A BED OF ROSES

Evening Post, Volume CXXVIII, Issue 5, 6 July 1939, Page 19

A BED OF ROSES

WHY NOT FLOWERED SHEETS

It is' some years" now since women asked themselves why. all sheets need necessarily be of white material, states the "Manchester Guardian." Sheets in pastel shades and in fresh pinks, blues, and yellows are familiar and fairly popular. Their only defect in use seems to be their tendency to fade in the wash till they are too nearly an off-white or too unmistakably a dingy white to please, and this is especially the case when they are made of cotton or. of material having'an admixture of cotton. Boiling is apt to detract from their inviting freshness, and in bed-linen freshness .is all.

• But' why, ■ somebody has now asked, need sheets be plain, whether their plainness be white or coloured? Why should they not have a gay flowered or sprigged pattern on a white ground? Why not, indeed? The novelty may not be to all tastes, but there is no denying the charm of certain new sets of bed-linen—pillow-cases and all— which are being displayed in a few shops here and there in London. They are dazzlingly white as to background, and the small flowers or posies disposed upon the white make them as inviting as a sward covered with daisies and buttercups. It would perhaps help one through the winter months to lie down and to wake up in a bed of flowers, especially if the petals are guaranteed to be of fast colours. Even if they were to fade a little with time we could put up with this so long as the whiteness remained white. Particularly for the divan bed destined to be used in a girl's bed-sitting-room, or for nursery beds, the notion seems to commend itself. At present the flowered sheet, offered also in silk, is somewhat costly, but before long the manufacturers may well be offering them in cotton and in linen at prices comparable with those we are used to paying for the plain variety*