FLOWERS ADD CHARM

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXVI, Issue 147, 6 June 1936, Page 12

FLOWERS ADD CHARM

Artificial Bouquets for Evening Wear The demand for artificial flowers fox evening wear has prompted the importation of some really beautiful examples of the handicraft from France and other countries. The flower-wearing vogue has attained unprecedented popularity this winter, and no wonder, for a really attractive corsage posy or spray can add the touch which turns a moderately priced evening gown into an expensive Parisian model. The new artificial flowers give tho lie to the saying that one cannot improve on Nature. Skilful fingers, lovely fabrics, and dyes which impart an infinite range of shades have combined tu produce roses just as realistic as any rose, and chrysanthemums larger and more delicate than any that ever bloomed in Japan. Indeed, most of tuu imported artificial flowers for this season are very large, almost fantastically so. A single rose will equal in size a whole bunch of genuine ones. When they are correctly worn this does not prove a detriment, but an enhancement to the simple beauty of a good evening gown. There have always been devotees oi flower-wearing, but most of them have chosen only real flowers. They Dougut, for instance, a pair of exquisitely tinted orchids, or a few white camellias, which were quite expensive, and wilted before the dance was over. For .this reason, artificial flowers have several obvious advantages. Firstly, it is possible to choose them of any v *ize and any shape. Secondly, in winter you can wear artificial lilies and other such flowers that really only bloom in spring or summer. You defeat the seasons and take your choice.

Thirdly, the shades of tho artificial flowers are so varied and so delicate that they will match any frock. “Changeable” velvet has been largely used in their construction, and imparts a soft sheen, “shot” with three or four colours. There are royal blue ■velvet chrysanthemums tinged with wine-red, flame, and gold. There are bottle-green velvet chrysanthemums tinted with mushroom pink and old gold. If your evening gown happens to be orange, for instance, there is no need to despair because gardens have never produced black or brown flowers. You can buy au artificial tiger-lily of black and orange velvet, cr pernaps a spray of brown-tinted roses. Were wo left to the tender mercies of real flowers and their colour schemes, we should have to choose our evening frocks with a strict regard to shade. As it is, we can buy a green, or a brown, or a navy blue gown, and know that somewhere there are artificial flowers to tone with it.

And, since they are not wired, artificial flowers are also much more pliable than the real, and can be modified tor different types of wear. For instance, a spray of velvet roses can bo worn as a corsage posy at one dance, and at the next it can be turned into an armlet, or perhaps twisted into the hair. The wearer can suit the wearing to her persona! -.ppearance, and to her coiffure. With a frock of pale blue fabric, for instance, she can pin a tiny trail of gold or silver lame roses in her hair. Or, if she prefers striking colour-con-trasts, she can don an emerald green camellia with a rust-red gown. Softlytinted red roses look well with any of the paler shades. Other flowers can bo obtained in pink, cyclamen, mauve, yellow, and sunset tunings, brown, vieux-rose, apricot, and natural colours.