The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1921-10-31
TOPEKA STATE JOURNAL
Information Bureau
FREDERIC J. HAsKIN, Director.
washington, D. @.
WHY RITATE EUROPE?

/ "A
next spring, if the tailors and the
makers of ready-te-wear clothes have
| their way, as doubtless they will.
| 1t has already been announced that
| the clothes designers, like all the rest
of the world, will descend upon WASH
ington when the armament conference
| opens, for the express purpose OF
| studying the clothes worn by the dele
gates and modelling their 1922 offer
| ings after them.
| We will be treated to Lloyd George
collars and BRAND pockets. All Eure-
pean diplomcy will be represented in
the spring style books. But the d&othes
will not really be modelled upon what
| the great men wear. Whether it is a
significant fact or not, great men are
very seldom good tailors' models:
| BRAND is anything but dressy and
Lloyd Georges trousers seem often to
| bag at the knees, according to the
| photographs. There is not anything
striking about Clemeneeau's garb eX7
/ cept that he wears black gloves in the
| house-a habit which even a Europen
| precedent probably would not serve
| to popularize in this country.
| The clothes will really be modelled
after those worn by the young strip
| lings who will come over from Europe
| in various capacities, cretarial, So
| cial, and purely ornamental. These
| imported exquisites will have trous-
seaux like brides. Their great func-
| ton will be to drink the oceans of tea
and other liquids set forth by Wash
| ington hostesses, to dance with the
I debutantes, and possibly to marry a
. few of the well-endowed ones, thus
cementing international alliances and
frecouping individual European for
tunes as the United States treasury
has recouped the national finances of
cur allies.
Doubtless these European attaches
will h x4-alI cd nd
| less American youths might do worse
than to lock like them, but the ques-
ton surely is legitimate why in this
| as in so many other ways, we should
| be an imitation of Europe.
| Apparently there is no such thing as
an American style. The highest rec
ommendation your tailor or haber-
! dasher can give anything is that it is
now being worn in London, just as the
| ladies look to Paris for styles It is
bad enough thus for the whole male
America to be trying desperately to
| look English while his better half
tries to look French, but surely it will
be confusing if our daring and original
designers are going to try to make us
look like the whole continent of Eu-
rope all at once, with perhaps an orr
entail touch thrown in.
1t is also curious that a nation
which prides itself on IT'S inventive
ness and its independence should be
mere ape of other nations. For it is
not only in matters of clothing, but
in manners and customs, in literature
and art, we are, or have been until
quite recently, docile followers of
British and other European models.
This is still more strange when you
take into accent the widespread
American Shibboleth that this is the
most perfect country in the world.
Recently a part of the American pub
tolerate a more critical attitude tow
ard it own land, but in general it has
been the American custom to pro-
claim America a great Improvement
over Europe in every way.
Imitation is always a confession of
a feeling of inferierity If you feel
superior you initiate nobody. Why.
then, if we are really so proud of
ourselves, do we initiate those inferior
European nations in so many ways?
The American doughboy often came
back from Europe sneering at the
frogs and the 'limeys," all too evil
IDENTIFY having failed in any genuine
appreciation of France and England.
Yet he gets back into citizens clothes
that are limitations of English models.
More than likely he reads English
books, or American books that are
imitation of English books. If he goes
in for society he encounters English
accents and English manners and goes
to English teas. Among people who
aspire to be considered socially smart,
the highest recommendation you can
give anything is to call it English. We
have bungalows in the English style,
and also estates and clubs In our
cookery, on the other hand, we imi-
tate the French, and any hotel which
aspires to be considered first cass must
print at least a part of its menu in
a language which scarcely any of its
patrons can read.
Architecture Imported.
Our architecture is a horrible hodge
podge of all European styles of all
ages-Gothic, English manor, Greek
classic, and a dozen others. Our fur
niture must be modelled after that of
Louis the Ounce or some other Eu-
ropean monarch long dead. The near
est thing to an American architecture
so far at all widely used is the
| so-calIed Colonial type, and that is
| indigenous type of furniture is the
heavy two-by-four stuff known as
Mission, and it is for the most part
ugly.
So our whole country, with it's boast
| of superiority, is in manners, dress,
customs, architecture, furniture, food,
and to a great extent in its art and
its literature, poor imitation of a
great many European models. The
only distinctive thing about it in these
regards is the jumbled quality which
comes of prorniscuous imitativeness.
1t must be said that in literature
during the past ten or fifteen years,
and especially since the war, the
United States has made something of
declaration of independence. A
whole crew of novelists, poets, and
critics have sprung into action, who
write about American life as they
know it, and who are not conspicuous
| iy indebted. to foreign models for any
thing in their viewpoint or method.
In architecture, a small but hardly
native tendency is gaining ground in
the southwest, and some really attrae-
tive buildings have been built on de-
signs evolved from the pueblos of the
| Indians. American art also now fol-
! lows the American scene more closely,
deals less in mythical subjects, runs
| less persistently to Europe for its edu-