Le Sentier Wholesale Garment District

The Sentier area, around Rue d'Aboukir and Rue du Caire in Paris's 2nd arrondissement, was historically the center of French ready-to-wear manufacturing and wholesaling, long home to garment wholesalers and factories whose customers came from Brazil, the Maghreb, the United States and Spain. According to APUR, the Paris urban planning institute, the number of textile and apparel wholesale businesses in the district fell from 415 in 2003 to 53 in 2023, a drop of about 87%, with many wholesalers relocating to the northeastern suburb of Aubervilliers. Some garment wholesale showrooms still operate here, but on a much smaller scale than in past decades.

The district wholesales women's ready-to-wear, fabrics and accessories, serving international re-export buyers. Although wholesale activity has shrunk sharply from its peak, Sentier remains one of the few garment wholesale clusters still operating inside central Paris. For Chinese export manufacturers, it is a place to meet the remaining Parisian garment wholesalers and buyers, and to observe how Europe's quick-response apparel supply chain is shifting toward suburban wholesale hubs such as Aubervilliers, where many family firms now run their showrooms.