So, you are all set to go to the fashion boutique! The boutique referred by your friend. May be a fashion store or an apparel retail store. But do you really know, what type of fashion garment are you going to buy? Or you just remember what your friend said, “Oh that store is fabulous! It has such a vast collection of haute couture!” Do you exactly know what is “ haute couture” and do you really think that your 'good fat wallet' is enough for getting haute couture apparels? You might be thinking, “what a silly question? Of course, I'll come to know that. After all, what are the labels for?” Come, lets see whether you'll be able to differentiate between the haute couture and other garments or not!

Types of Fashion Designs

Fashion designers usually depend upon textile designs to set their fashion collections as unique. These designs are the work of trained textile designers who design fabric weaves and prints for clothes and furnishings. There are essentially three categories of fashion design.

Haute couture: The high-fashion clothings, haute couture, is originally a French term meaning 'high sewing' but today it has come to represent high end fashion clothing which can cost anywhere between few thousands to few lacs of dollars. Created for specific clients with "made-to-measure" technique, they are usually made from high-quality, expensive fabric and sewn with great attention to detail and finish, often made with time-consuming, hand-executed methods. What is important in them is look and fit. Cost of materials and the time to make them doesn't matter- they can go to any extreme. In fact, Haute couture is a protected term which can only be officially used by companies that are the members of and meet certain well-defined standards set by the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture. Many ready-to-wear, and even mass market labels, claim to manufacture haute couture but according to established standards, they do not.

Ready-to-wear: These garments are not made for individual customers, but then also, much attention is paid to select the proper fabrics and their cuts. To maintain exclusivity, only a small quantity of such garments are manufactured and as such they are comparatively expensive but not like haute couture. They are produced as ready-to-wear collections and presented during fashion weeks, usually twice in a year. These collections can be under fashion designers own labels or under label of any fashion company for whom designers have made it. They can include anything from day wear or evening wear for men, women, teenage, lingerie, sportswear, bridal wear to even accessories.

Mass market clothing: As the above two categories come in very high and high price ranges which can be afforded only by a small section of consumers, the fashion industry mostly depends on mass market sales. This market presents a very wide range of ready-to-wear clothes in large quantities and standard sizes. Most often, cheap material and simple machine production techniques are used but the designs represent creativity. This helps in producing affordable fashion for all. The designs are, however, adapted form the trends set by the famous names in fashion. As such, they hit the market after a season or two.

Hopefully, now you know what you can get in the fashion stores and how to differentiate among them. Happy shopping then!