Goldsboro weekly argus. [volume] (Goldsboro, N.C.) 1885-1909, 1904-03-03
A TRUST ON STYLES.

There's many a married man With
a wife ambitious to spite her neigh
bors and with grown daughters who
make a special study of fashion
plates, who will regret to learn that
a'trust on feminine attire has been
organized. In other words, they
have succeeded in getting together a
style syndicate. This was brought
about by the incorporation at AL
bany, N. Y, of the international
Dressmakers' Association which rep
resents the leading modistes of Lon
don, Paris, and the large American
cities. The man of moderate means
whose eyes assume the dimensions
of soup plates when the Easter bon
net bills come in, may now look for
a material increase in his family ex-
penses. It was already a III of
deep concern to him that the styles
in feminine apparel appeared to
change as+often as the weather, and
before he got accustomed to identi-
flying the newest gowns of his wife
and daughters, 10 and behold, they
went entirely out of fashion and a
new cut and material had to be sup
piled to keep up with the procession.
But think what will be the effect Of
the fashion trust. 1t may be de-
Tended on to get together and put
out an entirely new and revolution
airy kink in design, color, shape or
blend every time a surplus is needed
to enlarge the business or whenever
the stockholders think it is time an
extra dividend should be forthcom-
ing.
And whatever the trust says will
have to "gO," of course, for it will
be the dictator of styles from whose
decision there is no appeal. For in
stance, about the time women of
taste get their ball gowns and walk
ing suits made up and exhibited once
or twice to the admiring public, their
wardrobes will be tabooed by the
trust as out-of-date, and new ideas
both in patterns and makeup will
be showed before their eyes as the
only real thing according to those
who act as arbiters of such matters.
Naturally this will keep the women
busy, so that in their craze to make
the proper appearance some will
doubtless feel sympathy for the lit
tie girl whose ambitions in this line
were so feverish that she prayed to
the Lord to bless her parents and
make her stylish.
But every cloud has its silver lin
ing, and so there is one advantage of
the trust after all. Women in this
country won't have to tag along a
season or more behind the genuine
article as decreed by Paris. There
won't be any newest modes, but the
trust will enable every woman to be
on the same footing with her up-to-
date neighbor, and all car come out
Of the handbook simultaneously. AS
an esteemed contemporary pertinent
ly suggests, F'There will be no fur
Their room for the ancient sheer that
the Flora McFlimseys are sporting
the styles which New York thinks
Paris years." for 'tit you see it in a
trust window it's so, and until the
given signal of they are Off a new
mode will not really be the thing,
and then everybody will have it at
the same time" There is, of course,
some consolation in this. 1t means
a great deal to the woman who strug-
giles h~eroically to be in the fashion to
feel that her o extravaganza VISA
Wis at the card table or around the
punch-bowl cannot monopolize the
leadership OF the dress procession,
and hence the trust will come in to
rescue her from a humiliating fate.
What the hard-Worked man who
has to meet the bills will do about it
yet remains to be seen. Most of them
Will doubtless regard the fashion
trust as another 1egalized hold-up
that not only acts as a purely arbi-
trary court in deciding what women
should wear, but which changes its
decisions to conform to its financial
greed and as an absolute dictator col
lects its tribute from the women pro-
portionate with their willingness to
bring up the ear of the fashion pa
radee
Chicago, Feb. 26. One man was