BACHELOR JUDGE ON DRESS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21531, 31 December 1931, Page 10

BACHELOR JUDGE ON DRESS

WOMEN SLAVES OF FASHION FALSE STANDARDS TONIC OF A NEW FROCK. (From Oub Own Correspondent.) LONDON. November 24. To use his own words, Mr Justice M'Cardie dealt bluntly in delivering a reserved' judgment in the case where Mr Gilbert Frankau, a well-known novelist and journalist, was sued in respect of his wife’s dress bills,- because he considered that plain speaking was essential, His review of the case was one of the most remarkable of the kind ever heard in an English court—the right of a husband to protect himself against the ex-, travagant expenditure of his wife. His judgment was in favour of Mr Frankau, and for the plaintiffs against Mrs Frankau, in the action in which Martial and Armand, Ltd,, dressmakers, of 19 Albemarle street, W., and Paris, claimed .from Mr Gilbert Frankau and his wife, Mrs Aimee Frankau, £265 13s, the balance of £630 13s, for goods supplied between November, 1927, and July, 1929. The items included £SO for an ermine collar on a cape, dresses at £4B, £44, £42, a velvet cape £34, three items at £3O, and several between £2O and £3O. Mr Frankau denied that he ordered or agreed to buy the goods or any of them, but Mrs Frankau alleged that she ordered the goods from the plaintiffs as her husband’s agent and not otherwise. Mr Justice M'Cardie considered that the questions at issue were of interest, and, perhaps, of some importance not only to dressmakers and shopkeepers, but also to husbands and wives. “ The perils of a husband do not grow less as the years go slowly by,” said his Lordship. The trial of the action had involved an inquiry of a delicate and almost painful nature between Mr and Mrs Frankau, but also with respect to Mr Frapkau’s financial resources over the material period. £9OO A YEAR ON DRESSES. .

Mr and Mrs Frankan were married in 1922. Mrs Frankan had no private means of her own, and Mr Frankan had no appreciable income apart from his earnings as an author and journalist. They lived together until October, 1930, when they separated, and Mrs Frankan had since instituted divorce proceedings. In October, 1925, Mr Frankau agreed with his wife that she should have a dress allowance of £SOO a year. In April, 1928, he increased that allowance to £6OO a year. The debts incurred by Mrs Frankau with the plaintiffs alone substantially exceeded the allowance. The plaintiffs’ claim did not include any item for underclothing, shoes, stockings, or the like. Mr Frankau paid for all his wife’s travelling and medical expenses. He paid all the household expenses. He provided his wife with pocket money. Yet, during the period covered by the plaintiff’s account, Airs Frankau was getting dresses and garments from other dressmakers to the value of many hundreds of pounds. On dresses alone she seemed to have been spending nearly £9OO a year, apart from underclothes, shoes, stockings, and the like. Quite apart from, and beyond the account of, the plaintiffs, she ordered and received, from 1927 to the spring of 1930, dresses, coats, undergarments, shoes and the like to the amount of noarlv £2OOO. The first ciuestiou to be considered was whether the goods supplied by the plaintiffs were “necessaries” or not. 'lho law on the matter had often been stated. Mr Frankau wished his wife to be well-dressed, yet he did not wish her to be well-dressed half as much as he wished her not to be. extravagant. He discouraged and condemned extravagance on her part. He had heavy obligations apart from the oppressive burden of taxation. For one thing, he had to pay his first wife a minimum of £IOOO a year. He liked to live in good style, to mix with good society, and to meet the famous, the cultured, or the charming. He had suffered bitterly from the extravagance of his first wife. ■

SLAVERY OF MEN AND WOMEN. “Imprudent wives,” said the judge, “ too often forget to calculate the proportion of the free net income of them husbands actually available for dress allowance or other expenditure. Too few men have the courage to express themselves clearly and frankly on the matter. Married men in particular have in some cases and for obvious reasons a natural reluctance, and sometimes an understandable fear, to state their views with ade-

