottom and a women's racing type swimsuit use about the same amount of fabric for a size medium. The only women's style that might have given an advantage was the zipper-back suit. The open back on other suits negates any advantage that might have come from covering the torso.
Thank you very much for that price. it was a big help :-) Did you see the other suits?
Animal print! Trashy but a bit sexy. Borderline bad taste and fun but I think some people can pull it off!
Did you see the one with the lanyard and medals? - For the Admiral in all of us!
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