Royal Hawaiian Shirt

I picked up this lovely shirt by Royal Hawaiian at a vintage clothing store. I found it right as the store was closing, so I only had a chance to give it a cursory inspection. Aside from one mismatched button, the shirt seemed to be in good shape until I got it home. Upon closer look, I realized the shirt once had a collar loop that was now gone. >:-(

In fact both the collar loop and the corresponding button were removed at some point. You can still see the remaining button threads under the collar. Maybe somebody wanted to streamline the look of the shirt? Didn't like the loop? Or perhaps the button came off and the previous owner decided to just cut off the loop rather than replace the button? Who knows. But otherwise, the shirt is in quite good condition. 

The shirt itself is barkcloth with five vertical button holes, large-sized Asian buttons, and it is really large - like an XXXL in modern day sizing. Most shirts of this period have four button holes, so I wonder if the extra large size required an additional button. The shirt has a triangular, loop-style label that reads "Royal Hawaiian - Made and Styled in Hawaii". The fabric is printed with "G.V.H. Hawaiianprints" on the seam.

A curious thing about the buttons. The original buttons are a bit large at 1.5 cm in diameter. Asian-style buttons on other shirts I have come in at around 1.2 cm. The replacement button is quite small in comparison, but is Asian style. I don't think I've ever seen Hawaiian shirt-styled Asian buttons for sale on the mainland, so this leaves me to speculate if the replacement button was sewn on in Hawaii(?).

Original button on left, replacement button on right.

Royal Hawaiian

Royal Hawaiian was founded in 1937 by Max Lewis, and the factory was located on Beretania Street. In 1947 Royal Hawaiian was acquired by Watumull and moved to their location at 1166 Fort Street. From what I gather, Watumull continued to manufacture clothing under the Royal Hawaiian label, although I do not know for how long. Watumull also sold clothing (including Hawaiian shirts) under the Watumull label as well.

Royal Hawaiian used at least two different designs for their label. The shirt I have has a variant of the Royal Seal of Hawaii (a similar seal was used for Duke Kahanamoku labels). There is another version that has palm trees in front of a beach with islands in the background.

Royal Hawaiian label with a stylized version of the Hawaiian Royal Seal.

All of Royal Hawaiian's clothing was sold at Watumull's East India Stores. By the mid 1960s Watumull had at least several retail locations throughout Hawaii. However, it appears these stores only offered clothing under the Watumull label.

Watumull's East India Store, from the 3 June 1937 edition of the Honolulu-Advertiser.

G.V.H. Hawaiiprint

I wasn't able to find much about G.V.H. Hawaiiprints. I did a search and found this company sold Hawaiian print fabrics in bolts and you can find vendors on Etsy and Ebay offering fabrics under the GVH Hawaiiprints name. I also found another Hawaiian shirt with a similar print to my shirt, but has a Made in Hawaii label. Whether Royal Hawaiian made this shirt under the Made in Hawaii label, or G.V.H. sold similar fabric to another manufacturer is unknown.

Hawaiian Shirt Print Styles

The great variety of designs are one of the things that makes Hawaiian shirts so interesting. There are thousands of different styles out there and you are bound to encounter designs that you will like and you will dislike. But despite the apparent chaos of the multitude of shirt designs, you can provide some organization to this apparent chaos. There are four basic pattern styles and five general print styles (which can be further broken down as desired).

Please note that a lot of books refer to "print" to indicate the general print layout of while I use the term "pattern". This is just my opinion, but I think pattern is a more descriptive term than print. To me, pattern refers to the general style of the design while print refers to the detail.

Pattern Style

Border Pattern
Border prints are shirts that have a vertically-oriented pattern. Many shirts of this type depict a contiguous border pattern that runs from the top of the shirt, down to the hem. The print may be solid lines, a string of flowers, bamboo, or anything that allows for an unbroken pattern. If you see an unbroken pattern running vertically down the shirt, that is a border print. 
 

Border Pattern (photo from Etsy)

Horizontal Pattern
Horizontal print shirts have a horizontal pattern that runs around the shirt, usually along the hem. The pattern may consist of just about anything, including solid lines, flowers, landscapes, etc. Some shirts may have vertical elements (e.g. a beach scene with palm trees sticking straight up), but these are not really border prints.

Horizontal Pattern (photo from Etsy)

All Over Pattern
As the name suggests, an All Over print has a print pattern that is distributed across the fabric, with no apparent pattern. Like all printed fabrics, there will be a repeat of the pattern after a certain point.

