The Waterbury Democrat., 1942-12-26
Designer Paints Bright 'Futuristic" Picture Of Postwar Fashion Front
 vERAMAxWELL FoREsEEs BETTER STYLES AND CHEAPER MASS CLOTHES FOR WOMEN
BY MARGUERITE YOUNG NEA Service Staff Writer

New York-Women who're slicing clothes budgets in order to visit a husband or sweetheart in the serv- Ice, inspire a bright town coat for spring and summer, i943. And Vera Maxwell, who designed 1t, believes 1t is forerunner of plenty of real- iy practical dressing, and, hope, cheaper and better designed mass production clothes"
 r Out with typical Maxwell flair and hand-finished, the new wrap is as fine job as her prewar im- ported tweed numbers. But the new one costs much less than they did because the material is good American jersey, all wool, but less expensive than imported tweed.
 T had to design for very specific wartime living situation" {" Miss Maxwell reports. '"The type of woman who was my customer before the war usually would be thinking of what to wear to a southern resort at this time. This year she is thinking of how to finance a trip somewhere to see her husband before he goes over seas. Probably, the trip comes out of her clothes money.
 Hence, this jersey coat, which packs and carries easily, without injuring its looks. And the coat comes home with its owner. In late spring and summer, in fact right through the next early fall, when she will have dark dresses for town, she will wear this light coat.
 "rhc dark coat for town cor- vention will be forgotten. She will have to strike out. and she'll love 1t. For in spring she'll look and feel fresher, newer, and by fall she will be followed by many more light-topcoated women be- cause by that time dyes will be shorter and lighter colors 8 war time must"
 Miss Maxwell can well be needed when she talks about war and fash ion and really purposeful clothes. Sk.s has been promoting clothes-for- action for years. It was she who or iginated the sleeveless tennis dress for freedom on the court she who made some of the first action worthy ski clothes she who mon. recently went out and de- signed -to-order an appealing look ing factory fashion.
 Tt was very nice to do tennis dress which a woman of good in- come could buy at $6.75" she re marks, but it's my hunch that by the end of the war such dresses, well-designed and really practical as well as pretty, may be bought for SITS, and therefore bought by more women and bought six-at- a-time so each dress can be worn just once before washing, as 1t should be, but now unfortunately isn't"
 Manufacturers of so-called junior dresses, both here and elsewhere, Miss Maxwell reports, are now max ing many new, cheaper but we'll styled dresses. She says alert ones realize there will be huge South American and other country market for such clothes, and are preparing to make them for both foreign and home consumption.
 "This kind of thing could bring America's mass production clothes into their own" she continued. We have a very good start for that, ln design, fin our great American institution the shirt maker dress. Already it is develop ing into good-looking and actioa- worthy costume of great variety
 As a matter of fact, that new coat of Miss Maxwell's is kin to the shirtwaist dress in design; is made to go smoothly over a shirt waist dress or over slacks and shirt.