Despite her early morning arrival, Trish was ready to meet by late morning. Tawn and I picked her up from the Windsor Hotel (conveniently located and very comfortable on Sukhumvit Soi 20) and headed to lunch.
Over a nearly three-hour lunch we poured through all of the outfit designs, reviewing notes and suggestions Tawn and I had received during our “pre-visit” visits with the dressmakers. This needs to be in two-ply. How is that strap meant to be cut? Is this meant to flow from the hips or start tapering before? And other questions and comments like that.
Right: One of the fifteen different outfit designs that we are working with.
We had time in the afternoon to visit the Jim Thompson factory outlet. Jim Thompson is one of the big names in Thai silk and their factory outlet on Sukhumvit 93 has a huge range of colors, patterns and textures available at a very reasonable price. The problem is, since it is the outlet, they don’t have everything and they won’t necessarily have it in stock in the future.
With Trish’s business model, she wants to be able to offer outfits in a wide range of colors. But of course that range needs to be consistently available and accurately represented on the computer (this is an e-business). So we will need to investigate other fabric sources to ensure a more consistent supply.
Late afternoon we met up with Bulan, a former student and former employee of Stuart’s, who has agreed to work as Trish’s assistant the next few days to get her to all her appointments, take her to all the fabric shops and the wholesale district, and to translate and negotiate along the way.
Tawn and I would love to play this role, but we have our jobs to attend to. We’ll check in regularly, though, and sit down over dinner each night to answer questions and help brainstorm the next steps.
christao408 
This is so exciting. Best wishes to Trish (Pat to us…hard to change) as she travels this new road. J/S
Yay! It’s great that Trish will have an assistant. That has to be a big help!
Wonderful that Trish’s designs are being made a reality. Good luck to her. You and Tawn are good friends to help her out.
Best of luck!
This (fashion) is such a strange world to me. I think I would be saying “Uhm… yeah, that looks good” all the time.
Just my topic – women and fashion and one’s appreciation for women.
Would like to see Trish’s head on this design as I miss her so. You and Tawn are indeed goodfriends to Goodfriend.
All the best!
Wow. My mom used to have her own sewing/tailor shop for years. She was an excellent seamstress and I’m only “fair”.I’m really more of a quilter. Now I wish I had spent more time with her tutoring me. She was not able to draw at all however and I was, so together we designed many unique dresses for many ladies. I like her princess cut in this example. Very figure flattering. There should be more designers that cater to plus sized women. If they have a properly fitted outfit, they look so much better. Most don’t realize that.
Sounds really cool what ur friend is doing.. and I like her designs..I like the tops but don’t really do skirts..Tell her to make a suit..she could get a lot of pink business from the power lesbians =P
the tops look good indeed…….
@snowjunky8 – I’ll let her know there’s an untapped market! =)
@socaltransplant – My understanding from Trish is that she is trying to cater to women who don’t fit “regular” sizes (which aren’t so regular). She has done some modeling in those areas and wants her designs to flatter women who aren’t well served by the mainstream stores.
@ElusiveWords – I hear you. Last night over dinner, Trish and Tawn were speaking some foreign language talking about “Dior” and “Lagerfeld”. A tongue that is even more difficult for me to understand than Thai!
@murisopsis – @Dezinerdreams – @bebesmill – @jandsschultz – Thanks. Stay tuned for more on Trish’s big adventures.
@chrispycrunch – Gosh, Chris, I feel like I’ve let you down by not talking about women, fashion and appreciation for women more. Actually, I should just get Tawn to blog more and you could read that, because that’s what he would be writing about. Well, two out of three, at least.