All Over Pattern (photo from Etsy)

Back Panel Pattern
Back Panel shirts dedicate the entire back of the shirt to a single design. These patterns seem to relatively rare. You find them more often with vintage shirts.

You can break down print styles to be as granular as you wish. Here are some higher-level style categories.

Back Panel Pattern (Photo from Vintage.Hawaiian-Shirt.net)

Print Style
You can break down print styles to be as granular as you wish. But here are some general print styles you will encounter. 

Hawaiian Motif
Hawaiian motifs are likely to be the most common patterns you will find. This style depicts any number of Hawaiian-specific themes including but not limited to tapa patterns, pineapples, flowers, bamboo, plants, tikis, etc. 

Photo Print
Photo prints are a print design that uses images of real places and people. Frequent motifs are Waikiki beach, Diamond Head, Hawaiian royalty (e.g. King Kalakaua), etc.. The images do not have to be literal photos and may include artworks of places and people.


Animal Motif
You will encounter shirts that have prints of fish, birds, even dragons. A lot of these designs are inspired by fauna that live in and around the Hawaiian Islands, although others have their origins in the Asian-origins of Hawaiian shirts (see more under Asian Motif).

Asian Motif
It is generally believed Hawaiian shirts originated in Asian tailor shops in Honolulu's Chinatown. The theory is that some tailors used surplus kimono fabric to fabricate the very first shirts. This fabric of had distinctly Asian themes (which may fall into one of the above print styles), and carried over as a common style in later shirts. You can find Hawaiian shirts with cranes, tigers, carp, Mount Fuji, etc. 

Other
An assortment of other styles exist including cocktails and tiki mugs. Hot rods seem to be styles more common on newer shirts. I've even seen football logos and Christian religious scenes. Whether these could be classified as "Hawaiian shirt styles" is debatable. I resist classifying any loud item of clothing as a "Hawaiian shirt", but I do realize this is how that term is used.

Hawaiian Shirt Hat Trick - Surf Line, Kona Kai Jantzen, and Sears Hawaiian Fashions

Christmas ended up happening on April Fool's Day for me, when I found three vintage Hawaiian shirts in a 2nd hand shop. This is the biggest single day, single location haul I've had so far.

Surf Line Hawaii

As I approached the clothing rack, one shirt jumped out. I've learned vintage shirts tend to have a richer color than new shirts - not brighter mind you, richer. I reached for this first and pulled out a dark blue and red shirt by Surf Line Hawaii. This item has four wooden buttons, vertical button holes, a collar loop, and a matching pocket. The shirt is made out of an unusual type of cotton. It is fairly coarse and heavy but it isn't broadcloth. The label is fully sewn in and there is also a fabric care tag (not a full label) on the inside of the left seam.

At first I wasn't able to find out much about Surf Line. The label didn't appear in any of my reference books but this brand does come up in some online stores. My shirt has a yellow script that reads "Surf Line" and Hawaii in blue block letters. The only decoration are stylized waves between the two lines of text. I came across a Surf Line for Liberty House shirt for sale that used a somewhat revised label design. There is also another label that reads Jam's Surf Line Hawaii, again using the same design as in my shirt, but with the "Jam's " name added. After a bit more searching, it all fell into place.

Surf Line started off as a surf shop located on Piikoi street in 1964. The owner was famous surfer Dave Rochlen. He began manufacturing clothing under the Surf Line name and they used the product name Jam's at least as early as 1965. Jam's clothing was originally inspired by loose fitting pajamas (pajamas, jammies, jams... get it?). The company is still in business today making all sorts of Hawaiian and surfer clothing.

So this brings up the interesting question of when this shirt was made. The four buttons are a telltale hint that the shirt is at least 1960s to 1970s (but obviously not earlier than 1964). The label itself appears to be made out of cotton and has an embroidery that seems to be 1960s. The cut and manufacturing almost seems like it is handmade, which could go counter to Surf Line Jam's later, large scale production. So taking everything into account, I would date this mid-1960s. Also, since Surf Line started out as a true surfer-oriented business, this might account for the heavyweight fabric of the shirt - the shirt needed to be rugged enough to stand up to frequent surf trips.

Kona*Kai Jantzen

The second shirt I picked off the rack was a beautiful green Kona Kai Jantzen, and it is my favorite of the three. The shirt is a soft cotton with five buttons, vertical button holes, fabric care label, and no collar loop. Jantzen started off as a swimwear company in 1916 and became well known for their logo of a bathing suit-clad girl in a diving pose. Jantzen later expanded to make an assortment of sportswear and ladies foundation garments. Jantzen also manufactured Hawaiian shirts but sorting out the details takes some explaining.

