Possible Clues:

• Sheer stocking
• Material transatlantic route shortened?
• Classical guitar string material
• Note variable length with both old and new fabric
• Stocking new line, working around end of day
• Synthetic invented in the 1930s
• Material, any longer part
• New Year bill at the end paid for by plastic
• Silk's successor, in stockings
• Plastic used for stockings