al or technical designing means designing for wall-paper,
lace, silk, chintz, calico, oil-cloth, linoleum, book-covers,
embroidery, wood-carving, silver-ware, jewelry, silks, handkerchiefs,
upholstery goods, and carpets of all grades, from ingrains to
moquettes. Up to within a very short period all this work has been
done by men, principally foreigners; but talented and enterprising
women saw that they were able to do the work equally well, and it is
only a question of time when women will entirely monopolize this field
of industry.

It will be seen at once that the woman who is ambitious to become an
industrial designer must have, first of all, originality. She must
have good taste and an eye for color. Drawing must come natural to
her. The mere ability to copy pictures, or make sketches from nature
is not enough. She must be full of ideas, and for some of the work
mentioned (notably carpet designing) she must have what might be
called a combining mind--that is, the ability to get ideas from
several designs, and by combining them together, make something new.
It must be confessed that this kind of ability is rare. Very few men
possess it, and fewer women. Manufacturers of carpets and wall-papers
say that they have to import nearly all their help of this kind from
Europe; they cannot find in this country the right kind of men to do
the work.

But because a woman has not this talent for originating largely
developed, she should not be discouraged from becoming an industrial
designer. If she has even a little talent in that direction she may
find, after taking a few lessons, that the study is very congenial to
her, and that she has more ability than she imagined. The kind of
designing of which I am particularly speaking in this chapter is
designing for carpets, oil-cloths, and wall-paper. That seems to be
the most popular at the present time, though there is a good chance
for skilled workers in the other branches to which allusion was made.

It is surprising what a demand there is for new designs in carpets,
wall-paper, and oil-cloths. One would suppose that a single design
would last for a long time; but such is not the fact. The demand of
the public is continually for novelty; the fashion changes in these
matters, just the same as it does in bonnets and dresses, and each
manufacturer is competing with his neighbor to get something pretty
and original. A good design can always be sold at a good price; an
ordinary or