In 1950 Jantzen acquired a Hawaiian clothing manufacturer called Nani Sportswear. They sold clothing under the Nani label until 1964 when that name was retired. Jantzen also sold Hawaiian shirts under their standard brand. These shirts had a label that said "Jantzen" and had the diving girl, all surrounded by a stylized border. I wasn't able to conclusively determine when this label style was used, or if clothing under the Jantzen name was manufactured by Nani. 

Jantzen also sold clothing under the label Kona*Kai by Jantzen. It isn't clear if Kona*Kai was evolved from Nani or was just a name for a particular line of clothing. It does appear that Kona*Kai by Jantzen clothing was sold sometime between the latter 1960s into the 1970s. To complicate things further, there was a manufacturer called Kona Kai that made Hawaiian shirts for Sears. Kona Kai is a fairly popular name in Hawaii and I believe the brand and the manufacture are different.

Rather risque ad for Jantzen, circa 1960s.

I initially dated this shirt as 1970s due to the five buttons and the manufacture label that is stitched in on only one side (as opposed to being fully sewn in). But I've seen some online well known retailers date shirts with similar tags as 1960s. It does appear older but similar looking Kona*Kai Jantzen labels were fully sewn in, while later ones were sewn on only one edge. My guess is the shirt is from the latter 1960s to mid-1970s.

Sears Hawaiian Fashions

The last shirt is a barkcloth shirt with four buttons (one missing), vertical button holes, internal pocket, and collar loop. The shirt has a Sears Hawaiian Fashions label.

I have a creeping suspicion the buttons are not original to the shirt. The buttons are a smoke colored plastic type. Curiously the collar loop button is a mother-of-pearl color and doesn't match the front buttons. This may not normally be an issue since the collar loop button is not visible. But this button is sewn in with white thread while the front buttons are attached with black thread. Then again the factory that made the shirt may have just used standard thread/button color matching. It seems like extra work and cost, but maybe that is a reflection of quality work.

Sears sold Hawaiian shirts under a number of labels. Between the late 1940s to the early 1960s Sears sold shirts made by Burma Gold Handprints, Hoaloha, Kona Kai, and Lauhala. These shirts generally had a label that had the manufacturer name with something like "Made Exclusively for Sears". Sears ultimately had their own brand and I've seen labels that read "Sears Hawaii". 

Sears store in Honolulu

Whether Sears Hawaii is different than Sears Hawaiian Fashions is unclear but I believe they are the same. But both names used the orange and pink stylized flowers along with the Sears name.

Malikini for Liberty House Dresses

I found a lovely pair of vintage Hawaiian dresses, the second such find in three days. The dress are both from Malikini for Liberty House.

The first dress is a red and white pull-over dress. The second is a navy blue and white dress with a back zipper. The zipper is a nylon one. Both dresses have the same style of Malikini for Liberty House labels and they were obviously owned by the same person.

Red Malikini for Liberty House dress.

Blue Malikini for Liberty House dress.

 The labels seem to be of a more modern design than other Malikini labels I've seen. The stylized purple, black, and orange "M" is much more modern than the palm tree and hibiscus images seen on older labels. Both dresses are 100% polyester. So the zipper style, label design, and fabric strongly indicate a date of the 1970s.

Malikini Sportswear was founded just after World War Two and was located at 746 Ilaniwai Street in Honolulu. They opened a retail women's clothing store in the Moanalua Shopping Center in 1964. Liberty House was a retailer that began in the mid-1800s. By the mid-1960s there were three or four Liberty House stores in Hawaii. They expanded to the mainland in the early 1970s but encountered financial difficulties by the end of the decade. Liberty House was eventually acquired by the early 1980s.

Lauhala Dress

I recently came across this Asian style dress by Lauhala. The fabric is, unfortunately, all polyester. This particular dress is style 4128. The label says "over" but I didn't flip it to see the other side. A potential clue for more information about the dress?

The dress has a Mandarin style collar and interesting bat wing-style sleeves. This kind of sleeve seemed to be popular from at least the 1940s, although I haven't seen any contemporary dresses with this style. The front opening has an interesting decorative piece - not exactly a bow, but sort of like a stiff ribbon. I've seen this same style of decoration on a Hawaiian Togs dress.

I have a Lauhala shirt and I've seen a couple of Lauhala label styles, but I haven't seen this kind before. The label is larger and more elaborate than others I've seen, with two-color embroidery. Based on the more "modern" label and the polyester fabric, I would place this dress around the early to mid-1970s.

Lauhala started as a sportswear manufacturer in 1943. Their headquarters was at 1722 Kalakaua Avenue and subsequently opened another in Hanapepe around 1965. 

