For most people a trip to Mexico means thinking about buying a new bathing suit or something else suitable for the beach life. For those headed into the cities where violence against the wealthy, the honest (cops) and drug dealers is incredibly high, there is now another option.
A Colombian designer of haute couture bullet-proof clothes has opened up shop in Mexico City, offering suits, overcoats and suede jackets, all of which can stop a bullet.
His racks are lined with bulletproof blazers, women’s suede jackets that’ll stop a .44 Magnum, T-shirts lined with body armor, and guayabera shirts for catching sun or bullets.
“In all the clothing that we have here, it’s 100 percent flexible,” Caballero says. “With the bulletproof vests of the police force, you can’t find that.”
…”We can make any type of bulletproof vest,” he says. “But the basis of the company is design, fashion, discretion. And what we are doing all the time — the discretion — we are working to develop the concept of fashion and, in this way, it’s very comfortable and flexible.”
Caballero boasts that his clients include the presidents of Colombia, Peru and Guatemala. There are rumors that his product has ended up under Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s trademark sweaters, but Caballero won’t confirm them. He’s made bulletproof clothes for Prince Felipe of Spain and his wife, Letizia. Once, Caballero says, he even created an armored kimono for actor Steven Seagal.
If that’s what life is all about in the cities, maybe I’m better off sticking to the beaches.
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