I quite like this sketch made by Julia Gill. I go biking a lot and it gets to be very strenuous because my dress would seemingly like to stop me from doing it at all. There are no easy solutions to this problem either because people would not like us simply wearing less clothing, but this design that this fine lady has made helps with that. She has defeated this trivial issue. Once this is created I will finally be able to go out and enjoy a nice bike ride without such a struggle. People shouldn’t really have an issue with us wearing something like this since it covers us nice and well. If I had it my way, it wouldn’t really matter what I chose to do with MY body and how I presented MYSELF, but things just can’t be that simple I am afraid. I really love this sketch, though. This was created by a creative and problem-solving mind and this mind resides within a woman! A woman eager to help ease the life of other progressive women around her! A woman that’s not afraid to throw aside that role as her husband’s keeper for some time and just focus on her own wants and needs. I wonder how people reacted to her findings. And, it looks quite nice too. Which is good because if there’s one old-fashioned quality we New Women still might want to have it would have to be that of vanity! For that reason, I think the ruffly exterior of the legs makes a very visually gratifying touch to the whole dress.
Editorial Commentary: This commentary was written by an unnamed “New Woman” that lived during the Victorian period of England and her word choices and interests really outline and highlight a lot of the characteristics that one of these “New Women” would have had. It is quite evident just how important this creation is to her just from the first few sentences. There is a lot of frustration that we can even sense in her words. Not necessarily angry and bitter frustration, but annoyed and somewhat bothered probably as a result of being so used to being overlooked at this point. This frustration comes with being told you can’t do something even if it would make your life much easier. She is very passionate when it comes to this subject. She even goes on to talk about how much she loves the creativity involved with the mind who made this which emphasizes how important it is to her that a woman is strong and intelligent enough to do something inventive and practical like this. What makes it even more important to her and her gender is that this is something that she’d actually be using. What shows this is that at one point in the commentary, she declares with an excited tone just how happy it makes her that a woman is working to help other progressive women of her time period. If there’s anything that seems to be important to our character it's working towards getting to a point where women can have big accomplishments of their own. This is because they are living in a time where it's not really even a discussion at all.
Citation: Rachel. “#2 Gill’s Cycling Semi-Skirt – Patent #6794.” Bikes & Bloomers, 29 April 2014, http://bikesandbloomers.com/garment-3-julia-gill/. Accessed 10 November 2020.