With our Gitman Vintage Autumn/Winter stock carefully arranged in the shop we decided it was time to get in touch and find out a little more about their day to day activities. Here’s a day in the life of Chris Olberding, head honcho at Gitman Vintage…..

 

2 September 2011

I arrive to the office at 8am. It’s a short walk from my apartment, so
there’s no cab or subway involved. Just a morning stroll past MoMA, across
Park Avenue to 54th and Lexington. Along the way, I stop and get egg
whites, oj and coffee at my usual spot.

 

Park Avenue

On any given day, at any given time, there are always emails to deal with –
today’s are from Tres Bien Shop “we need more shirts”; from Lane Crawford
“where are our shirts?”; from Isetan “we’ll take what’s ready”; and from my
favorite cryptic emailer, Monsieur McNairy, simply: “my girl shirts?”.

 

5th Avenue

In addition to managing other flows, we’re also in the midst of trying to
get as much AW11 out of the warehouse as possible.  But few emails down and
I discover that Joe, one of our main packers in the warehouse, broke his
ankle last week and is out for 5 weeks.  I’ve been told we had a difficult
time finding a sub, especially the Irene aftermath last week, but we’ll be
back on course this week.

 

The route to work

An appointment arrives early… My assistant, Ryan shows them SS12.   They
like the tennis story, Grand Slambrays, and pick all including the matching
tattersall.  Even though NY market has ended and we’re gearing up for our
Fashion Night Event at the Ace Hotel on Thursday, it’s hard to imagine that
we need to be moving onto AW12, even thought SS12 orders are still coming
and AW11 reorders are still going out.

 

Museum of Modern Art

Note to self: Fabric needs to be ordered for Projects that need to be set-up
but not before the Models are created for a final Sample request which was
submitted so we can get an Order to be entered because after all that is
what drives the machine.  I schedule a rental car at Hertz for tomorrow — I
must get to the factory.

I have lunch at Greenacre Park — one of the most serene city parks ever
created.  It’s on east 51st, but once there the traffic noise fades, namely
as its cancelled by the dramatic waterfall and zen-like brook leading up to
you, you feel as though you may be in Kyoto.  It’s a magical place, designed
by Hideo Sasaki in 1971.

 

Greenacre Park.

Post-lunch: work now always 3-fold: shipping AW11, selling SS12, and pulling
together AW12.  Notes are already accumulating for SS13.

 

Gitman HQ

A few magazines arrive with nice mentions of GV — GQ, Details, Milk
(China), 2nd (Japan) and FHM (UK — with Ian!).   Still waiting to see the
piece on Gitman Bros in Russian GQ.   Today is a good PR day.

 

Greenacre Park

The rest of the day, I spend following up on some special projects (Journal
Standard, Stussy Japan, Corso Como), followed by the continual tracking of
delivery of fabric and the never ending updating of the web.

 

Click on the image below to see our full range of bespoke Gitman Vintage shirts and ties.