A bit of trivia regarding the name of the company. The plant embroidered on the label is a Pandanus. This plant looks sort of like a cross between a palm and a mangrove and it has a fruit that looks somewhat like a pineapple. Lauhala is the Hawaiian word for Pandanus leaves used in weaving.

Master Book of Hawaiian Shirt

If you can read Japanese, then you are in luck. Master Book of Hawaiian Shirt is probably the best and most comprehensive book on vintage Hawaiian shirts that I've come across so far.

This book is a soup-to-nuts assessment of Hawaiian shirt history, design, and manufacturing. You will find photos and text discussing:

• Hawaiian shirt history
• Fabrics
• Buttons
• Labels
• Individual designers (with photos of the designers as well as samples of their shirts)
• Manufacturing
• Prints and print styles
• Collectors

The book delves fairly deep into teach of the topics, so this isn't just a picture book but one that is chock full of real information. The trick is, of course, is that it is all in Japanese.

There is a book called Aloha Style: Master Book of Hawaiian Shirt 2. I don't know if this is a follow-up book or possibly a rebranded version of the original. Either way, this book is worth having.

Desmond's of Southern California by Kahala shirt

Ok, I scored my first vintage silkie yesterday. I went to a 2nd hand shop and hit the racks. The second or third shirt I checked had a telltale vintage label:

Desmond's of Southern California

by Kahala

All Silk

M

Since I was still in the store, I had to suppress my shout of joy until I paid for my purchase and left. I did take a look at the shirt before buying it and noticed there were some condition issues in that the fabric was separating in the right armpit location, but was in otherwise in good shape. Four coconut shell buttons, vertical button holes and, at first, it didn't appear to have a collar loop.

The vertical blue strips to the left and right of the button line looks sort of like palm tree trunks.

When I got this beauty home I took a closer look. The fabric separation was occurring in two areas under the right sleeve. The separation is very close to the seam where the sleeve attaches to the body of the shirt, but it isn't on the seam itself. The separations are in a place that normal hanging on a hanger doesn't put any undo strain on them. One good thing is that the separations are not visible when the shirt is being worn. This could be sewn up without being seen, but I am not going to do anything at the moment.

The print is stylized and somewhat abstract. So there is nothing obviously Hawaiian about it at first - no palm trees, no fish, no waves, etc. But after looking at the shirt a bit more, I see what might be elements of tropical design. Palm trunks and palm fronds? The color palette consists of red, blue, black, white, and grey. Pretty conservative compared to the strong colors of shirts from the 1960s.

Upon closer examination, I found a button for a collar loop. When I first looked at the shirt in the store, I didn't see a collar loop. But after a bit of searching I found the loop. In the other Hawaiian shirts I own, the loops are prominent and made out of fabric. On this shirt, the loop was made out of reinforced thread and it lay flat. So it almost looked like a bit of stiching and was nearly invisible. Is this typical of older shirts? 

The collar loop is nearly invisible.

The label is, of course, the biggest source of information about the shirt. Desmond's of Southern California was a clothing retailer in the Los Angeles area that was founded in 1862 and operated until being sold in 1981. At one point Desmond's had 19 locations throughout California. 

Desmond's of Southern California existed from 1862 to 1981.

 I checked several reference books and found a few different designs of labels for Desmond's. One version has an outrigger and another has a palm tree. The label on my shirt has text and a wave pattern. I checked Hana Shirt Company and they have a couple of shirts from Desmond's, one shirt dated 1950s had the outrigger. But they also have a NFS rayon shirt with a label that appears to be similar to mine, and this was dated 1940s. 

The "All Silk" label is in script font.

 The shirt also has a second label that reads "All Silk". This term is a bit unusual in that modern clothing seems to use percentages, e.g. "100% silk" or some such thing. The label also has a size, "M". I recall but can't find an article about when letter sizing was introduced to clothing. IIRC clothing up to the 1950s used a ML (Medium/Large) size. 

The shirt itself was manufactured by the well known Kahala brand. Kahala made a lot of shirts for retailers and a common style of label on vintage Hawaiian shirts reads "Made for <Name of Retailer> by <Name of Manufacturer>".

Based on the information I've gathered on this shirt, I would date it to the late 1940s or, at the latest, the very early 1950s.

Waikiki 76 Hawaiian Shirt

I came across this green shirt with interesting designs, including tikis. While I liked the design, I didn't buy it because of the material and where it was manufactured.

The shirt has a label from Waikiki 76. It is 100% crepe polyester and was made in Korea. It has four large, wooden buttons with vertical button holes. No collar loop and a semi-matching pocket.

