TOPICS FOR WOMEN

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 146, 23 June 1938, Page 19

TOPICS FOR WOMEN

SOME NEW NOTIONS THE FLORA OF FASHION

The flowers that bloom in the spring may be recaptured to blossom on our gayest winter styles. Flowers are the fashion, real and unreal, and -if you're smart you will wear beautiful blooms in the most unexpected places. Just pick your favourites and wear masses of them. Set them with a lavish hand on simple dresses. Remember how they glow when foiled against navy, black, or other dark colours, how lovely they look on pastel satins or billowing sheers. , So suit

on to the part that will come just above your forehead.

All the flowery gestures of fashion are so ravishing that if they grow any lovelier some progressive spirit with economy in mind will use her evening head-dress, shoes, or gown in lieu of

FLOWERS AT YOUR FEET. But fashion is flowering where other accessories are concerned, too. In the evening you may actually have at your feet in sandals which have either daffodils, poppies, lilies-of-the-valley, or a brilliant orange marigold posed at the toe so that every time you move they peep from beneath the swirling bouffant skirts. Then there

flowers for the drawing-room between wearings! Flowers by day and night, for gaiety, above all, for chic—that is why fashion says it with flowers.—M.R.

your whims and pick some flowers to a wear with your dwn whimsy, and a c fashion-conscience need be your only li guide. • Flowers flourish on hats, on dresses, fl on house-coats. You will note them e on veils, on gloves, on powder com- b pacts.' You may even espy them spill- \ ing out of, evening bags, peeping from a beneath swirling skirts on the tips, of r dancjjng toes. Flowers are attached t to ribbon dog collars, flowers are- s tucked in blouses or trailed down the l dress. Flowers, feathers, and ribbons f are concocted,into headdresses: to pose on the top of the head. : . ... And since there is shortly'to be an - occasion when you simply must be t decked with flowers in some enchant- i ing way or another, what better time t than the present to elaborate on some j of these decors so that for the Plunket ~ Society's Ball, "Carnival of Flowers ( you will know of so many different ( ways that the /mly problem will be 1 which schemeAo choose. The object is,.of course, to think of the most in- , genious manner in which this floral £ adornment may be applied. j FLOWERY GESTURES. 1 A slimly-tailored' frock can be livened brilliantly with the addition | of flowery bouquet. You could tuck • enormous carnations inside a high ' square neckline. With a low neck you might drop a lei over the shoulders. Through the belt of your dress try sliding the stems of. a bunch of lilies-of-the-valley. Flowers smart alone are twice as smart doubled so dare them on both lapels of your tailored evening jacket or on each shoulder of your frock. Fill pockets with them and lace them into bunchy chokers about your throat and wrists. Little jewelled flowers make attractive necklets and bracelets and tiny sparkling blossoms look effective piercing the ears. Headdresses have the popular acceptance of fashion's flora. The most exotic (and expensive) fresh flowers look unattractive just arranged without any other supporting blossoms. Two orchids, for instance, are most effective when placed in the hair with some petals thrust through an upswept curl to rest, on the brow. The more usual types of fresh flowers or artificial blooms are massed to make devices for the hair. Mixtures of kinds and colours are clumped into diadems with misty veiling surmounted over all. One very individual concoction, mainly composed of a halo of yellow jonquils and feathery fern, was poised on a sari of green chiffon that fell over the head and shoulders and matched the decollete gown which had a tiny cluster of the jonquils as a further colourful accent at the waist. . The newest way to wear roses is in a long garland falling from the tip-top of the head down over the ear on one side to the shoulder. In this way the blooms show to greater advantage and at the same time add to the contour of the throat of the wearer. Why don't you pin luscious mauve hibiscus (or the nearest flower you can get to it) in your curls as if inspired by Gauguin and the lovely, Tahitian ladies in his South Sea paintings.

