From the late 1950s to the late 1980s, the Soviet state conducted a unique experiment in the partial decentralization of fashion by opening modeling organizations in regional centers of Russia. These institutions made a decisive contribution to the democratization of fashion and the emergence of new professions in the provinces related to the fashion industry: fashion designers, art historians, and models.

Using the example of the Perm Fashion House of the Ministry of Light Industry of the RSFSR and the experimental workshop of the Perm Region Consumer Services Department, it is shown how the fashion production system developed from scratch in a large industrial region, how it was integrated into the hierarchical system of Soviet fashion, and what official and unofficial mechanisms were used to achieve success.

Based on interviews and archival documents, the book tells about who and how created clothes for our grandmothers and mothers if they did not live in Moscow or Leningrad. Through the history of fashion, the book reveals the evolution of Soviet society, showing how the economy influenced the design of clothes that were sewn in factories and studios. The author suggests rethinking ideas about the Soviet province and the economic structure of late Soviet society.