quate firmness. Too many women are the slaves of fashion, and too many men are the slaves of women. “There can be no doubt that, so far ag concerns the actual physical necessity for warmth, and so far as there is any needed or desired concealment of the female body, the ordinary society woman could clothe herself quite well on onefifth of the money she now expends on dress. “She could buy a sufficiency of stout and long-wearing woollen or flannel garments for a very small sum per annum. Cotton fabrics for summer time are extremely cheap. It is well to recognise the blunt realities of the matter. What, then,' is the secret or the reason for the modern scale of expenditure on dress? “It is, I suppose, useless to treat the twentieth century as if it were the fifteenth or sixteenth. The fifteenth century judge, if he could be here, would listen to the present case with amazement. He would deem the cost of the wife’s clothes beyond belief. “The transformation of social life and social habit has been enormous in range and amplitude. The standard of life in all classes has risen beyond measure. Actual physical necessity has ceased to be the sole measure of a woman's need of dress. FASHION’S RAPID CHANGES. “ The dressmaker and the dress designer have advanced their art and their attractions still more rapidly than the increase in the standards of comfort and wealth. A woman to-day is caught in a net of new traditions, new conventions, new fashions, and new standards of adornment. Not only do fashions change greatly, but they change with almost ludicrous rapidity. That which is regarded as charming in one month is described a few months later as antiquated and impossible. “ The vast machinery of fashion creation is ever active, ever powerful, and ever merciless. It commands the resources of the world. It controls innumerable devices. CHIEF DECORATIONS OF SOCIAL LIFE. “It is permissible, I hope, to recognise, as I do, that nothing is more charming than a charmingly-dressed woman. But the law has to consider husbands as well as wives, and it is just as well to state that a husband has rights as well as duties, and that he can still use a shield against the stabs of an extravagant wife. This Question of dress is beset with many factors. Quite apart from the sacred trtist of motherhood, and the noble companionship she so often gives to man, the functions of a woman in modern society are largely utilitarian. “ Nature has decreed that the leadership of physical strength and intellectual achievement shall normally belong to man But women are the chief decorations of social life. WOMAN’S INBORN DESIRE. “Legitimate scope must be given to woman’s instinct for dress. Women cannot be expected to renounce an essential feature of feminity or to abandon one of Nature’s solaces for a constant and insuperable physical handicap. “A reasonable indulgence to dress is needed to counterbalance what I .may call the inferiority complex of women. "In considering how much of a man s income is his own, and how much is to lie regarded as the perquisite of his wife s dressmaker, several factors must be borne in mind. “ The factor of sex allurement - is not without its weight, and 1 doubt not that sex interest is a most important. thing for all vital men and women. Atecmie and unemotional people play but a small part in the national life. Woman has an inborn desire for the dainty and the charming, and sometimes for the cosy. “ She instinctively desires to be well dressed, not only for herself and for those to whom she is interlinked, but also for the purpose of attracting the attention and admiration of other women and also of the men she may meet. “Dress, after all, is one of the chief methods of women's self-expression. I can well understand the fascination of a beautiful garment. . . , “Jt is also, I conceive, important to remember the singular and tonic efleet produced on a woman by a new and attractive dress, coat, or hat, niattei s of dress women often remain children to the end. The psychology of the matter must not be overlooked. “But the law has laid it down that the rule of prudence and proportion must be observed. A husband is not to be exposed to ruin by the extravagance of a wife and the feminine instinct tor variety and grace of decoration must be curbed to (be needed extent. .. . . “Too many women, like men. Hunk that the present alone matters that the future can be left to itself.

WARNING TO WOMEN. Mr Justice M'Cardie said that he had formed the conclusion that Mrs Frankau was grossly extravagant, that the goods supplied were not necessary, and that Mr Frankau was not liable for “ the reckless profusion ”of his wife. There were many ways in which a husband could protect himself from the dangers created by an extravagant wife. They were well known to lawyers; they should be equally well known to every husband. One was by means of a fixed allowance to the wife. Mr Frankau had allowed his wife £SOO a year. He (Mr Justice M'Cardie) thought that far too generous; £2OO a year would have been ample. This had been a painful case. It might or might not convey a warning to many married women. At any rate, it illustrated the truth of the words of the late Mr Justice Lush, who said: “A person who deals with a married woman on credit does so, so far as regards a remedy against the husband, at his own risk.” Mr Justice M'Cardie accordingly entered judgment with costs in favour of Mr Frankau, and judgment, with costs, in favour of Messrs Martial and Armand against Mrs Frankau. Mrs Frankau was also ordered to pay the costs that Messrs Martial and Armand had to pay to Mr Frankau.