A MAID IN MAYFAIR.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 249, 21 October 1933, Page 3 (Supplement)

A MAID IN MAYFAIR.

new drama club.

BAREFOOTED CRAZE.

Our London Lady Correspondent.). Here is no divine right or all-highest jsense about Princess Juliana of ' |j 4n( j i She is a thoroughly democratic \ up-to-date young lady, devoted to " gjmple life and camping out, and, a ll the Dutch, a confirmed cyclist. Ifbcn she left school, and went to take law degree at Leyden University, j { popped her Royal title altogether. • e a i so joined a summer camping as•ociation under an assumed name. They V a , little golf in Holland, but I have i heard that the Princess has taken f°xt,p frame. She may be tempted to do 10 if she walks round the Goodwood golf r-e—one of the most beautiful in Sf country. Princess ' Juliana won ,den opinions during her stay in Lonf She was completely unspoilt, and 3 ° D k as much pleasure in seeing all the vhts of London aa an American trinper !l f ij er e for a month's holiday. More[A s jj e «-ent about in a most unconvlntional manner, wandering in the .da studying the riders in the Row, ri-iting the galleries, and seeing all the theatres she could crowd into a busy ' amme. When she was not moving P j.° t in public she was nearly always a ctn with a cigarette between her lips, Ld amongst her personal circle, at I(as t, insists on everyone calling her by her Christian name. But she has no use , jjjtrht clubs, for the one social accomplishment that makes no appeal to her j. that of dancing. She avoids it whenever she possibly can. "THE OLD BARN." The New Drama Club, which has for its object the discovery of new blood for the stage, has certainly broken fresh [■round. Instead of making its headquarters at one of London's little "intimate" theatres, it has taken premises in one of the prettiest spots in Surrey. It has discovered an old hotel at Egham, once the home of Queen Elizabeth, and retaining still the atmosphere of Old England! Attached to the hotel is a fifteenth, century tithe barn, having at one end a minstrels' gallery, under niich a stage has been built. The whole is situated in old world, delightful .-rounds, and the Sunday evening performances will start early, so that members of the club can dine and dance after the performance, and bathe, if they think fit, in a flood-lit swimming pool which has been made in the sunken gardens. Thfe first performance took place, when a new play, "Echo," by Leila Manning Taylor, was produced, the lead being taken by Miss Diana Churchill, who was chosen from six of the most promising younger actresses of the day. Musical comedy, as well as the "legitimate" drama, will be generously encouraged by the club. POOL PARTIES. Mayfair and even suburban hostesses lave hit upon a new way of entertaining dinner guests. Instead of arranging either a cabaret or a dance, they whisk them off in cars to one or other of the innumerable bathing pools now existing outside London. Here, in really hot weather, those guests may bathe by moonlight to whom the romanice of such eiercise appeals, and those who are too old, too timid, or too rheumatic for that form of sport can derive great entertainment from sitting round the pool, at well-appointed tables, and quizzing the bathers. I am told these "pool" parties meet with great favour, and that the local pool habitues also like them. It brightens up the normal scenery, and adds social eclat to the occasions. But the worst of it is that heat waves in England are so few and far between. 1 . \ ' RIGHT IN THE SWIIff. There is a comic side to May fair's latest craze for sandals and bare feet. At. several recent society crushes, notably the party given by Baroness Van Word at her house in Belgrave Square, many women wore this ancient and picturesque form of footgear. West Encl iashionables and the smart set adopt this mode, of course, not for any motives of comfort or hygiene, but simply and solely because it enables them to display to an admiring world that their ioenails are dyed to match their fingertails. There has long been a cult of sandal-wearing in London, however, imongst certain highbrows and cranks, and Mr. G. B. Shaw was once a strong supporter of the movement. For some reason or other many of its masculine adherents are ardent vegetarians. So, ior the nonce, extremes meet, and people lite G.B.S.' have the dubious satisfaction of finding themselves in the smart' sit. BEATEN TO A FRAZZLE. The up-to-date fashionable dame has Damo Nature beaten to a frazzle every lime. Since the sun-basking epidemic f et the social seal on tanned skins, many ""omen have incurred much agony in first getting thoroughly sunburned, limbs, back, and all, and then great expense in having themselves bleached n 'Mte again. All this is now a thing of 'he barbaric past. West End beauty specialists are selling stuff, for application to the face, that takes a tan powder °n a soothing ointment foundation. This makes the user look most convincingly sunburnt, and washes off in a moment. '°f the legs, arms and back, a tan p namel that is equally amenable to 'Ponging is sold. So now everything in 'he deckchair is lovely. Ladies who are as sun-tanned as Gipsies all day can ''irn out for dinner as white as the fair wvvena herself.. And the sun-tan actu- % acts as a sun shield. THAT SLINKY LOOK. Sophisticated "slinky" lines will, I am ° u d, be a feature of the autumn dress parade, in contrast to the billowy ouffant silhouettes seen at Ascot and Oodwood. It looks, too, as though banting" will go out of fashion for a because it is decreed that a woman Day again admit the possession of a including a defined waist "t it i s ri ot expected that the ? a will catch on. Day-time skirts pnerally are somewhat shorter this ®fason, following the lead given several »mes recently by the Queen, the Duchess °» York, and the Princess Royal. There ar efe\v trimmed frocks to be seen in the e arly private collections of models. Most ™ them are fashioned plainly to show off e curves of the figure, and there is ( en a certain Directoire suggestion ' b °ut some of them. One amusing novelty, by the way, is the travelling 'oat of rough tweed, which fastens with 'toy logs of wood instead of the usual r ound buttons.