"Asking 'What do women want?' was key to the success," said Dirty Rigger designer Jess Morris. "It had been apparent for a while that the colour pink was by many deemed as stereotypical or even sexist, especially in such a male dominated industry. Another common issue of the traditionally bright ladies rigger gloves was their indiscreet nature, often standing out when working backstage where the idea is, of course, to be as unseen as possible during a performance. These issues meant many women were resorting to wearing men's gloves, often too long and too wide in the finger even in smaller sizes. These areas were all something we needed to address.
"Our design team set out to master a new anatomical cut designed to work with the naturally slimmer hands of females. As we continued to look for ideas for the new design we found that many women agreed that they didn't want it to look too different to the men's, maybe a subtle 'nod' to show they were designed for women but not too demonstrative. It was a similar view when generating a name for the new range, a simple statement of the gloves style and how it was designed to fit smaller hands may be preferred over a name that more directly singled them out as just for ladies."
After listening to the many women involved in the industry and the thoughts from the Dirty Rigger social community, the first version of the Dirty Rigger SlimFit was born. After months of field testing, a new anatomical cut and numerous material upgrades, version four of the glove was officially launched in July 2015.
(Jim Evans)
