Unless you live in a major metropolis, the idea of locally made clothing generally makes people think of ill-fit items better suited for a muddy outdoor concert than Monday at the office.

Thus, St. Louis fashion continues to be a dubious descriptor. But that's not stopping intrepid boutique owners from investing in local designs.

"Locally made clothing used to be a hippie concept, but it's now more of a hipster concept," said April Tate, founder of the St. Louis Craft Mafia. "The local people who like handmade and unique things is growing along with the organic and green movement."

Tate's 40-member St. Louis Craft Mafia is behind a new studio and market place on Cherokee Street called Made! at 3159 Cherokee Street.

The venue has about 15 resident artists and the space is open to the public on the weekends for shopping, collaborating and using equipment to create projects of their own.

Tate said that old-fashioned crafting has been given a modern-day face-lift.

"It's definitely something that now appeals to 20-somethings and 30-somethings, as opposed to the idea that crafting is only for old ladies," Tate said.

And those attempting to make a living designing and crafting definitely skew younger in age, perhaps because it's such a labor-intensive, often idealistic pursuit.

Cindy Cummins of DIYstyle Boutique, a new shop in St. Charles that exclusively caters to local designers, said that she opened her venture because she wanted to give young designers an opportunity to shine. The next generation of designers became a keen interest for Cummins when her daughter entered design school and she lamented the opportunities that existed after graduation.

"We are trying to cater to designers who are trying to make a career of this," Cummins said. "I want it to be similar to the fashion incubators that exisit in other cities, (such as) Chicago."

Cummins hopes to eventually start a nonprofit that promotes local designs. For now, her St. Louis Fashion Collective includes about a dozen clothing and jewelry designers who are sold in the DIYStyle Boutique.

The idea came from a meeting of about 25 local fashion designers who discussed the difficulties of finding local outlets to sell their items. Slowly, more opportunities are developing.

"For whatever reason, people these days are a little more concerned about trying to shop local and support local artists," said Natalie Woods of Daisy Clover Boutique, 8146 Big Bend Boulevard, Webster Groves.

Woods leased the space in the back of her shop to Kathy Torre-Stewart of Torre Designs to open Scratch Boutique, which features a dozen or so local artists. Next door, Salt of the Earth, a shop that normally caters to imported home goods, has designated space to a "close to home" selection of locally crafted art work, sculpture, pottery and jewelry.

Local boutiques offer an opportunity for designers who normally have to wait for the next major craft show to reach customers year-round.

Kari Kraichely of Charm Boutique, 313 North 11th Street, opened her hand-crafted jewelry shop in October 2007 with just one local jewelry artist and more than a dozen artist from outside the region. She quickly discovered that her downtown location attracted a lot of visitors in town for conventions. And those visitors wanted items made in St. Louis.

"They wanted to know which jewelry was made locally, because they were going back to Milwalkee or Miami and they wanted something unique," Kraichely said.

Her out-of-town shoppers wanted something to remember their trip by, so she went from carrying one local jewelry line to now carrying about 12 out of the 32 lines available in her store. And she's on the hunt for more St. Louis artists.

She said that it not just good for her business, but great for the city when people from other parts of the county come here and buy something local. She said, "Reputation is all word-of-mouth, so when someone in Los Angeles, Austin, Seattle is walking around wearing a great necklace or ring and people are asking them where they got it. It means something if they say, 'St. Louis.'"

Find out more about St. Louis designers in Lifestyle. Our "Made in St. Louis" feature runs every week. To see past features, go to stltoday.com/fashion.