There is still a place for bows, ribbons, beads, cords and rhinestones in New York - on television, that is.
Project Runway, the New York-based reality show where fashion-designer hopefuls race against the clock to turn their visions into outfits, is currently drawing in up to a million viewers per episode in the United States, with twice that tuning in for the season finale earlier this year.
Hosted by supermodel Heidi Klum, it showcases a New York scene which, from a design point of view at least, is humming with vitality. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the manufacturing side.
In the cold reality of New York's once fabled Garment Centre, the city's apparel manufacturing industry continues to shrink and fade in a hot wash of cheaper overseas competition, predominantly from China.
Last week, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced that clothes created on the Project Runway show would be auctioned off, with half of the proceeds going to support the Garment Industry Development Corp (GIDC) - a non-profit entity that supports the city's clothing industry and works to retain garment jobs in New York.
'The apparel manufacturing sector in New York is struggling, although I'd say that things aren't quite as bad as they were three or four years ago,' says GIDC executive director Sarah Crean.