Economy / Hickey Freeman's Next Chapter This story is part of States of Our Union, a series presented in collaboration between The Nation, Magnum Photos, and the Economic Hardship Reporting Project. The Hickey Freeman factory on the outskirts of Rochester, New York—a towering building known as the Temple to Fine Tailoring—looks like a vestige of bygone era of American fashion, but its tailored suits have never gone out of style. And while the workforce has morphed since the company's founding in 1899, the meticulous attention to detail and reverence for the craft remain constants.
Decades ago, the din of the factory was cut with voices of Italian women reciting the rosary as they stitched. In recent years, new accents have hovered over the shop floor—migrants from China, Afghanistan, Nepal, Morocco, Democratic Republic of Congo, and dozens of other countries, all plying an Old World trade as they pieced together new lives in the United States. Hickey-Freeman factory, founded in 1899, now known as Rochester Tailored Clothing.
Rochester, NY, 2024. (Susan Meiselas / Magnum Photos) "It's beautiful when you see all the different countries, different nationalities, just getting along beautifully. I love it," said Guy Regis, an Italian American presser who joined the operation in the early 1970s right after high school.
(Susan Meiselas / Magnum Photos) Kledia, from Albania, 10 years at Hickey-Freeman. Rochester, NY, 2013 and 2024. Following several ownership transitions since .