While the FREE EAST brand name may be new to some, it is a safe bet that anyone who grew up in Taiwan will be familiar with FREE, a big local brand in casual wear for many years now.

It's been over 30 years since FREE was launched. Business has been good, and FREE is now sold in Japan. In 2008, however, the maker-Freeman Industrial Corporation, Ltd.-moved to build on their success with FREE by launching FREE EAST, a brand that aims for the pinnacle in upmarket clothing.

Says Henry Lai, chairman of Freeman Industrial, "We had gone about as far as you can with knitted garments. For the sake of both the company and its customers, we had to come up with a new product that would really break the mold for us." Ever since launching FREE in 1975, the company has insisted on keeping its manufacturing operations in Taiwan, and always defined itself as a maker of high-quality, high-priced goods. Because of its English-language brand name, however, and because it was the first domestic apparel maker to hire foreign models, many consumers have the mistaken idea that FREE is a Western brand.

Selected, cropped, and re-created by skilled artisans, paintings by famous Taiwanese artists find a second life in the clothing of FREE EAST. Shown here from left to right are Lin Yushan's Nocturnal Attack, Yuan Chin Taa's Moon Viewing, and Li Mei Shu's Peacock and Flowers and Birds.

Clothing as art

Sales of FREE have frequently been the best on its floor at department stores for many years now, but the department stores still regard FREE as a domestic brand, not an international one. To shake the domestic image, Lai decided it was time to take off in a new direction.

"Integrating into the world economy is the only way to go," says Lai, who says that FREE, despite its high quality, is going to face increasingly fierce competition from low-cost producers in Vietnam and China. Worries about being overtaken spurred him to cast about for a new way forward.

FREE EAST was launched after four years of research and preparation.

Unlike the casual nature of FREE, the FREE EAST brand is artistic, taking the works of well-known Taiwanese artists and incorporating them into dresses, suits, sweaters, evening wear, and other items meant for formal occasions. FREE EAST represents something entirely new in Taiwanese fashion.

Art works from many famous artists have been incorporated into FREE EAST apparel, including inkwash paintings by Li Mei Shu and Lin Yu Shan, the acrylic paintings of Chen Hui Kun, the modern inkwashes of Huang Kuang Nan, Yuan Chin Taa, and Jimmy Lee, the acrylic paintings of Chan Chien-yu, the oil paintings of Chu Teh-i, and more. Without fail, the clothes superbly capture the essence of these works, whether it be an owl, a pair of birds, or goldfish, to name just a few examples.

Lai, who got his start in textiles, explains that FREE EAST fabrics do not use traditional dyeing and embroidery; instead, complex works of art are incorporated directly into the fabric. It is an extremely complex task that would be difficult for anyone to copycat, and is not amenable to mass production. In fact, some of the "flagship" articles made under the FREE EAST label have been one-offs. As Lai explains, "To go international, you've got to have the ability to produce one-off items."

The casual observer would never guess how much work it takes to get a vivid, natural-looking image onto a piece of cashmere (right). After the knitting process, which has been patented in the US, is finished, all the little stray ends have to be laboriously clipped off. The image shown here is a detail from Lin Yushan's Tiger on the Wind.

An Eastern aesthetic

A great deal of care is expended in the selection of what goes into FREE EAST garments, including what works of art to use and what type of fabric will best express the beauty of the art.

FREE EAST winter wear is made from cashmere, while summer wear is made of cotton, silk, and UV-resistant materials developed by the company itself. To ensure the quality of the cashmere, Lai travels personally to Inner Mongolia, Outer Mongolia, and Xinjiang to select the wool.

Choosing art works is an even trickier task. Lai explains that the first priority is to find something with a distinctively oriental flavor, and especially something that is specifically Taiwanese. Second in importance is the question of whether the art work, when worked into a fabric, will convey a sense of motion and hold the viewer's interest. Examples include Taiwan's butterflies, beetles, birds, flowers, and the like. Lai's personal favorite is tigers. He notes that in the Far East, the tiger wards off evil, and points out that Lin Yushan has painted some tigers that look rather gentle, while others by the artist are of fierce mien.

Once a painting has been selected, it's time for the clothing and artistic designers to figure out what to do with it. They may work with a part of it and possibly magnify it to turn the two-dimensional art into something suitable for display on a three-dimensional article of clothing. With Lin Yushan's Fierce Tiger Glares Back over the Shoulder, for example, they zero in on the beast's striped back and transfer this portion of the image to a purple dress; the result is decidedly untame, and has a very modern feel. Li Mei-shu's Line Drawing of the Temple of Sanxia, in the meantime, is cleverly displayed along the hem of a cape and a modified cheongsam dress; the effect is a pleasingly classical aesthetic touch.

The next step is to develop the necessary knitting techniques. With traditional Chinese clothing, images are generally added by means of embroidery. This makes for a very unnatural image, however, and the fabric is very heavy because each additional color means an extra layer of embroidery. With FREE EAST, by contrast, the art is incorporated right into the original weave; the images are vivid and natural, and the colors brilliant, yet the fabric is light and very much in keeping with the modern emphasis on comfort.

