From: preston@sware.com (preston)
Newsgroups: rec.guns
Subject: Re: Advice wanted: Holster for woman
Date: 19 Dec 92 00:24:08 GMT


	A friend of mine fax'ed this article to me.  It appeared in the
Chicago Tribune, but I don't have a date line or section.  It definately
appeared on or before 12/18/92, the day I received the article.  It
probably appeared sometime between 12/11/92 and 12/18/92, but I don't
guarantee it.  I attempted to type it in exactly as it appears in the
article, but I may have made some mistakes.  Also one line in the
article was garbled during the fax transmission and is so noted in
the transcription below.  I double checked the address and phone
at the end to make sure that they are as they appear in the article.
I have neither called nor written for a brochure.

===========================================================================
Under Control
By Lewis Beate  [it may be Beale, the fax is blury here]

Ladies! Upset because that cute little semi-automatic you've been packing
is causing unsightly bulges in your slinky cocktail dress?  Concerned that
your shoulder holster is poking and prodding all the wrong curves and
contours?  Have no fear.  The pistol-packin' grandmom of a 3-year-old
grandaughter is here to take care of your design needs.

``The women  know have a hard enough time getting in their pants, without
having additional room for a gun,'' says Linda Mutchnick, a 49-year-old
Philadelphia-area paralegal who has come out with a line of clothes designed
specifically with the gun-toting women in mind.

Mutchnick has been packing heat -- currently a .380 Beretta -- for 10 years,
ever since a series of threatening phone calls she received at work made her
fear for her personal safety.  She's a member of the National Rifle
Association who has never had to fire her weapon in self-defense.  but she
practices twice weekly, is training to be an NRA certified weapons instructor
and carries her piece with her at all times.  During her decade of gun
ownership, she's also discovered one sobering fact: fashion and gun-toting
tend to be mutually exclusive concepts.

	Too much hip action

``Up until now, most modes of carrying guns have been aimed toward men,''
she says, referring specifically to sholder and hip holsters.  ``And
I don't need to tell you that a woman's physique is so much different
from a man's.  When wearing a holster on a belt, the swell of a woman's
hip causes the barrel of a gun to be pushed out, and the butt pushed in,
which is very uncomfortable.  With a shoulder holster, you have a similar
problem, but now you're dealing with the breast area.''

Over the years, Mutchnick discovered that ready-to-wear garments were simply
not made with gun-carrying women in mind.  And the few attempts to deal with
the problem seemed totally inadequate.  ``I've seen bra holsters,'' she says,
``and holsters that fit on the belly area down in the pants, where you
practically have to disrobe to get to the gun.  By the time you get to it,
you could be dead.''

	Searching for solutions

So Mutchnick decided to take matters into her own hands.  A self-described
``clothes and fashion-conscious'' person who ``knows quality,'' she sat
down earlier this year and began sketching out the problem areas for
gun toters, what she calls ``the areas that were being poked, pinched,
prodded, and jabbed.''

Concentrating on skirts and slacks, with primary emphasis on the waist
area, Mutchnick realized that some sort of elaticized rigging would be needed,
allowing for expansion of the problem areas without throwing ``the whole
garment off whack.''  Her solution was to combine a structured waistband
with an elastic one, placing adjustable pieces 1 inch apart on each side of
the waist.  She took the same formula and adapted it to the shoulders on
jackets, then came up with a series of specs wihch would help her determine
``how heavy the elastic and how heavy the interfacing material must be to
hold the gun without distorting the shape of the dress... [... the rest of
this sentence is grabled and I can't decipher it (~4 words)...]

Mutchnick then took her sketches to a designer, who made patters for her.
She then purchased some muslin and reworked the designs in order to get all
the bugs out.  By last October, she was ready to roll out her line.

	An entiere outfit

All of Mutchnick's fashions are custom-made.  She is currently offering
skirts, slacks, a vest and two types of jackets, one of which is reversible
and can be adapted for right- or left-handed shoulder-holsters users.
Prices are determined by the type of material used.  A basic skirt, made
from $6.00/yard cotton or cotton sateen, costs $110.00.  A jacket can cost up
to $275.00.  Mutchnick's more expensive line is made of wool gabardine, wool
crepe or belgian linen, which runs in the $22.00 - $25.00/yard range.  Orders
are processed within 6 to 8 weeks.

Mutchnick's sales have been mostly word-of-mouth referrals.  She has a mail-
order catalog and has hired four seamstresses to handle orders.  The NRA
estimates there are 15 million female gun owners, most of whom purchase
handguns for personal protection.  Mutchnick's clients have included a
physician, advertising executive, attorney, bookkeeper and police officer.

	Ready to take the heat

Mutchnick has named her line PistolERA, which is something of a triple
entendre.  It is not only the Spanish word for holster or gunfighter,
but evokes the Equal Rights Amendment, even though Mutchnick says she
``is not an activist, not involved with the ERA.''

More than anything, Mutchnick says she came up with the name because of
the political situation in 1992, the so-called Year of the Woman.  ``We're
doing so many things these days that were closed to us before,'' she says.
``I thought with the era of the woman, it would be apropos.''

The creator of the PistolERA line knows her clothes aren't for everyone.  She
recognizes that gun ownership is ``a very personal decision that demands
responsibility.''  She also is tired of feeling uncomfortable every time she
straps on her heat.  So it's a personal comfort thing for this postmodern
Annie Oakley, and she's ready to take the criticism her clothing line
will undoubtedly inspire.

``There are some very gun-sensitive cities in this country, and some vocal
anti-gun people,'' she says.  ``They'll hate me for what I'm doing, because
it's related.  But I'm not trying to alter anyone's opinion as to whether
to carry or not.'' [End of article]

PistolERA brochures are available at
5760 Corsair Ct.
Bensalem, PA 19020
or Call (215) 752-9131
===========================================================================

-Preston (preston@sware.com)
SecureWare, Inc. // 2957 Clairmont Rd., Suite 200 // Atlanta, GA 30329
Work: (404) 315-6296