Participate!

In a Save the Garment Center demonstration! On Wednesday October 21 at 12 p.m. on the corner of 39th Street and Seventh Avenue, the fate of the Garment District is in your hands. The Save the Garment Center initiative is hosting a rally to stir discussion about the industry's (and neighborhood's) current state. Supporters to take to the podium include Nanette Lepore, CFDA executive director Steven Kolb and Simon Collins, the Dean of Fashion at The New School for Design.Designers, CDFA members, factory workers, Workers United Union employees, as well as Parsons and Pratt students, will assemble to coax Mayor Bloomberg and city officials to reconsider the effort to rezone New York City's Garment Center. The current statistics are staggering. "I'm concerned. I want to preserve and build on the 5% on manufacturing that is left here in New York City," said Nanette Lepore Monday evening during the screening of Marc Levin's documentary Schmatta: Rags to Riches to Rags, which will premiere on Monday the 19 on HBO. Community members will gather outside the Button and Needle Statue to fight for the district so that it does not literally fall apart at the seams.