Cosmopolitan clientele

Press, Volume CXVI, Issue 34106, 19 March 1976, Page 5

Cosmopolitan clientele

Being- a fashion buyer for just one store for stores throughout New Zealand, Austraor chain is no easy job; Miss Eva Webb buys lia, and Europe.

From her London office, - she has to anticipate the - tastes of women from Dune-: » din to Dusseldorf. Her customers are a cosmopolitan 1 s clientele she meets only I 1 (occasionally. A director of one of the .big British buying agents,! r Dix and Simpson, Ltd, Miss Web is in New Zealand vis- . iting stores on whose behalf 1 she buys the best of British 5 tailoring and fine fabrics. , It is 24 years since she was here last, but she found. Christchurch tastes little! 1 changed. “1 always concen-i r trate on well-tailored clothes! . for Christchurch,*” she says, i But it is tailoring of the ti’7os she buys now; softer, J much less-structured gar- ' |ments. But she is pleased to ’ note that cut is coming back into its own, with longer '(skirts requiring the balance |of a carefully constructed j jacket. | In the 30-odd years she I has been with the company, I Eva Webb has seen many changes on the style scene. Her customers continue to seek the tailoring for which | England is famous, but she ’ finds their requirements harder to meet as the number .of skilled craftsmen diminish. “Young people are not learning the craft, and all the established tailors are getting older now,” she says. “So many of the better firms in Britain are not working at all.” Miss Webb has her problems, too, with New Zealand import licences which are, she says, getting smaller all the time. This gives her? much less scope for buying. Either she must buy sparingly over a range of styling, or concentrate on buying in depth. Before coming to New Zealand for six weeks, Miss Webb spent six weeks in Australia. She is meeting many store staff with whom she has had a long correspondence, and renewing many acquaintances. New Zealanders in the apparel business visit her London office constantly, and 'this helps her keep in touch with developments and tastes here. When she returns home she will begin training her successor, and | she considers her up-to-date knowledge invaluable.

Life-styles and climate do make a difference in clothing tastes. "I always consider the clarity of colour you like here,” she says. “My visit has reminded me of how much brighter the

■.light is here than in Brit- : ain.” Although Miss Webb finds our way of dressing much less formal than in much of Europe, in keeping with a more casual life-style, she ■ believes the well-dressed [woman now looks much the : I same throughout the world. “Unfortunately,” she says, [“they are not often the very I young. But elegance is returning.” About her directorship llMiss Webb is modest, sur- : prised it should be menJtioned. She regards the position as not unusual for a iwoman, “a reward for many years of work for the company.”