1 · Overview for General Readers
The Summer Issue before the Leipzig Town-Hall Cover
This is the same Leipzig quarterly as Plate 3, one year and one season earlier. Guter Rat für heute und morgen was issued four times a year — Sommer, Herbst, Winter, Frühjahr — and each issue carried a running order number for the East German postal and book trade. Plate 6 is Bestellnr. 584, season SOMMER. Plate 3 is Bestellnr. 587, season FRÜHJAHR. The catalogued issue between them, Bestellnr. 586, is Winter 1958. The missing number in this scan, 585, is the autumn issue of 1958.
The cover keeps the yellow brush-script masthead and the line mit Schnittmusterbogen, so the fashion-and-sewing character of the magazine is still intact. What changes is the picture: a young woman in a pale rose fine-knit pullover and a dark skirt printed with large stylized flowers, seated in long grass with a wire-haired terrier on a chain collar. The imprint sits on a yellow band. On the Spring 1959 cover the same imprint sits on a black band. The series identity stays; the seasonal dress of the cover changes.
2 · Diplomatic Cover Transcription
Inscriptions & Imprint on Plate 6
Top Header Strip
BESTELLNR. 584 | mit Schnittmusterbogen | PREIS DM 1.25
Upper Left Masthead
Guter Rat
FÜR HEUTE
UND
MORGEN
SOMMER
Bottom Imprint Banner (black capitals on a yellow bar)
VERLAG FÜR DIE FRAU · LEIPZIG
3 · Dating & Bibliographic Proof
From Bestellnr. 584 to Bestellnr. 587
The cover does not print a calendar year. The year follows from the order number and from one catalogued neighbour:
- Bestellnr. 586 = Winter 1958. Antiquarian listings of Verlag für die Frau record Guter Rat für heute und morgen, Heft 586 mit Schnittmusterbogen, Winter 1958 (26 pages, 29 × 22.5 cm, Leipzig).
- The magazine was a quarterly. Seasons advance one number at a time. Working back from Winter 1958: 585 is Herbst 1958, and 584 is Sommer 1958. Working forward: 587 is Frühjahr 1959, which is Plate 3 of this edition.
- The pattern-sheet era and the DM price agree. Schnittmusterbogen were included through 1962, and the cover price is still given as
DM, the GDR currency abbreviation used until 31 July 1964.
4 · Historical Background, Distribution & Audience
Same House, Same Price, One Season Earlier
Publisher, price, and supplement match Plate 3 exactly: Verlag für die Frau, Leipzig, DM 1.25, and a pattern sheet. The house had been formed on 1 July 1946 from the expropriated Verlag Otto Beyer and held the GDR’s main women’s and fashion list, including Guter Rat. The figure of about 768,500 copies per quarterly issue is the documented scale of that title in this period, not a count printed on this cover.
Readers were working women and home dressmakers who needed a summer pattern more than a studio portrait. A copy at 1.25 DM, passed through a household and a sewing circle, was still scarce enough to be kept back for regular customers.
Plate 6 · East German Mass Fashion & Consumer Culture (GDR)
Guter Rat für heute und morgen
SOMMER · Bestellnr. 584 · mit Schnittmusterbogen · Verlag für die Frau, Leipzig (Summer 1958)
Bestellnr. 586= Winter 1958 (26 pp., 29 × 22.5 cm, Verlag für die Frau, Leipzig) and by Plate 3, Bestellnr. 587 = Frühjahr 1959. Two quarterly steps before Winter 1958 is Sommer 1958.1 · Overview for General Readers
The Summer Issue before the Leipzig Town-Hall Cover
This is the same Leipzig quarterly as Plate 3, one year and one season earlier. Guter Rat für heute und morgen was issued four times a year — Sommer, Herbst, Winter, Frühjahr — and each issue carried a running order number for the East German postal and book trade. Plate 6 is Bestellnr. 584, season SOMMER. Plate 3 is Bestellnr. 587, season FRÜHJAHR. The catalogued issue between them, Bestellnr. 586, is Winter 1958. The missing number in this scan, 585, is the autumn issue of 1958.
The cover keeps the yellow brush-script masthead and the line mit Schnittmusterbogen, so the fashion-and-sewing character of the magazine is still intact. What changes is the picture: a young woman in a pale rose fine-knit pullover and a dark skirt printed with large stylized flowers, seated in long grass with a wire-haired terrier on a chain collar. The imprint sits on a yellow band. On the Spring 1959 cover the same imprint sits on a black band. The series identity stays; the seasonal dress of the cover changes.
2 · Diplomatic Cover Transcription
Inscriptions & Imprint on Plate 6
FÜR HEUTE
UND
MORGEN
SOMMER Bottom Imprint Banner (black capitals on a yellow bar) VERLAG FÜR DIE FRAU · LEIPZIG
3 · Dating & Bibliographic Proof
From Bestellnr. 584 to Bestellnr. 587
The cover does not print a calendar year. The year follows from the order number and from one catalogued neighbour:
DM, the GDR currency abbreviation used until 31 July 1964.4 · Historical Background, Distribution & Audience
Same House, Same Price, One Season Earlier
Publisher, price, and supplement match Plate 3 exactly: Verlag für die Frau, Leipzig, DM 1.25, and a pattern sheet. The house had been formed on 1 July 1946 from the expropriated Verlag Otto Beyer and held the GDR’s main women’s and fashion list, including Guter Rat. The figure of about 768,500 copies per quarterly issue is the documented scale of that title in this period, not a count printed on this cover.
Readers were working women and home dressmakers who needed a summer pattern more than a studio portrait. A copy at 1.25 DM, passed through a household and a sewing circle, was still scarce enough to be kept back for regular customers.
5 · Fashion Design & Visual Iconography
Summer Separates, a Printed Skirt, and a Domestic Animal