ABSTRACT
The Changing Face of Fashion in Montreal,
1885-1905 - New Markets, Improved Taste, and the Move to Mass Production
Evelyn A. Payton-Taylor
1992
Under the Conservative government's National Policy,
Canadian industry flourished moving steadily towards self-sufficiency particularly in the
Montreal dominated textile sector. As the leading citizens of Canada's commercial and
industrial centre, Montreal's elite followed fashionable trends set by Parisian designers
by purchasing their clothing while travelling abroad or patronizing exclusive dressmakers
who would copy the latest elegantly engraved fashion plates appearing in international
ladies' journals such as Harper's Bazaar. As the local press and
Montreal-produced journals began to include Paris-inspired fashion commentary during the
late 1880s and the rising retail dry goods sector offered an increasingly varied and up to
date selection of reasonably priced fashionable dress goods, trims, millinery and
accessories both locally and Canada wide through mail order catalogues, distinctions
between the well-dressed Montrealer and her less affluent fellow citizens began to blur.
By the early 1890s fashion reflected a growing demand for practical, more simplified
clothing. As women entered the workforce and engaged in active sports, collective taste
adjusted to the introduction of ready-made, yet perfectly acceptable man-tailored suits,
blouses, skirts and shirtwaists freeing Canadians from total dependence on foreign imports
or their own sewing skills in order to be fashionably dressed.
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