NO "DRESSING UP"

Evening Star, Issue 23723, 2 November 1940, Page 16

NO "DRESSING UP"

LONDON WOMEN DISCARD HATS “ Hats have been almost entirely discarded in London, where the wartime trend is for plain tailored clothes devoid of superfluous detail,” said Miss H. Metcalf, when interviewed by the ‘ Morning Herald l ’ on her return to Sydney, after three years in London as buyer of winter fashions. Evening clothes were also severely practical, she said , a ltd the greatest concession to “ dressing up ” was the donning of a short dinner frock for restaurant wear. In the daytime those women who arc not in uniform arc unanimous in choosing sensible trousers or skirts with shirt blouses, and Miss Metcalf predicted that coats for next winter would be short, plain, and cut on slim linos. “ Tweed and camelhair arc the favourite coat materials,” she said, “ and they are shorn of all but the barest minimum of trimming. Long-haired l furs arc increasingly difficult to obtain, and Astrakhan and Persian lamb are used instead.” The rapid improvement in home industries is especially noticeable in silks, which are being designed and printed in English factories, she added. STOCKINGS WILL BE GAUDY. Brilliantly-coloured stockings are promised for the autumn. They are to bo in Chinese green, London tan. and ripe corn. This is a repetition of the gay stocking fashion of the last war, which produced the famous Tango red.

New Zealand sheep farmers will he interested to know that the stockings are to be of wool in a lacy, openwork pattern that is a revival of the Edwardian fashion. Worn, with the new many-coloured tweeds, stockings will match one of the colours in the suit, and tone with scarf, gloves, and handbag. AN ENGLISH VILLAGE IN WARTIME TRAVEL CLUB'S INTERESTING VISITOR At the Travel Club’s morning tea reception in the Savoy on Wednesday morning Mr AV. R. Brugh was in the chair, and welcomed as the speaker for the morning Mrs lltyd Clayton, recently arrived with her children, to be in Dunedin for the duration of the war. I There was a large attendance of meinJ bers; the hostesses were Mrs H. L. '■ Dolamore and Mrs G. C. May; Mrs Richard Hudson (chairwoman of the Entertainment Committee) welcomed Airs Johnston and Mrs Cuddie, visitors from Christchurch. The (lowers in the i Tudor Hall were very lovely, each of j tho tables being arranged with a tall ' vase of golden irin, while masses of lavender and white lilac gave a dainty perfume to the whole room. Airs Clayton gavo a most interesting picture of tho changed life in an ordinary village in England under war time conditions. The particular village, which is, of course, typical of hundreds of others, ' was Chipping Campden. in the Cotswolds, where Airs Clayton has her home. As soon as war was declared, she said, au influx of city

dwellers, evacuated children, and troops quite changed the normal life of the little town, gayer fashions were seen, girls in trousers being quite an innovation at that time, and life generally was speeded up for the villagers. In Campden, as in all the Cotswolct villages, every cottage is a gem, and with its grey stone Avails and flint roof, fading into the landscape is perfectly camouflaged, so that from the air the village was comparatively safe, although with planes coming over all the time bombs were often dropped on the nearby fields, making huge craters and keeping A.R.P. workers busy. At once every woman joined in Red Cross work, attending lectures, sewing, helping in the hospitals, and so on. The Women’s Institute did wonderful work, washing and mending for the soldiers, and preserving the largo fruit crops in the district. When some 500 war-weary soldiers arrived from Dunkirk, with stories of their miraculous crossing from France, Campdon felt that it was really in the centre of Avar activities. Mrs Clayton enlivened her talk vvitli interesting anecdotes of the time. One she told Avas of three American tourists, who in happier times had enjoyed the Old World spot and avlio sent £4O for war needs. She concluded with a description of the anti-waste campaign, when everyone responded so freely, giving even their treasured aluminium pans to he turned into Spitfires. England, said Mrs Clayton, Avas in the throes of a social revolution, but it was a revolution founded on a spirit of mutual friendliness. The morning concluded with tAvo songs by Mr J. Leech, Avhieh were heartily applauded, 1