Stylemax... in the windy city

I had my favorite Bibelot experience this weekend!  I happen to be in a far away town at the same time as our clothing buyer, so I joined up with her at Stylemax, Chicago's midwest clothing market.  There are over 4000 different clothing lines all together on one floor of the Chicago Merchandise Mart (one seriously huge building).

I am very interested in clothing, and always have been.  I even graduated with a degree in apparel merchandising from Iowa State, I just never found a job in that industry.  Well, one thing for sure... this trip was a reminder of how fun clothes are!  I learned a lot, and through this blog post, I hope you will too!  

We were there for fall merchandise, so it was hard to think about that while still looking forward to our spring here in Minnesota.  I felt like I was getting some sort of inside scoop of what's to come this fall (and now, you will too).

A list of trends for summer/fall 2012...

• high/low (hem in front of garment vs. hem in back)
• swing style hems
  
• bat winged shirts/capes
• scarves
• colorful denim
• skinny, straight, wide leg, bell (anything goes for pants)

A few shots of the hallways at market so you can get an idea of how it's all set up...

Here's the run down on how clothes get from market to our sales floor for most of the clothing lines the Bibelot carries...

Each sales rep group has a number of clothing lines.  Each clothing line has a rack or two filled with one of each style they are offering (depending on when they can ship to stores).  Once the rep shows you all of the body styles, you sit down and choose fabrication, colors, etc until you have found the perfect shirt for the store.  Now do that with all of the lines and each piece within the line and you understand the amount of work it takes to get one beautiful group of clothing into a store like the Bibelot.  I want you guys to see what the process looks like...

If you open this folder up, it has plain outlines of each body style available, the name, price, and item number.  Buyers use this as a reminder of what they saw at market and to write their orders once they get home.

Cards of fabric and color swatches

Here are more photos of the buying process...

The Comfy showroom space

The Niche Showroom... 

we got to work with one of the designers for the line, Ayse!

Mystree was a mad house...

Our buyer, Tamara, working with an intern

People were everywhere in this showroom.  Purses and people were constantly bumping into each other.  The lights were hot and I was tired.  I love Mystree, but this was exhausting!

Echo Showroom... 

filled to the max with scarves, mittens, and hats!

the Echo lookbook

Discussing fall and winter accessories

These mittens are on order!

We were invited to a fashion show early Sunday morning... who has ever heard of a 7:30am fashion show?  It was worth getting up for (plus, we were served breakfast)!  I took a short video of Tribal, another Bibelot line.  The footage isn't very good, the audio is really muffled, and it's pretty short, but you can get the idea.

Every night when we got back to our hotel from market, we were incredibly tired.  We had the whole city of Chicago to explore, but all we could do was go on one walk (celebrity sighting) and look at the city from our room...

The amazing view from our room (the tall one is the Sear's Tower)

Tamara and I (I'm in the scarf) with Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins.  We found him slurping a blueberry shake and he was nice enough to chat with us for a bit!

Ok, back to work stuff.

A Bibelot customer favorite... the Cutloose showroom!

Each showroom decorated a little differently.  This was one of my faves.

You guys are going to love this stuff!  It's SO Bibelot!

By Monday evening, I was beat.  Loved seeing all the new things but also totally tired and ready to go home.  While Tamara kept on buying for the store, I had to stand in line to fly home.

This was not nearly as glam as the clothing market.

I had the best time in Chicago!  The sales reps were incredible!  It's very similar to an extended family.  Everyone sees each other a few times a year and stays in touch via email and phone calls throughout the rest of the year.  The Bibelot sure has a great reputation, so I was proud to be there working for them. I am so excited to see all of the items that I got to help pick out come in to the store so you all can see how wonderful fall will be!