EASTBOURNE PARTY I A delightful afternoon party was held recently at the residence of Mrs. C. Girdlestone (president of the Eastbourne Plunket Society), the'occasion being the presentation of a handsome gift to Mrs. E. W. Wise, an ex-presi-dent. Both Mrs. E. W. Wise and Mrs. Dudley Hoggard (ex-treasurer) were the recipients of charming posies. Mrs. Girdlestone made the presentation. Bowls of luculia and roses were charmingly arranged in the drawingroom, and a dainty afternoon tea was served. A competition was won by Mrs. Gordon Berry, and the singing of Mrs. F. Collins gave much pleasure.

/ Chiffon scarves wound bandanna fashion about the head often have a posy of flowers fastened to them and a matching square of chiffon at the wrist frames some more of the blossoms. The peasant headkerchiefs that you wear to and from the dance look very demure when made of pastel chiffon with a little spray of flowers stitchec

are other dainty slippers entirely covered with little flower petals of — love-in-thfrmist, violets, or carnations. | As well as the romantic fantasy of flowered, toes, gloves may also bo elevated to floral favourites. Embroider your gloves with flowers in vivid hues on the index finger and in a narrow band along the side seam I running upward from the wrist. For those who would carry a fan, a novel I suggestion" 'is to have one made entire- III 1 ly'of fresh flowers or of feathers and flowers together. EMBROIDERIES IX BLOOM. v i The famous designer Schiaperelli takes inspiration from field and forest for, her most;recent youthful collection, flower colours, twining branches of leaves about the waist, coat and wrap fasteners'of tiny sheaves of wheat or of gold leaves with icy enamel insects on them being, high-lighted evening trends. In fact, leaves and flowers are a big motif of the whole collection, being seen in embroideries and jewellery, also in head-dresses and in cut-outs on handbags. One of her satin evening boleros, half-yellow and half-pink, is embroidered all over with apple blossoms, and some printed gowns shqw.flne patterns of leaves, flowers, and wild strawberries. Many of these treatments of rich embroidery take on new forms with flat silken stitches, also glittery synthetic materials, sometimes semi-de-tached leaves and flowers on branches, outlining the bust and crossing around the waist. There are also flower appliques, such as big clusters of.wistaria on the corsage of a vivid pink crepe dress, or green taffeta petals composing a capelet over a white crepe gown with which a fan of huge green leaves is carried.

This designer drapes graceful curves in the white satin of one evening | gown and catches them together at the knees with a bunch of pink roses, . leaves, stems, and all, in the manner of [ 1912. One of her siren dinner frocks takes colourful tulips to its heart, . literally. Lilacs in sentimental shades flourish on a dark dinner ensemble, i and a strapless primrose coloured gown i is designed to be worn with a lei of i heavenly blue cornflowers massed to- , gether. i A gigantic spray of multi-coloured • felt flowers wtih shining beaded tendrils dramatises the line of an asym- . metrical evening sheath. Vivid but [ melting shades of rose red, green, blue, 1 and violet are appliqued on the cloud i blue material. BODICES AFLOWER. The idea of flower bedecked bodices is well-liked by designers, who work it in printed chiffon or. crepe dresses, , for example, the low decolletage marked by massed appliques of the k print, cut-out sections with embroidered edges flying free and giving a very full and frothy outline. This same idea is also expressed in dresses of chiffon in solid colours, with flower-like motifs appliqued on in similar fashion. Fancy bodices always top full skirts, a That stark and unadorned look and fit a of bodices fashioned with the precia sion of a brassiere or bodice lining it gives way to frank use of trimming, s. and, most especially, flowers, hence u the term "flower box" or "garden dey colletage" is applied to the bodice n fronts covered almost entirely with id flowerg.

Among the guests were Mesdames Pearce, D. Hogg, W. Hogg, Isaacs, Burch, Clifton, Kent, Haughton, Jervis, Northe, Jones, Heenan, Moore, Shearer, Dick, Berry, Mather, Bishop, McCallum, Hurst-Barton, Phillips, ,Cass, Barham, Brady, Cogdale, Palmer, and Miss Isaacs.