By: Stefanie Keto

Power looms still major consumers of domestic yarn

LAHORE: The non documented power loom sector – though affected by the high speed air jet looms installed by documented weavers – is still the major source of domestic yarn consumption, producing bed wear; curtains, cotton, lawn, and other fabrics fro local sales and grey cloth for exports.

According to data compiled by the All Pakistan Textile Mills Association there are 300,000 power looms operating in the country that produce 100 square meter of fabric per day equivalent to 6.30 billion meters per year at efficiency level of 60 percent on 350 working days a year.   About 24,000 shuttle less looms produce 300 square meter of fabric a day that amounts to 3.02 billion square meters per year while 6,000 air jet looms manufacture 1.26 billion square meters of fabric at 600 square meters per day.  The power loom sector is thus the major consumer of yarn spun by the domestic spinning industry.

By: Stefanie Keto

Advanced textiles for health and well-being

Marie O’Mahony.

O’Mahony (advanced textiles for fashion design, U. of Technology, Australia) offers a wide ranging survey of how technology is creating textiles in a manner that is so precise and so clever that these advanced textiles are having an enormous impact in many facets of life. Coverage begins with an introduction to the field and discussion of fibers, fabric structures, and surfaces. Following are chapters on fiber use in habitats, transport, personal attire and equipment, and the environment. Abundant illustrations support the text. Appended are a glossary, a directory of suppliers, and a bibliography.

Designing dendrimers

edited by Sebastiano Campagna, Paola Ceroni, Fausto Puntoriero.

Chemists report on the current status and ongoing research into synthesizing materials that are branched like trees, and display properties that the same material in different configurations do not. The topics include novel methods for dendrimer synthesis, shape persistent polyphenylene-based dendrimers, redox-active organometallic dendrimers as electrochemical sensors, enlightening structure and properties of dendrimers by fluorescence depolarization, and peptide dendrimers as artificial proteins

Designer’s guide to fashion apparel

Evelyn L. Brannon.

Designer’s Guide to Fashion Apparel explores the creative process of apparel design and the development of a collection. From budget to couture, children’s to men’s and women’s, fashion-forward to traditional and formal to active, the text demonstrates the proper application of design principles in creating aesthetically-pleasing apparel while emphasizing the importance of production parameters as dictated by the needs of the target consumer. Written from an industry perspective, the book is intended to nurture the student’s interest in design while providing the thorough grounding needed for a successful career in the business.

The Ashgate companion to the history of textile workers, 1650-2000

edited by Lex Heerma van Voss, Els Hiemstra-Kuperus, Elise van Nederveen Meerkerk.

This collection offers the first systematic global and comparative history of textile workers over the course of 350 years. This period covers the major changes in wool and cotton production, and the global picture from before the Industrial Revolution through to the twentieth century. As well as offering a unique reference source for anyone interested in the history of a particular country’s textile industry, this project provides a unique resource for international comparison. By providing standardised global studies of key textile industries and workers, both geographically and thematically, this book provides a comprehensive and contemporary analysis of a major element of the world’s economy, allowing historians to challenge many of the received ideas about globalization. As such this collection will be welcomed by all scholars engaged in the history of the textile industry and international trade.

Marketing research

Carl McDaniel, Jr., Roger Gates.

Real Data, Real People, Real Research. In the Eight Edition of Marketing Research , McDaniel and Gates continue to share their real-life experiences from the industry to teach students how to make critical business decisions through the study of market research. The authors’ practical approach and emphasis on being “real” has made this one of the world’s leading marketing research texts. Like no other, this text prepares students by introducing actual data samples, marketing research professionals , and real-world case problems. Filled with engaging, current examples drawn from the authors’ ongoing involvement in the field, this comprehensive text teaches students how to become effective consumers of market research.

Product planning essentials

Kenneth B. Kahn.

This text for undergraduates, graduate students, and practitioners uses an interdisciplinary approach to cover product development and product management topics, and illustrates various tools and techniques for managing product planning efforts. Coverage progresses from concept generation and organizing people through market planning, commercialization, and launch. Chapter discussion questions are included. This second edition offers two new chapters on design and legal and public policy considerations, along with expanded discussion of global considerations and sustainable product development. Also new are simplified technical discussions of planning techniques, and best practices from recent cases. Kahn teaches marketing and directs the da Vinci Center for Innovation in Product Design and Development at Virginia Commonwealth University.

New horizons in standardized work : techniques for manufacturing and business process improvement

Timothy D. Martin & Jeffrey T. Bell.

Drawing on decades of experience in manufacturing and industrial engineering, Martin and Bell offer managers a practical discussion of how standardized work principles can be applied in an organization to verify that the process is being done correctly and to provide opportunities for process improvement. The text assumes readers have at least a basic understanding of the concepts of the Toyota Production System (TPS) and lean manufacturing. Coverage includes an overview of standardized work, the importance of keen observation in the development and improvement of standardized work, cyclic standardized work, long-cycle standardized work, and the three main worker interface levels in job design. The concepts are illustrated with examples from various industries, such as health care, construction, business processes, and food services.

By: Stefanie Keto

Dior replaces John Galliano with Raf Simons

More than a year after it fired John Galliano as creative director, Dior has reportedly selected Raf Simons to replace him, the New York Times reports. Simons, 44,  previously led Jil Sander for six years, leaving in February when Sander returned to the brand. Unlike the flamboyant Galliano, who ended each runway show with a flourish of theatricality.

