The Wasp — 1895 — page 329: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

This page combines fashion satire with social commentary. The left illustration shows "One of Doucet's Sewing Girls"—a caricatured seamstress hunched over needlework, satirizing the exploitative labor behind Paris's famous haute couture. The accompanying text mocks how women's fashion fantasies drive demand for garments created under poor working conditions. The right section, "The 'Him' of To-Day," presents a sketch of a fashionable gentleman and contrasts the modern "Him" (defined by sartorial propriety and English manners) with an older type of rowdy "blood." The poem emphasizes that respectability now requires proper clothing, deportment, and adherence to English standards—satirizing how status has become performance through fashion rather than inherent character.