The Men's Dress Furnishings Association was a trade association based in New York, New York which promoted men's fashion accessories with a primary focus on dress shirts and neckties. The group also educated consumers at high schools and colleges.
Founded in 1947 as the Men's Tie Foundation, they changed their name to the Neckwear Association of America in 1978. In 2003, due to a decline in its membership as a result of manufacturers closing, consolidating, or losing business to overseas competition, the Association added dress shirt manufacturers to boost their membership and became the Men's Dress Furnishings Association.
The group announced in 2008 that it was shutting down after 60 years. Membership in the group had declined from a high of 120 manufacturers in the 1980s to 25 in 2008. Increased competition from manufacturers outside the United States as well as the declining number of men wearing ties was cited.
Famous quotes containing the words men, dress and/or association:
“Men insist that they don’t mind women succeeding so long as they retain their “femininity”. Yet the qualities that men consider “feminine”Mtimidity, submissiveness, obedience, silliness, and self-debasement—are the very qualities best guaranteed to assure the defeat of even the most gifted aspirant.”
—Elizabeth Gould Davis (b. 1910)
“In art, a dress is never just a dress; nor in life either.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“The spiritual kinship between Lincoln and Whitman was founded upon their Americanism, their essential Westernism. Whitman had grown up without much formal education; Lincoln had scarcely any education. One had become the notable poet of the day; one the orator of the Gettsyburg Address. It was inevitable that Whitman as a poet should turn with a feeling of kinship to Lincoln, and even without any association or contact feel that Lincoln was his.”
—Edgar Lee Masters (1869–1950)