FASHIONS RETURN TO 1927

Press, Volume XCIII, Issue 27987, 6 June 1956, Page 2

FASHIONS RETURN TO 1927

With

New Hats

DESIGNERS KEEP WAIST LINE HIGH LONDON. Sometimes there is a phase in the history of fashion when clothes are outstanding for their total lack of beauty. It is as if dress and hat designers feel suddenly such a savage frustration that all they can do is to ta'ke it out of womenkind generally. W’ith this end in view they decide to invent fashions which hide any natural, feminine charm. Consult the 1927 fashion books and examine the chemise dresses and cloche hats that were popular. You will find the whole story starting again in the 1956 magazines, writes Victoria Chappelle, international fashion writer and formerly a fashion editor of the “Daily Mail” in London and Paris. It has begun, as always, with the new hats. These can be described variously as a species of mushroom, a type of inverted flowerpot. and similes of work-baskets worn gravely upside down. . Tlfey are enormous and, in my view, very ugly. They hide the hair and most of the forehead, which means that they depend for their effect upon eye make-up so heavy as to be theatrical. This not only gives the impression of excessively thick eyelashes (backed by a quantity of eyeshadow), but the eye itself must have the effect of being elongated. In addition, such a hat must be won absolutely straight on the head; thslightest tilt is fatal to the effect an merely gives the impression that yc are tired of the whole thing and wis you had not started it. The in teres' ing thing about all this is that in few months you and I will be lookin at our “work-baskets” and ‘flower pots” with admiration and why we wore anything else. Fashion has that effect.

As a logical sequence to the outsize hat, our suits and dresses should lose their curves and indeed some of them have, in the meantime acquiring a suggestion of bulkiness and looseness round the shoulders. But while a woman is always eager to experiment with a new hat and easily finds an excuse for buying one, she thinks a good many times before she changes' her silhouette.

For this reason, many of the ultraloose jackets shown at the London collection early this year are “hanging fire.” There are some in the stores if anyone wants them, but the majority of women are asking instead for clothes which at least let them see some of their curves—although, strictly speaking, the era of excessive •‘curvaceousness” is past, and only film stars bother about it any more. This is where the London dressmakers score. They are more receptive to the feelings of the woman with a moderate purse and the need to look as pretty as she can Camisole-Top Blouses Most suit jackets, although slightly shorter than last year, are fitted almost in the normal manner. Only revers are a little dated and instead you find pretty yokes, perhaps tying in a soft bow, or with some other draping that softens the neckline. Of course, there are suits with boxy jackets but these do not look shapeless by any means. They are skilfully cut to make the hips look narrower if anything. Even the straight coats—and there are dozens of them this year, mostly seven-eighth or three-quarter length —are slim and feminine, with such cunningly chosen colours as rose, primrose and grey, and every shade of blue, from a bright navy to a translucent turquoise. What women will like this year are the camisole top over-blouses shown in many houses in colours to match suits, and cut to fit closely to show an attractive neckline. And still persisting, although it is by no means its first season, is the topper coat—trim and thigh length in a fabric woven to match the suit with which it is worn. The chemise dress—we call it a sheath in its 1956 edition—is definitely accepted and so long as it can be worn with the normal waistline most women are likely to welcome and wear it. In fact, the knitted sheath dress, perfectly straight but drawn in by an elegant belt, is one of the best early summer and holiday garments. In cotton, it is light and cool and comes out of a suitcase as uncreased as when it was put in. By all accounts, the waistline is not going to repeat its 1927 performance yet. Instead, it is going steadily higher. So long as a woman is at least fairly slim, it is an uncommonly becoming style. It makes hqf figure look more delicate and hei legs appear longer. But it also needs a carefully chosen foundation garment, and any woman who is tempted

by this high-waisted line should begin there.

One of the best ways of suggesting this new line is by adding a very short bolero to a dress cut on princess lines. This, in effect, enables you to change your silhouette immediately' you take off your jacket. If the jacket is buttoned down the back, so much the better for your appearance. This is the newest idea, although you will have to be something of a contortionist to get in and out of it.

Do not get the idea that your favourite pleats are out of date; on the contrary—because I imagine, women have put up a kind of passive resist tance to their disappearance. Besides, now that we can have them in Terylene and wool, or in Terylene alone who is going to give them up? C