Ellen Curtis Demorest

Ellen Louise Demorest (, November 15, 1824 – August 10, 1898) was an American businesswoman, fashion arbiter, and milliner, widely credited for inventing mass-produced tissue-paper dressmaking patterns. In 1860, with her husband, William Jennings Demorest, she established a company to sell the patterns, which were adaptations of the latest French fashions, and a magazine to promote them. Her dressmaking patterns made French styles accessible to ordinary women, thus greatly influencing US fashion.

Early life Demorest was born November 15, 1824, in Schuylerville, New York. She was the second of eight children (6 girls 2 boys) born to Electra Curtis and Henry D. Curtis. Her father was a farmer and the owner of a men's hat factory. One of her father's eighteen siblings — Charity — (1834–1919, married to Jeremiah Shonts) was the maternal grandmother of Charles B.J. Snyder, a renowned American architect who served as Superintendent of School Buildings for the New York City Board of Education from 1891 to 1923.

At eighteen, Demorest set up a millinery shop in Saratoga Springs with the help of her father. After a year, she moved her business to Troy before relocating again to Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

She was known from girlhood as Nell.

Career Early in their marriage, the Demorests ran a Philadelphia emporium. Ellen and her sister Kate were working on a system of simplified dress making when they saw the Demorest's African-American maid cutting a dress pattern out of brown paper. Ellen was inspired by the idea to create tissue paper patterns of fashionable garments for the home sewer.

The family relocated to New York and began manufacturing patterns. In the fall of 1860, they launched a quarterly magazine, Mme. Demorest’s Mirror of Fashions.

Mme. Demorest’s Mirror of Fashions and Demorest’s Illustrated Monthly soon reached a circulation of 60,000.

The fashions worn by Empress Eugenie were of particular interest to the readers of Demorest’s Illustrated Monthly Magazine and Mme. Demorest’s Mirror of Fashions. Correspondents reported on every dress the Empress wore and her gowns were reproduced for a semi-annual New York show.

Journalist and women's rights advocate Jane Cunningham Croly edited Demorest’s Illustrated Monthly Magazine from 1860 to 1887. Under her leadership, Demorest’s Monthly advocated for female education and employment. Croly promoted female accomplishment with a monthly "What Women Are Doing" column. The column claimed to take "note of every woman rancher, banker, dentist or businesswoman... who came to light in a distinctive way in any part of the country." Offices in Europe, Canada and Cuba distributed Demorest patterns.

Magazines published Demorest’s Illustrated Monthly Magazine Mme. Demorest’s Mirror of Fashions.