Freeman Industrial put a lot of work into developing the necessary knitting techniques. The image is first encoded in digital format, then knitted into the fabric by hand. The company has patented the process in the United States.

According to the company's chief brand officer, Lai Pengchao, they intended from the start to do upmarket hand-made clothing, but were concerned that it might be possible with today's advanced computerized machinery to mimic their product in mass production, so they met with some of the most advanced equipment makers in the world-Shima Seiki Manufacturing in Japan and Stoll in Germany-to see if they could manage the trick. The two companies were confident at first that they could do it, but gave up in the end due to the irregularities in works of art, and because of how often it was necessary to switch yarns. The computerized equipment was no match for a pair of dextrous human hands.

Selected, cropped, and re-created by skilled artisans, paintings by famous Taiwanese artists find a second life in the clothing of FREE EAST. Shown here from left to right are Lin Yushan's Nocturnal Attack, Yuan Chin Taa's Moon Viewing, and Li Mei Shu's Peacock and Flowers and Birds.

Expensive for a reason

"Once we were sure it couldn't be done by machine, we saw our opportunity," says Lai Pengchao, who notes that flowers are the most difficult thing of all to knit because of the many different hues and shapes in a single petal. It is sometimes necessary to switch colors after a single stitch, which is too difficult for even the most sophisticated programming and equipment.

FREE EAST garments are all the more valuable because they can't be produced in volume by machinery. Head designer Lai Yu-ching has trained a team of 30 knitters to make FREE EAST garments totally by hand. A single evening gown takes a month or two to complete, but the result is worth the wait. But one might wonder how the company can survive an economic downturn when one of its dresses carries a price tag of NT$60-70,000 and an evening gown can easily go for over NT$100,000.

Lai notes that Americans used to buy an average of seven sweaters per year, but the figure is now down to less than two. Besides reflecting today's economic weakness and constrained consumer spending, the drop in sweater sales also highlights the excess production capacity and consumption of years past.

"We've entered into an age of conscious consumption. People are looking for value," opines Lai. He feels that consumers want to spend their money on things that have value. Where added value is appreciated, a sense of value exists. Because of its distinctly Taiwanese aesthetic feel, FREE EAST apparel sells quite well with a lot of overseas Chinese on their trips back to Taiwan, and some aficionados like the idea behind the brand so much that they buy one FREE EAST item every month.

Lai says, "We make FREE EAST clothing to be art. It's something you can feel proud to wear, but it's also worth buying just as a collector's item!" When the brand was first launched, the company in designing its clothing went exclusively with paintings from the Taiwan art world's leading lights, who offer their support because they identify with the company's ideals. In the future, however, after FREE EAST has consolidated its position in the market he hopes to obtain more licenses so that everyone can work together to support the arts in Taiwan.

Asian values in resurgence

Lai is not worried about the fact that he has launched his new brand in the middle of a bad economic downturn.

"When the economy is weak, that's all the more reason to pluck up your courage and start up something new." Lai feels that now is the perfect time to be reaching for market share. He founded his company, for example, during the oil crisis. "When the big players are hurting is when the little guys have a chance to make it big!"

The current economic recession, which started with the US subprime mortgage crisis, is like an "invisible war," says Lai, who has a hunch that oriental cultures have a chance to score a big comeback amidst the turmoil.

"I hope FREE EAST will do more than just encourage every person in Taiwan to want to own at least one work of art in their lives. I hope it also comes to serve as a symbol of Asian values." It may seem a rather lofty goal, but Lai is knitting his way toward that dream, one stitch at a time.

Selected, cropped, and re-created by skilled artisans, paintings by famous Taiwanese artists find a second life in the clothing of FREE EAST. Shown here from left to right are Lin Yushan's Nocturnal Attack, Yuan Chin Taa's Moon Viewing, and Li Mei Shu's Peacock and Flowers and Birds.

The father-and-son duo of Henry Lai and Lai Pengchao both act as spokesmen for FREE EAST. They hope to use Asian culture to spur increased activity in Taiwan's cultural and creative industry.

The casual observer would never guess how much work it takes to get a vivid, natural-looking image onto a piece of cashmere (right). After the knitting process, which has been patented in the US, is finished, all the little stray ends have to be laboriously clipped off. The image shown here is a detail from Lin Yushan's Tiger on the Wind.

(photo by Jimmy Lin)

Art meets fashion-FREE EAST represents the birth of "aesthetics in motion." The tiger in Lin Yushan's famous Fierce Tiger Glares Back over the Shoulder looks all the more formidable here in a garment worn by Taiwanese supermodel Patina Lin.

(photo by Jimmy Lin)

Selected, cropped, and re-created by skilled artisans, paintings by famous Taiwanese artists find a second life in the clothing of FREE EAST. Shown here from left to right are Lin Yushan's Nocturnal Attack, Yuan Chin Taa's Moon Viewing, and Li Mei Shu's Peacock and Flowers and Birds.

The image here is from Wild Bird's Dream, a colloid painting by Chan Chien-yu.