United States · Missouri · Kansas City
Garment District, Kansas City — Area Guide & Where to Stay
The Garment District is a loft quarter of Downtown Kansas City, second only to New York City for clothing manufacture in the 1930s.
About Garment District
Where to stay in Garment District
Each area has its own feel; here's who each one suits.
Loft conversions in the old manufacturing blocks put beds inside the Garment District itself, and the 21c Museum Hotel Kansas City sits among the same downtown streets, a short walk from Barney Allis Plaza. Broadway Boulevard edges Quality Hill. Rooms on the Kansas City Garment District Museum side keep the needle and thread monument and the old sewing floors within a couple of minutes on foot.
Choose the district for a downtown base with history in the walls.
About Garment District
What are the main landmarks in Garment District?
An oversize needle marks these blocks. Dave Stevens designed the needle and thread monument installed in 2002, and it stands as the neighbourhood's own memorial to the clothing trade that once filled these floors. The Kansas City Garment District Museum opened the same year to hold that record.
Downtown Kansas City puts more within reach: the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, the Grand Avenue Temple, and Barney Allis Plaza all sit inside a short walk.
What is the history of Garment District?
Several large clothing manufacturers clustered in these blocks during the 1930s, making the Kansas City garment trade second in size only to New York City's and, at its height, responsible for about a quarter of all clothing made in the United States. Henry Perry started selling barbecue from an alley stand in the neighbourhood in 1908, the beginning of the Kansas City-style barbecue tradition. The sewing floors emptied.
Manufacturing left, and the industrial buildings were redeveloped into loft apartments, offices and restaurants.
Where is Garment District?
The Garment District occupies a flat downtown grid east of Quality Hill and across Broadway Boulevard, within Kansas City, Missouri.
Good for
More areas in Kansas City
Updated September 2026