Kangol Apparel: Clothing Line Takes on the Kangaroo

Kangol berets and hats have been around since the late 1930s, when an enterprising Polish immigrant in England started making military berets.

Over the years, Kangol became known for its wide selection of wool and knit hats, caps, and berets, which took on an element of coolness in the 1980s with the hip-hop community.

In the 1990s, the film and TV community discovered Kangol hats with the kangaroo logo. Think actor Samuel Jackson or band leader Kevin Eubanks of NBC’s “The Tonight Show.”

For decades, Kangol, started by Jacques Spreiregen, has been synonymous with its hats. But in the United States, that’s about to change. Three months ago, Los Angeles apparel maker Masud Sarshar bought the U.S. master license for the brand, giving him the right for 10 years to make or license anything but hats in the United States.

With the licensing in place, Sarshar and his crew started designing the men’s and women’s Fall/Winter ’09 collection, which debuts Feb. 17 at the MAGIC Marketplace in Las Vegas.

“I think it’s a great label, and nothing has been done with it,” Sarshar said. “They have a very good name and a celebrity following.”

This is not Sarshar’s first venture into licensing a brand. Nine years ago, his company, Apparel Limited Inc., acquired the Dickies Girl license from Williamson-Dickie Manufacturing Co. in Fort Worth, Texas, where the company has been making overalls and workwear since 1922.

Sarshar started out taking Dickies overalls and dyeing them in 24 customized colors that quickly became popular with young women. He then acquired the Dickies Girl license and adapted that bright color palette to simple but stylish pants that also took off with young women.

Dickies Girl has grown rapidly in the past decade and operates out of a 75,000-square-foot warehouse and office space at 3011 E. Pico Blvd. in downtown Los Angeles. The distinctive building attracts more than its share of attention with its exterior walls plastered with graffiti. Several years ago, Sarshar hired 85 teams of graffiti artists, headed by Los Angeles graffiti artist Man One, who spent two days and used 25,000 spray cans to create a mural.

Sarshar will be using the Dickies Girl location to warehouse his Kangol line, but for now, he has moved his personal office to a 2,200-square-foot space in Malibu, Calif., that is the workplace for 22 people. Every space in the hillside office building shares the same spectacular view of the Pacific Ocean, the Malibu Pier and Catalina Island off in the distance. It looks like an advertisement for the Los Angeles tourism bureau.

Sarshar jokes he may have the most expensive sample room in the West. In a corner space, four sewing-machine operators recently were crafting Kangol pant samples. In another office, Dana Cambuston and Bhavna Ahluwalia were putting the finishing touches on the new collection in collaboration with Sarshar.

Cambuston is the former creative director for Buffalo, the Canadian denim line and retailer with a design department located in Los Angeles. She envisions Kangol’s collections to have simple lines geared toward a sophisticated consumer. The men’s and women’s lines each have more than 40 styles. With the exception of the cashmere items, many pieces will be garment-dyed. The collections will include chinos, jeans, cotton or cashmere sweaters, cashmere hoodies, T-shirts, and classic polos. For women, there is a cashmere camisole-style dress with matching knee-length cardigan. Everything will be made in three fits: American, British and slim, with manufacturing done in China, Peru and the United States.

While styles will be clean and lean, Sarshar plans to take his color-selection concept, which was so popular with Dickies Girl, and apply it to Kangol, offering up to 19 different colors in many styles.

He is aiming for a more affluent customer who might shop at Fred Segal, Theodore, Planet Blue, Ron Herman, Neiman Marcus or Barneys New York. Retail price points will be $300 to $400 for cashmere sweaters, $100 to $200 for cotton sweaters, $60 to $130 for polos and $150 to $225 for chinos.

Unlike many manufacturers in these tough economic times, Sarshar said he plans to carry a considerable amount of Kangol inventory at his Dickies Girl warehouse to sell to cautious retailers reluctant to place orders too far in advance. “I think in this economy we are in, people are going to be pulling back,” Sarshar said. “And we’re coming in with an atomic bomb and blowing up the market.” —Deborah Belgum