Fabric Market Prowl

I discovered the wonders of the Chinese fabric market during one of my first weeks in Shanghai. Hundreds of tollbooth size cubbyholes were overflowing with fabric within a three-story warehouse. Walking through the labyrinth of corridors, I pushed aside the overgrowth of sample patterns hanging right above eye level and weaved around the ends of fabric outcroppings stabbing out from their enclosures. Moving at anything more than shuffling pace caused vertigo from the kaleidoscope of vision-assaulting colors.

The experience was intimidating and exhausting for a China novice. I bought one dress and did not venture back to the wilds of the fabric market until I absolutely had to purchase a winter jacket.

Selecting the booth that contains a desired pattern is barely the tactical stage of the upcoming ballad-worthy campaign. The fabric type, color, and alternations must be debated in a combination of choppy English, accented Chinese exclamations, hand gestures, and universal moans and cheers. The final barrage comes with the negotiation of the price. That discussion is typically not successful unless the customer fake walks away and a calculator is thrown. When I bought my “North Face” bag at the fake market, the saleswoman actually set it on fire to prove the bag was fireproof. THAT is how successful Chinese transactions are done.

Today when my friends and I decided to go on a fabric market shopping spree, we braced ourselves for the onslaught of pushy booth attendants and spontaneous fashion bad ideas. We armed ourselves with strategically separated bunches of Yuan, the ultimate Walk-Away-At-This-Price list, which was cross-referenced and catalogued, and the following Do’s and Dont’s of the Fabric Market:

DO: Take a friend who will honesty tell you that the outfit you are trying on makes it look like you are one step away from living in a back alley apartment with sixteen cats, a stack of cheesy romance novels, and a carpet medley of cigarette stumps and packing peanuts from worthless QVC purchases.

DON’T: Take an in-and-out shopper or a boyfriend. If sitting on the plush couches at American stores is purgatory, than waiting through the pattern selection, color decision, texture arrangement, measurement debacle, and price negotiation would be considered inhuman treatment. They will burn you in effigy or write revenge songs about the experience and not share any of the royalties.

DO: Have at least the type of clothing preferred in mind to avoid the indecisive person’s meltdown.

DON’T: Wear the jeans to be copied. As I found out today, stripping to the skivvies in a packed Chinese anything is not for the modest or toga-phobic. For the record, the bright blue clump of fabric that I was given while the seamster measured the jeans only drew more attention to the fact that I was pants-less. (Special shout-out to my friends who held-up my “dressing room” during that episode.)

DO: Know the cuts and colors that would keep small children from breaking into tears.

DON’T: Listen to the booth operators. Few people can successfully pull off a pea soup colored muumuu regardless of how much “that bulk will go away when tailor-made”.

DO: Break out of the neutral button-down black hole and be adventurous. It’s China after all.

DON’T: Go native. Rhinestones, pictures of kittens, and glitter effects are never fashionable...particularly on the same dress.

DO: Develop guangxi with the seamstresses. Bring them customers, holiday gifts, food, kidneys…whatever it takes. My friends and I managed to have business suits custom-made for fifty US dollars because we are at hugging level with one seamstress and her mom.

DON’T: Befriend the other foreign shoppers! Every customer is a piranha within the deeps waters of the fabric market. The best deals are limited, and “tourists” and “newbies” are easy to spot. If someone oozing trepidation or hesitation is sensed within a two-booth radius, duck down a different corridor. Otherwise, the avid fabric market shopper might get lumped in with the group receiving the “800 Yuan friend-price discount”.

Remember to follow the rules and good hunting!