Gaiety Or Dignity Achieved

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 208, 3 September 1938, Page 5 (Supplement)

Gaiety Or Dignity Achieved

Fashion Notes

GAIETY or dignity are happily achieved by the Paris dressmakers in their new spring clothes. Pale-coloured suits or coats are brightened by printed blouses, or shown on printed frocks. Revers which often permit the collar to close at the very throat are then cut out to suggest a guimpe of printed fabric. Unusual use is made of printed silk for dresses this season. These materials are chosen in different shades of the same design, as many as three varied colourings being used for a single ensemble of coat and diess. The majority of these printed frocks have fullness set in the front of the skirt, and short sleeves, while the coats which are worn over them are full length, and fasten across the front of the waist only with a buckle. Besides floral prints Paris this season uses a large quantity of spotted silks and these also are used with foundations of varied colours. The new day-time ensembles, dresses and suits are above all wearable. Plenty of colour is used, necklines are high, skirts cut with easy grace, sleeves full or tight-fitting, and with slitsr which are left open, or filled in with another colour material. There are coats of various lengths, and interest is often set at the back of the shoulders in the form of insets of intricate shape. Loose swagger coats of light colours are worn on dark dresses. A pink coat is offset, for example, by a belt on a black dress fastening beneath a mass of gay pink and crimson flower*. Gay Dress Season We are facing a gay dress summer. And certain large Paris hotels are following the lead of London, and are not admitting women .who are not in evening dress for dinner. It might be somewhat difficult to determine what is and what iB not now evening dress, since the Paris couture houses have gone off individually on their own in the creation of their new models. Some have chosen long-skirted and train tailor-mades with long slooveg, little coats and veritable "Gibson Girl" hate. Others are exploiting the shirt-waist dress in glorified metal cloth as an evening venture. While still a third group comes out with "Don't dress for dinner" and illustrates it by a cut-out neck and very little sleeve above a day-length skirt. All of which leads a woman to assure that she will very probably be allowed in anywhere, provided the fabric of her chosen model gleams and glitters, or the "lid" which she believes to be a hat, truthfully can be termed "miniscule." A Hard Fight Dressmakers are fighting to kill the long skirt. There are more inches of stocking visible in Paris just now than have been the case since 1028, when the knee-length skirt vanished. Manj of the

oned lengths and in practical glazed chintzes and crepes. They have uneven hemlines and sweeping circular backs, which are the latest among the ■'shorts," and are very smart in linens, and chintzes and taffetas. Both linen and taffeta now arc made with effective printings—the linen in multi-coloured stamped patterns of heraldic inspiration, and the taffeta as faconne, and very rich in design. Hats—Formal and Informal The Paris milliners this season are stressing the difference betw'een formal and informal millinery. The chic and sophisticated little toques of black or coloured grosgrain ribbon or straw are being trimmed with flowers and veils for the afternoon, providing a soft contrast to the youthful shapes for walking and sporty wear. Crowns of grosgrain and straw are treated in new ways, and novelty is centred here rather than in brims, which are

By--A Paris Exper

always studied with a view to framing the face successfully. Very flat, straight brims, often quite wide and always with shallow crowns, are a strong feature. Violet straw is being used quite considerably in some of the smartest hats. It is often seen trimmed in pale pastel flowers with a veiling in some delicate pastel colouring. China has inspired some of the models now being worn by the younger set. One seen at the Longchamps racecourse, and in black picot straw, was. trimmed with two pompoms of lime-green adorning the slightly conical straw. A youthful model in straw boasts a wide brim turned up all round the head to a height which conceals the crown from view. In direct contrast is another

I Above: An evening suit designed by Molyneux is made of coarse black linen embroidered &ilh gold. It is o>orn ipith a gold lame headdret*.

model for summer wear, with the fine edge of its broad brim turned sharply down to the depth of half an inch. Among the high-crown models, there are those with a slightly indented crown and a narrow brim slightly rolled up on each side. A billowy bunch of ostrich feather tips is often added as the only trimming. ♦ * ♦ ♦ Paris Snapshots JjACE is everywhere tailored into suits and used for entire dresses. * • • • TRANSPARENT dresses in black chiffon are seen worn over flesh-pink foundations, and with long pink gloves and pink shoes. • • • • J3LAIN white tailor-mades look striking with black lace blouses. * • • • gLEEP is a beauty restorer. Fatigue is a destroyer.