The decline of the Fashion District

A view from our roof top , a list of defunct  businesses painted on the wall . These old advertisements  now serve as a memorial  to the old Millinery  District  .

The Fashion  District  reached  its peak by the mid 70's . And as so many other industries in America it went into decline   Offshore  manufacturing  had  started  to eat away at  domestic manufacturing . And as capital moved to overseas manufacturing , less capital was reinvested in the N.Y.C. Fashion District . The cost of manufacturing in N.Y.C. went up , and so there was less incentive to continue manufacturing in the Garment Center . Businesses closed , and landlords converted industrial space to office space .  With office space returning a higher rent return per square foot than manufacturing  space . The conversion to office space was eventually followed by the conversion to Hotels . With Hotel Rooms bringing an even higher return on investment in comparison to Office Space rentals . So in the further pursuit  of higher rents , the amount  of  available space for shops like ours has declined dramatically here in the Fashion District . Today less than 50 % of the Fashion District tenants are in a fashion related business !