I love that blog title/quote so much! Where'd you see it? Looking it up, it seems to come from "Tableau de Paris" originally, and that does seem like the kind of thing L-S Mercier would say. Also I don't know if you're interested in the stripe aspect of the quote per se, rather than just the wittiness, but I highly recommend the book "The Devil's Cloth" by Michel Pastoureau, which has a section on the "revolutionary stripe" in eighteenth-century fashion and decorative arts.
It is from Tableau De Paris, yes! I found it in a blog post from @mimicofmodes where it accompanied a rather relevant fashion plate, and I love that fashion plate so much that I made my own version, though it was over 3 years ago so of course I’d do everything different now. It’s my blog title simply because I’m completely obsessed with late 1780′s-early 1790′s fashion, and I like stripes, and it a nice fun quote. I’m obsessed with 18th century menswear in general, but c. 1785-95 is my favourite. I keep meaning to read more 18th century writing, but then I keep not doing that, so I haven’t read anything else of Tableau De Paris. So much reading (and drawing and painting) that I keep meaning to do, but then I just do more sewing instead.
My sewing blog is currently entitled The Prettiest Gentleman About Town, which is from The Spectator, 1714, which is another thing I keep meaning to read.
