Maxi-Coats Popular

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32251, 20 March 1970, Page 2

Maxi-Coats Popular

Melbourne is preparing to adopt maxi-coats this winter, according to Mr James Maslen, a representative of a fabric firm there. “The shops are full of maxi coats, mostly in tweedy woollens and wet-look materials, and everyone seems happy with the idea of wearing a mini-skirt under a maxi-coat,’ he said yesterday. “But I think the midilength will be the story.

People have been put off the extreme maxis by reports from overseas about them trailing in slush and snow and generally being inconveni ent”

Mr Maslen, who is Australian and New Zealand sales manager for Prestige Fabrics, Ltd, arrived in Christchurch on his way to Auckland. He will be present for his com, pany’s exhibition at the Eas ter Show, and for the opening of its first showroom in Auckland.

Both woven and knitted synthetic fabrics were produced at the company’s Australian mills, said Mr Maslen, who made a sales visit to New Zea land last August. Until recently, the knitted fabrics were more for a middle - aged market; young people wanted plain wools for winter, he said. But, with more improvements designed

to attract a wider market, young people were beginning to accept knitted synthetics as a “fashion right.” “I think my company was the first in the world to apply koratron (a resin) finish to a knitted synthetic fabric to give it a permanent press. It is completely non-iron and we have sold it exclusively to a large men’s wear manufacturer for two years,” said Mr Maslen.

Another “first” for his company was the production of woven crimplene, which had all the virtues of knitted crimplene but with additional stability. It should be on sale in New Zealand stores in made-up garments in a few months time. When Mr Maslem talks about work in the mills—about yarns, fabrics, patterning and dyeing techniques and competition with other firms—it brings to mind ths television programme, “Champion House.” New Fibre “The newest thing we have, and we are probably the only Australian mill producing it, is a fibre called dacron which has special dye-variant qualities,” he said. “You just dip the fabric into a dye bath and the different textures and weights take up different patterns with the dye. We are using this to get stripes and checks on polyester garberdine, which we have been very successful with in the plainer designs in the last couple of years.” Because they are so easily dyed into beautiful colours and effectively patterned, synthetics are popular with the manufacturers of clothing foi the young, according to Mi Maslem.

“They are very acceptable to the young because of their easy-care properties, and we can produce many colours combined in all sorts of ways to make subtle, as well as, dramatic contrasts,” he said Mr Maslem believes there has to be room for both synthetics and wool.

Mr Maslem, who has travelled round the world several times on fact-finding and selling missions for his company, had talks with Christchurch manufacturers yesterday.