Detroit swap: Auto plants for fashion showrooms
Detroit has skilled manufactures and a unique industrial design sensibility -- strengths city planners are tapping as they try jumpstart a local fashion industry.

DETROIT (CNNMoney.com) -- Detroit's auto industry trained generations of workers in design and manufacturing. As that business fades and its jobs disappear, city planners are hoping to redeploy the city's creative minds and craftsmen toward a new and growing field: fashion.

They may seem like wildly different industries, but cars and clothes have elements in common, Detroit fashion insiders say. The city's industrial history gives it a unique design sensibility, and its manufacturing capabilities play well to a growing demand for garments that are made in America.

"Car designers are very aware of fashion, and they understand the principles of design," says Joe Faris, a metro Detroit resident and senior designer for Schott N.Y.C. "Creative people are just creative -- it can be applied both ways."

"I think that Michigan is a key spot for a fashion industry to start and to blossom, says Brian Heath, founder and producer of Detroit Fashion Week. "We're ready."

http://money.cnn.com/2009/09/18/smallbus...

Dick Milde