An online search of "Waikiki 76" brings up a few shirts on Ebay and Etsy, all of which are made from polyester. Interestingly, the other shirts have a rectangular label, but the one I found has a trapezoidal shaped one.

A search of the RN shows Waikiki 76's parent company was Dongwha USA Enterprise Co., located at 900 Wilshire Blvd in Los Angeles. I couldn't find much more about this company; the name Dongwha is used in several Korean companies, and there is no clear connection between the manufacturer of the shirt and these other companies. And there is no apparent connection to Hawaii.

Kimi's Hawaiian Shirt

I recently picked up this Hawaiian shirt made by Kimi's. There was an additional label beneath the manufacturer's label that is now gone. The shirt appears to be 100% cotton with four bronze colored asian metal buttons, vertical button holes, and collar loop. Oh, and it is really, really pink. Ok, maybe salmon.

Kimi's shirt in its wrinkled, freshly discovered glory.

I haven't been able to find much on Kimi's. I checked for label examples in several reference books, but nothing turned up. My guess is that Kimi's is one of those small brands that never got a whole lot of visibility. It is important to know that Kimi is a fairly common name for Asian women in Hawaii. It might be derived from Kimiko.

An Etsy search turned up a couple of dresses with a different designed Kimi's label. This one says "Kimi's at Kings Alley, Waikiki, Sandwich Islands". So this gives us clues to help garner some information. Lets break this down a bit to see what information we can extract.

Kimi's label from dress found on Etsy.

King's Alley (now called King's Village) is a shopping center located at the corner of Kaiulani Avenue and Koa Avenue. The center was completed in 1972 according to the Honolulu Star Bulletin. So if the Kimi's label in the shirt is the same business as that on the dress, then we can surmise that Kimi's was around at least since the early 1970s. 

But a closer look at the Kimi's label in the shirt I picked up suggests that it is older than the one in the dress. The shirt label is white with black palm trees and a stylized font, very typical of 1960s and earlier design. The Etsy dress has an older-fashioned style font, similar to that found in the late 1800s. King's Alley was themed to represent Hawaii in the late 1890s and the font from the dress label seems to coincide with the theme.

Kimi's label. 1960s version?

 A search of the Honolulu Star-Bulletin archives has a 1999 article that mentions a clothing store at the Maunakea Marketplace called Kimi's that was still in business. However, there is no indication this store sold branded clothing under their name, and I suspect it has nothing to do with the Kimi's branded clothing.

So what I surmise from the available evidence is that Kimi's had a retail store in King's Alley at least in the 1970s. But the different style label of my shirt suggests that Kimi's was around before that time. I speculate that the shirt is an earlier Kimi's product (and likely from a different location). Based on the construction, cut, and patina, I'm guessing early to mid-1960s. 

One final note, I hand-washed the shirt in cold water (like I do with all of my shirts). This shirt bled a bit, leading a friend to speculate whether this shirt was originally white in color. If you note, the shirt has vertical stripes of different shades of pink (ok, salmon). Is it possible this shirt was originally white and red, and that the dye bled and tinted the white? A men's shirt this pink (salmon!) seems a bit unusual. But the coloration seems pretty even, so I'm guessing the answer is no, it wasn't originally white.

Alfred Shaheen Exhibit Gallery Guide

I ordered a copy of the gallery guide for the Alfred Shaheen exhibit at the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles, which ran in 2010. Unfortunately the guide does not have photos of the exhibit items, but there are text descriptions of the items that include dates and fabrics. 

This guide should be a great help in dating fabrics. Many of the reference books I've seen seem rather subjective on the topic of dating. Since this is guide is for a museum exhibit, I'll consider it authoritatively vetted over other references. :)

You can order a copy from the museum's online store

Cotton vs. Polyester

I suppose polyester is the pariah of fabrics. This synthetic may never get away from its image of 1970s double-knit, leisure suit fashion. But polyester has a place in the history of Aloha shirts, whether we like it or not. Starting in at least the 1970s, clothing designers began to use either 100% polyester or a polyester blend in some of their fabrics. It seems the pure polyester fabrics were more prevalent in the 70s, as what I encounter for later-era shirts are mostly poly/cotton blends.

I suspect most purists will reject any shirt as vintage if it has any polyester in it. So if you are trying to create some criteria of what "vintage" means, then it may be fair to say any shirt with this synthetic fabric is excluded from this coveted criteria. But do note that rayon, while completely accepted as a vintage fabric, is also a synthetic.

