Dozens of tailor shops run by trained and untrained designers in Ho Chi Minh City’s old apartment buildings have increasingly appealed to youth in recent years for their custom-made, unique designs and affordable prices.

On weekends, groups of girls are often seen at old apartment buildings, particularly those in downtown District 1.

The fashion stores – tailor shops inside the buildings which offer clothes designed by owners themselves – open a new world in sharp contrast to the buildings’ worn, messy look.

The first few such shops were opened late last year and more have since appeared, forming the current trend of selling and buying self-designed clothes. Such tailor shops have become strong contenders against the fashion stores selling ready-made or brand clothes.

The tailor shops are also a reminiscent reminder of Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City now) during the 1900s, when such tailor shops were in vogue.

Affordable prices, tasteful, unique designs

When the door of Popbirdy Studio on the fourth floor of Apartment Building 42 Le Loi in District 1 cracked open, a space entirely different from its surroundings opened.

In the cozy, 20m² room hangs two rows of shirts, skirts and dresses of various designs, textures and colors.

“I often go shopping for clothes at shops in the city, including brand name places, but usually can’t find what I’m looking for as most of the clothes are mass-produced and I end up paying quite a lot anyway. The clothing items here boast unique, trendy designs and quality materials and fetch reasonable prices,” said Nguyen Ngoc Nhu, 25, who works at a media company.

Le Hanh Mai, who once sold clothes online in Hanoi, has had her Popbirdy Shop open since May 2012.

Passionate about fashion, she then considered designing her own clothes instead of buying undesirable ones from other shops.

The girl tried her hand designing a waterfall-styled, black and white blouse.

The blouse, which fetched VND550,000 (US$26), has become her shop’s hallmark item.

“Today’s wearers tend to be stylistically liberal, as long as their outfits accentuate their beauty and personality. It’s thus not necessary to adopt fashion trends on the catwalk or from fashion magazines. Also, selling one’s self-designed clothes is no longer exclusive to professional designers,” Mai shared.

In the same apartment building, Nosbyn Studio, which is even smaller than Popbirdy Studio, also boasts a diverse range of self-designed clothing items. 

The shop was launched for a fun reason: the girl who owns it often lost her favorite clothes, and she was too lazy to buy new ones from shops.

She then came up with the idea of designing and tailoring her own clothes, which were unexpectedly and enthusiastically embraced by her friends and acquaintances.

The aspiring, twenty-something shop owners

Most owners of such self-designing shops are in their 20s. They are fashion fanatics and aspire to establish their own trademark.

Some are trained in fashion designing, while others are total laypeople.

The items are gaining in appeal among local youth as they are trendy, unique and custom-made, shop owners explained.

The items range in price from VND200,000-500,000 (up to $24) apiece, which is the same as those for sale at stores in the city’s fashion hotspots such as Nguyen Trai, Le Van Sy, Nguyen Dinh Chieu and Cach Mang Thang 8 Streets in Districts 1 and 3.

In addition, with self-designed items, shop owners can showcase their boundless creativity and uniqueness and take meticulous care of their products.

Shop owners typically design and tailor their items and post their photos on their websites or Facebook.

Several, such as Zinnia Shop, 5th Floor of Apartment Building 14 Nguyen Hue, District 1, also provide custom-made designs.

Shop owners added that if they are creative enough, release new items on a regular basis and know how to please their clientele, who are mostly aged from 16 to 25, they can earn a living quite well.

Regarding their choice of opening their shops in apartments, shop owners explained that the apartment rent is lower than that for a place on the street.

As most of their clientele get to know them online, they do not need a conspicuous place to showcase their products.

“Shops inside old apartment buildings downtown are quite easy for customers to get to. Customers can also relish the novelty of discovering new places, instead of dropping by haphazard shops on the street,” noted Tuyp Tran, owner of MayHem Shop, 136/10 Le Thanh Ton Street, District 1.

In addition, the old apartment buildings appeal greatly to clients who love taking photos.

The buildings provide a stunning background to accentuate the outfits they have just bought from the shops.

Some shops are decorated as mini studios, which allow their clients to don new outfits and pose for photos.

Shop owners also compete intensely with one another and adopt different approaches to boost their sales and draw clients.

They offer 10-20 percent discounts on weekends or during special occasions. 

MayHem Shop offers a 15 percent discount to its clients who happen to arrive at the shop shortly before it starts raining.

They also regularly update eye-catching photos of new products on their websites and give them cute, strange names such as “midnight mix skirt,” “collar shirt,” and “beach calling.”

Professional designer Dong Nguyen considered the boom of such self-designing fashion shops an inevitable trend to cater to the majority of urban youth who love dressing fashionably but cannot afford brand-name products.

“A similar trend was popular in the U.S. and Europe during the 1960s and 1970s. However, how long the appeal and novelty of the trend lasts is the question,” he noted.

Nguyen pointed out that most self-designing shop owners have minimized expenses to make their items most accessible to their clients.

“However, in order to establish a strong brand in the long run, it takes considerably more than that, particularly regarding creativity, investment and promotion. If self-designing shop owners do all of these, their products will certainly fetch much higher prices, which is a difficult puzzle for them to solve,” he stressed.

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