Winter Hats Softer And More Feminine

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28489, 20 January 1958, Page 2

Winter Hats Softer And More Feminine

[By

MURIEL PENN]

LONDON. Hats for. the winter are small, head-hugging and feminine. Many of them are really pretty. Gone are the hard “buckets” of the past year, and, except for a few models for very formal occasions, the enormous cart 'heel* with shallow brim and practically no way of keeping it on the head in defiance of the law of gravity.

This season’s hats are soft and draped, off the face but, more often than not, hair-hiding. Possibly because of the scarcity of rabbit fur, stiff felts have given way to soft jerseys, crocheted chenille, satin, tweed and, above all, velvet, fur, and feathers.

There is something particularly feminine in the light, airy effect of feathers on the head, whether osprey or the more humble pheasant, cock or London pigeon, while mink or ermine invariably spell luxury with a capital “L.” Feathers All the London milliners are showing models trimmed with feathers, and sometirfles made of feathers, in their winter collections.

Madame Simone Mirman who makes hats for Princess Margaret and the Duchess of Kent and is the only milliner allowed to sell hats designed by the late Christian Dior in Britain, makes wide use of both feathers and mink in her current collection.

Among the more striking feather models shown by Madame Mirman is an open crown fez made of white cock feathers flecked with dark green feathers forming three rows of almost regular squares. Or there is a black velvet tambourine, this year’s version of the pillbox, trimmed all round with pendant peacock feathers. Pigeon feathers are used by Kate Hamilton to trim a white melusine beret.

Natural cock feathers are used by Edward Harvane for a headhugging helmet complete with “ear-hiding” flaps, with a soft “spikey” effect, while red feathers cover the red velvet brim of one of the only three large hats in his collection. Mink Supreme Mink emerged, alongside feathers, as number one trimming for the winter’s hats as long ago as last June when the Associated Millinery Designers of London showed one of the first collections y

of model hats for the autumn and winter season. It has reigned Supreme ever since. One of the more original models almost entirely of mink appears in the collection of Jenny Fischer. Madame Fischer uses 28 mink tails mounted on a coral red brim to make a becoming cap reminiscent of a sea urchin. More fantastic, and be it admitted, less wearable, is a Victorian bonnet of white fox mounted on black velvet and tied primly under the chin. Edward Harvane. too. combines white fox and black velvet. A high, pointed, jester cap of black velvet is ringed with white fox fur. Both he and Madame Mirman also make use of the less feminine Persian lamb. Mr Harvane uses it in black .in combination with red velvet, for example, for a formal-type beret. Madame Mirman makes a fez of grey Astrakhan and trims a white velvet cone with black Persian lamb Among her many models featuring mink or mink trims is a tambourine made entirely of mink heads featuring glittering red bead eyes. Colours Used

Predominant colours in all the millinery collections 'are: black, teamed with white or red, white and red followed by brownish shades of green, grey-blues and neutral tones from autumn gold to caf6 au lait brown. To these, Mr Harvane adds a brilliant parma velvet, Miss Hamilton a chartreuse green with coffee velvet trimming, and Madame Fischer, turquoise* Madame Mirman carries her creations right into the colour chart with Lebanese blue, Tangier topaz, - Libyan green, Syrian brown, Beirut grey and desert white.