So what if you encounter a shirt without a fabric label that might be polyester? Is there a definitive test? I had such an encounter with this shirt.

I found this shirt at a thrift store. I suspected it was at least part polyester, but there were some attributes to it that had me think it might be from the 1960s. The label was missing, but it appeared to be a full-sewn in one, that is indicative of a vintage shirt. The metal buttons also had a vintage patina to them.

The fabric of the shirt was very light weight. All of the 1970s polyester shirts I've seen tended to be heavier weight. The weight of the fabric felt like a woman's summer scarf - very light and airy. Upon closer inspection, there seemed to be surface imperfections to the fabric, which are indicative this was not polyester. The shirt, while soft, didn't didn't seem to have a richness that you find in silk or rayon. But the shirt appeared to have been starched, which might account for the coarseness.

The fabric had a wavy look that suggested this might be imperfections.

My rule is if I have doubts on the vintage of a shirt, then pass on it. But I was intrigued by this shirt for some reason although I had my doubts. There were a few other clues as well. I tightly squeezed the fabric to see if it would hold wrinkles. Silk and rayon will hold wrinkles while polyesters won't (or so I've been told). Sure enough it did hold some wrinkles, but not a lot. So this test was inconclusive.

So I opted to pony up the four dollars and get it and find out more about this item. After bringing it home, I hand-washed the shirt to see of the coarseness (that I attributed to a possible starching) would go away. No dice. Upon further inspection of the loose threads on the inside seam, I saw some unraveling that looked more like fuzziness than stringiness. Ok, this really suggested polyester. But there was one definite test left.

I snipped off some loose threads from the seams and but them in a fireproof container (in this case, the bottom of an empty soda can). I then applied a flame in the definitive "fire test". If a fabric is silk, then it will burn to ashes and smell like burning hair. But if the fabric is polyester, then it will melt and smell like burning plastic.

The flame test.

I think my sample was too small to detect a smell, but the thread burned down to a tiny ball of hardened plastic. This was definitely polyester. In retrospect, the fuzziness of the unraveled fabric was likely a solid clue that the shirt was indeed polyester. So a lesson learned as to the value of carefully examining the seams.

The Aloha Shirt book

As it turned out, I already had Dale Hope's book The Aloha Shirt sitting on my bookshelf when I started collecting vintage Aloha shirts. I don't recall when I bought it or how long it sat there collecting dust. But this book turned out to be a great reference to learn about the history and evolution of Hawaiian shirts.

The bulk of the book is to relate the chronology of Aloha shirts, from its roots in early Polynesian culture to the present day. Hope discusses the somewhat murky origins of the shirts, going from the palaka, to the early tailors in Chinatown that were the source of the first recognizable Aloha shirts. He goes on to discuss the evolution of the shirts from a largely island phenomena to an internationally recognized fashion style.

For the collector, there are numerous photos of vintage shirts from the early days, some labels, and perhaps in some sort of meta-reference, a discussion of collectors. If you are looking for a reference book on collecting shirts, this probably won't be for you. But I do think this book is a must for anybody interested learning about the history and nature of the Hawaiian shirt. Highly recommended to have on your bookshelf.

Liberty House and assorted labels

I made a run today to see what I could unearth. I found a few items from the 1970s but nothing worth picking up. 

My first find was a Tori Richard for Liberty House shirt. Liberty House is one of the venerable vintage Aloha shirt labels, but the were still around at least until the early 1990s. And Liberty House opened Mainland stores in the 1970s, although all were closed by the end of the decade. I checked out this co-branded label and have found a pretty wide range of guesses. One Ebay seller had a shirt with the label and dated it early 1960s, which I think is waaaay off. The Museum of Hawaiian Shirts has a non co-branded version of the label as 1967, and another version (without the trademark symbol and with "Honolulu") as from the 1970s. My guess, based on the label configuration and patina of the shirt, I would agree with the 1970s date.

I found a second co-branded shirt for Liberty House. I couldn't discern the name of the manufacture: Mark Raynton, Mark Rayiton, or Mark Rayrton. I suspect the first, but I couldn't find anything about this guy. The shirt felt like it was 100% polyester, which would date it to the 1970s. The shirt also had four buttons, suggesting it is older than the 1980s. 

The fabric label was missing and I'm a bit wary about trying to discern polyester by touch. I picked up a Lauhala shirt that I first thought was polyester. The fabric had a shine to it and it felt rather slippery to the touch. But the fabric label did say 100% cotton and I suspect it is some kind of high-quality weave. From what I can tell, the polyester of the Liberty House shirt has a lighter weight to it than the cotton Lauhala.