By: Stefanie Keto

Searcher drawing new attention in the hunt for Amelia Earhart

For most of the 25 years he’s been investigating the disappearance of famed aviator Amelia Earhart, Ric Gillespie has gotten little traction. Experts and various self-proclaimed skeptics have dismissed, doubted, and debunked his theory that she and her navigator did not plunge into the vastness of the Pacific, but instead lived as castaways on a pinpoint of land called Nikumaroro.

A smudge in a 74-year-old photograph turned everything around. A forensic analyst in Washington thought it looked more like an object than a photographic defect. With some of the same techniques he had used to analyze security-camera footage, he made out what he thinks is the landing gear of Earhart’s long-lost plane.

Now, a senior official at the State Department has seen the photo and publicly stated there’s a “possibility that this is a strut, a wheel with a surrounding mud flap, of an airplane.”

By: Stefanie Keto

N.C. State hosts its first fashion week

Paris. New York. Milan. N.C. State?

The university has something in common with the world’s most fashionable cities this week by hosting its inaugural fashion week. N.C. State Fashion Week (www.ncstatefashionweek.com), which started Wednesday and goes through Friday, is three days of fashion shows, guest speakers and exhibitions.

The event developed as an extension of the curriculum of the university’s colleges of textiles and design.

“The idea originated over a year ago because we were implementing a new textile design program,” says Nancy Webster, professor in the textile design program and fashion week organizer. “We wanted to showcase our ability to drive the front end of the business with the creative. We are known for the technical and scientific side of textiles and design, and we wanted to show our capacity for the creative and business side, as well.”

The event kicked off on with the “Avant Garde” show, featuring radical designs by students from N.C. State, as well as those from partner schools: the Fashion Institute of Technology of New York, China’s Donghua University and Hong Kong Polytechnic University. A concluding show, with the theme “Color Fusion,” will close the event at 7:30 p.m. Friday.

By: Stefanie Keto

US space companies prepare for space station docking

Two US rocket companies are readying the first private space missions to the International Space Station (ISS). SpaceX and Orbital both have multi-billion dollar Nasa contracts to supply cargo to the station, filling the void left by the retirement last year of the space shuttle.

California-based SpaceX has set the pace so far, having successfully launched its Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon capsule into orbit, and safely returning the capsule to Earth, in December 2010.  The company says it could launch for the ISS as soon as 30 April.

By: Stefanie Keto

Govt plans strategic cotton reserve to secure supplies

In a bid to bail out the textile industry, the Government plans to build a strategic reserve of cotton to secure supplies for mills. The reserve will ensure raw material supplies to mills and help stabilise prices in times of shortage.

According to a proposal by the Textile Ministry, State-run Cotton Corporation of India (CCI) will be directed to build up a reserve of 2.5 million bales (of 170 kg each) of cotton till the cotton arrivals begin for new season. CCI is likely to procure around 10 lakh bales a month from growers for the next two months at market prices instead of minimum support prices, thus making the proposal attractive to farmers too.

“This (the cotton reserve) comes as a boost to us at a time when we are suffering because of labour issues, burdened by debt and intense competition from exporters to secure the raw material. Cash-strapped Indian mills lose out the most when raw material prices zoom and unbridled exports trigger irrational price hikes,” said Mr P.D. Damodaran, former Chairman, The Southern India Mills’ Association.

By: Stefanie Keto

Ancient textiles : production, craft and society : proceedings of the First International Conference on Ancient Textiles, held at Lund, Sweden, and Copenhagen, Denmark, on March 19-23, 2003

edited by Carole Gillis and Marie-Louise B. Nosch.

An understanding of textiles and the role they played in the past is important for anyone interested in past societies. Textiles served – and in fact still do – as both functional and symbolic items. The evidence for ancient textiles in Europe is split quite definitely along a north-south divide, with an abundance of actual examples in the north, but precious little in the south, where indirect evidence comes from such things as vase painting and frescoes. This volume brings together these two schools to look in more detail at textiles in the ancient world, and is based on a conference held in Denamrk and Sweden in March 2003. Section one, Production and Organisation, takes a chronological look through more than four thousand years of history, from Syria in the mid-third millennium BC, to Seventeenth Century Germany. Section two, Crafts and Technology, focuses on the relationship between the primary producer (the craftsman) and the secondary receiver (the archaeologist/conservator). The third section, Society, examines the symbolic nature of textiles, and their place within ancient societal groups. Throughout the book emphasis is placed on the universality of textiles, and the importance of information exchange between scholars from different disciplines.

By: Stefanie Keto

Fashion Trend That Goes Straight to the Hips

It sounds like a very bad idea: Design clothes with an extra flap of fabric around the part of a woman’s body about which she is most sensitive. The hip-accentuating peplum is back.

It’s springing from dresses, jackets and pants in stores thanks to high-end designers including Giorgio Armani, Celine and Jason Wu and mainstream retailers like J. Crew and H&M. Actually, the peplum doesn’t have to be a booty bummer, say designers and retailers. With the right fit, it can be flattering for most women.

By: Stefanie Keto

Specialty Textiles Inc. receives expansion grant

In Kings Mountain, N.C., city council members awarded Specialty Textiles Inc. (STI), a local textile goods manufacturer, a $15,000 grant to support its planned expansion in the community. The expansion will bring an estimated 62 new jobs and $5 million in taxable investment into Kings Mountain.