A garment district is developing in the city of Seattle, thanks to efforts by three local fashion and apparel companies including Built for Man, Tasty Tiger and Stigmare Couture Marketing. The companies have established Built In Seattle™, a project that aims to present the city's fashion apparel resources and talent and show that the city offers more than outerwear and technical apparel, while also being able to provide manufacturing and design services as well as "living wage jobs."

Built for Man, led by Founder and Creative Director Francisco Hernandez, has been designing fashion apparel made using natural fibers for seven years in Seattle. The label has been using the manufacturing facilities of Tasty Tiger, a producer of spandex and slinky knit products maker that has been in business in Seattle since 1997 and provides its facility to Built for Man during off-hours. Those two companies began their cooperation with help from Steven Paul Matsumoto, founder of Stigmare Couture Marketing, Bellevue, Wash., and a consultant to the textile and apparel industries. Matsumoto has been working for more than three years to cultivate a regional supply chain and manufacturing resources to support independent and global brands in a Seattle-based garment district.

Built for Man will preview its Fall/Winter 2014 collection at its fashion show, "The Man of the Future," in Seattle on March 19.

March 12, 2013