This last shirt is new, but it highlights a potential risk to new collectors. The label has a retro look to it, but this shirt is not only vintage, it wasn't even made in Hawaii. Upon closer look, you can see this shirt was made in Pakistan. Labels can be tricky to master, so beware in relying on just the design of the label.

I wonder if the crescent moon on the label has anything to do with the fact this shirt was made in a Muslim country.

Hawaii Togs Muumuu

Ok, so I made my first foray into vintage Aloha dresses. I picked up a lovely barkcloth muumuu for a mere $5.00. A really, really big muumuu at that. At first look it seems to be 1960s. But if you make a closer examination, there is much more here than first meets the eye.

The dress has the manufacturer tag as well as a cardboard product tag that has fabric, style, size, and RN number information. But the cardboard tag is not a fabric care label. And interestingly, there is a price tag still attached to the back! The tags have the following information:

Manufacturer tag
An Original
Hawaiian Togs
Made in Hawaii
Size 18

Product tag
100% Acrylic
Illegible printed text
Style: C (in pencil)
Size: 18
RN 23746

Ok, so we have some information to start with. Hawaiian Togs was the manufacturer and I've seen this label come up on eBay and some vintage clothing retailer sites. The RN number tells us the company, once located at 1528 Makaloa Street in Honolulu, had their RN number issued sometime around 1962.

The dress is clearly old. The muslin lining has a patina of age and has darkened. At first look I would say this dress was early 1960s. But there are a couple of things about the dress that might indicate otherwise. First, the Product tag says the material is acrylic. Now the rule-of-thumb I use with Aloha shirts is if the shirt has polyester, then it was most likely 1970s or later. However, I don't know much about acrylic. According to this article, arcrylic was created by DuPont in 1944 and was first made commercially in 1950.

The second odd thing is the zipper. The rule-of-thumb I've used is if the zipper is metal, then it dated from the 1960s or earlier. But this dress has a nylon zipper. Ok, so does this mean the dress is later vintage, was the zipper replaced, or is the use of nylon zippers actually older than I first thought? 

Answering the second question is probably the easiest. I looked very closely at the stitching holding the zipper to the dress. At the top of the zipper is a eye-hook closure. This closure has a patina and that discolored the fabric, so it is clear the eye-hook is original to the dress. The stitching between the eye-hook and zipper does not appear to have been disrupted, so it seems the zipper has not been replaced since the dress was first made. 

Answering the third question is also fairly easy. Were nylon zippers used in the 1960s? A search of several vintage clothing sites shows that nylon zippers were used in clothing as early as the late 1950s, although they were not very common. This website says nylon zippers began to displace metal zippers after 1963. I looked at the zipper to see if I could identify the manufacturer. I first thought I saw a symbol of a crown, and there is a zipper company called Crown. But upon closer look, it wasn't a crown but rather a shield-shaped symbol with USA stamped within. There is a Flikr site here that has photos of vintage zippers. Some of the zippers are of the nylon type. I'm certainly no expert on either zippers or zipper packaging, so I'll have to accept from multiple sources that nylon zippers were indeed used in the 1960s.

So that leaves the first question. Is the dress of later vintage than the 1960s? There is one more clue to examine. The seams are pinked. According to this website, pinked seams were common in 1950s era clothes, but were displaced by serged seams in the 1960s. It is impossible to tell if Hawaii Togs still pinked the seams of their clothing in the 1960s, but this information suggests serged seams became increasingly common as time progressed. I can only surmise that the later the dress, the less likely it would have pinked seams.

So looking at the totality of the evidence: the nylon zipper, the acrylic fabric, the shape of the manufacturer tag, the RN number, and the seams, I would venture this dress is mid to late-1960s. And as I first mentioned, this dress still has the original price tag and it sold for $29.95. So if the dress was sold for this price in 1967, adjusted for inflation, this dress would sell for $205.88 today! So is this a further clue? Two-hundred dollars for a muumuu seems really high. But I can't tell if the price tag is original to the dress, so I'm going to stick with the original estimate.

Basic Aloha Shirt Identification

Ok, so I made the first step to understanding how to identify vintage Aloha shirts. I conducted a Google search to learn the basics of how to discern the identify of an Aloha shirt. I've aggregated the knowledge and assembled it into a graphic. Sorry, I need to scrub the graphic a bit, it looks a tad sloppy.

I'll fully admit that this is my initial investigation into the topic, so some of the information may be erroneous or incomplete. I will revise this graphic as I learn more.

