Red Stars & Gas Masks

"I can't imagine why you should want to interview me!" Thus last week petite, blonde Paulina Semionova Molotova, wife of the Soviet Premier, greeted a newshawk who had tracked her to her new post as director of the Soviet Powder, Perfume, Rouge & Lipstick Trust (called "Tezhe" for short).

Bespectacled, statistic-loving Premier Molotov has been embarrassed lately by guarded criticism in the Moscow press of his beauteous blonde young wife's doings, still more embarrassed by Moscow gossip. Why, since the Soviet Union is again pinched by a food shortage (TIME, May 23), are powders, perfumes, rouges and lipsticks so important as to engage the energies of the Premier's wife? Why does not she, like the frumpy middle-aged spouse of Soviet President Kalinin, manage a collective farm?

On the office door of the Premier's wife is lettered "P. S. Zhemchuzhina, Manager." Wearing a skirt and blouse with a knitted shawl thrown over her shoulders, she parried unspoken criticism last week by launching into enthusiastic description of "our Trust's experiments to produce new and better soaps!"

She concluded with a shake of her tousled blonde head: "I am really very busy. The Trust is running slightly behind schedule. And today I am supposed to attend the First All-Union Style Show."

This show proved decidedly significant. Months ago the Soviet Clothing Trust called upon comrades throughout the entire Soviet Union to submit clothing designs and, if possible, samples. Last week the show was thrown open and its major style message was instantly evident: trousers for women!

Nearly all the preferred female garments had thoroughgoing trousers, undisguised by any resemblance to beach pajamas or slit skirts. Soviet women, if they follow the lead of Moscow's show (and following may become compulsory), will dress morning, noon & night in garments resembling an aviatrix's flying suit.

"Such clothes break definitely with the impractical skirt and with all bourgeois traditions of women's dress," proclaimed a placard. "The Soviet woman must move unhampered and with perfect freedom as she does her work."

Male costumes shown at the First All-Union Style Show strikingly resembled the female garments except for a leaning toward brighter colors. New patterns in cloth avoided flowers, stripes, dots or other Capitalist commonplaces. Stressed instead were cogwheels, electric flashes, light bulbs, tractors, cotton mill spindles, atheistic symbols, airplanes, dirigibles and soldiers. In line with the Soviet Union's emphasis upon electrical development many fabrics represented stylized transmission lines & equipment, zigzags of high voltage or lightning. Particularly fetching and announced for either male or female wear is a new Soviet printed cotton cloth with a pattern of alternate red stars & gas masks.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.