Rue Lafayette
South of Rue Lafayette
is a district called Le Sentier, the heart of the Paris garment industry.
All those fabulous hand-sewn
dresses are hand-sewn in dingy workshops round here.
Before sewing-machines were
invented, this was home to thousands and thousands of young girls who sewed all
day for pitiful wages.
They used to supplement their meagre pay by picking up men during their two-hour
lunch-break, and became known as les midinettes – the noontime girls.
Their great Festival and day off was St.
Catherine’s Day, 30th April; and on Rue Lafayette is Square Montholon, a nice
little park with a children’s playground
and, next to the sandpit, a delightful statue entitled
‘Saint Catherine’s Day’ and dedicated to the Parisian working girl.
It shows a bunch of them,
plumply pretty, overdressed even for 1890, having a whale of a time and no
better than they should be. Don’t miss it.