I've already developed sort of a technique to weed out interesting and desirable shirts from the rest. If you've checked the clothing rack at your local thrift store, you will no doubt have run into numerous Cooke Street shirts and the like. They aren't bad shirts if you want something to wear (I believe the Cooke Street brand is sold through Costco). But they aren't quite what I'm looking for. Some things to look for include:

Manufacturer's label 

• Well  known manufacturers (Kramer's, Liberty House, etc.).
• Place of manufacture. Vintage shirts were made mostly in Hawaii, but to an extent in Japan and the Mainland. Shirts made in China, Indonesia, Russia, etc. are likely to be contemporary (note: there are always exceptions!).
• How is the label attached? Fully-sewn in labels tend to be common up to the 1970s.  Shirts with the label sewn in on one side (so it is kind of flappy) dates from the 1970s to the present.

Fabric care label

• Is there a label or not? If there is a label, does it have text or symbols? Fabric care labels came into use in the early 1960s. Symbols on fabric care labels came into use around the early 1970s.
• Where is the fabric care label located? If the label is attached to the manufacturer's label, it might be from the 1960s to 1970s. Later shirts had the label placed on the inside side seam.

Buttons

• Number of buttons. Shirts from the 1930s to the early 1950s commonly used three to four. But shirts from the 1930s through the 1970s often used up to five. Contemporary shirts often use six buttons.
• Horizontal button holes are likely before the mid-1960s although they were still used into the 1970s. Vertical button holes are most common today, but have been used since the early days.

Collars

•  Aloha shirts traditionally have long pointy collars. It was common to see narrow collars on shirts from the 1950s and 60s (similar I suppose to narrow ties and lapels found on men's suits). I've seen smaller collars on shirts from the 1980s as well.

Pockets

• A number of sites say vintage or at least the best quality shirts have matching pockets (i.e. the pattern of the shirt matches the pattern on the shirt). This doesn't appear to be conclusive one way or another. A web search of photos of vintage Aloha shirts shows there is no consistency. Some shirts do have internal pockets.

Fabrics

• Vintage shirts were made out of silk, rayon, and cotton. Polyester and poly/cotton blends appear to have come into use in the 1970s. The weight and feel of the fabric is important, as some vintage shirts 'feel' old while others don't. Learning more about fabric tactility is a skill I wish to develop further.

Alfred Shaheen Monograph

The San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles had a show that showcased shirts and dresses from Alfred Shaheen in 2010. Jo Anne C. Stabb, a scholar of fashion and textiles, wrote a very interesting analysis of the exhibit. This monograph is definitely worth a read.

Hawaii's Alfred Shaheen: Fabric to Fashion (an Exhibition Review).

HI Fashion - The Legacy of Alfred Shaheen

The Bishop Museum has an exhibit on the legendary Aloha shirt manufacturer Alfred Shaheen. The exhibit runs until 25 February 2013 and has over 200 shirts, dresses (including "the famous Hawaiian Bombshell Dress"), photos, and a lot more.

It doesn't appear that the Bishop Museum created an exhibition guide for this, which is too bad. So check it out if you can.

Here are some links for more info:

Bishop Museum
Honolulu Star-Advertiser
Hawaii Public Radio
AlfredShaheen.com

 

That first Aloha shirt

Ok, so I've decided to make the plunge into collecting vintage Aloha shirts. I am sort of new to the game but my other hobby of collecting Tiki mugs helps to some extent. Yes, I know Tiki is Polynesian Pop while Aloha Shirts are true Hawaiian culture. But being able to find and identify Midcentury items is a nice skill to have when looking for shirts.

I decided to collect Aloha shirts about four months ago after being inspired by a trip to Hawaii. I did buy a couple of old Aloha shirts some years ago while hunting for Tiki. One is a polyester Sears shirt from the 1970s. Yeah, I know, polyester. But I liked the old label so I grabbed it for a couple of bucks. The other shirt is a barkcloth one but it got stored away somewhere and I haven't been able to find it. I also have some newer shirts that I've purchased for wear while on trips to the islands.

So my first 'official' shirt is this baby. I went to a thrift store the first day I decided to collect and found a vintage Kramer's. What are the odds? The first thrift store on the first day I started looking and found this. A beautiful barkcloth piece that I'm guessing is from the 1950s. Two of the original metal buttons have been replaced with plain brown ones, but the shirt is otherwise in impeccable condition.

The purpose of this blog is to document my learning experience to find and identify vintage Aloha shirts. The term 'vintage' is so overused that it is really meaningless anymore. But I'm looking for shirts that pre-date the 1970s (although there are always exceptions). I expect to make a lot of mistakes and to make some great finds. This should be quite and interesting adventure.