New Hats Are Spiced Up Wit And Surprise The Feature

Manawatu Times, Volume 63, Issue 87, 13 April 1938, Page 14

New Hats Are Spiced Up Wit And Surprise The Feature

'J'HERE are many reasons for going south in the early weeks of the new year (says a New York fashion writer), and one of them is hats. The fun of buying them! This season the argument is particularly potent, for millinery is now deliciously witty. Frocks are feminine, ornaments sophisticated, accessories elegant, then, into these discreet ensembles hats inject the spice of drollery.

Wit has been defined as the unexpected association of incongruities. Millinery which presents’ ch n straps and pull cords; which encases long bobs in snoods; which places on heads shapes like high bowls, open-edg; up; which crowns very human girls in halos and sends Salvation Army bonnets to parties, is playing pranks. But how consummately it is all done ! With grace, propriety, chic.

For the High Coiffure.

Some of the new silhouettes are designed for the high co'ffuro. Lilly Dache has done one which reveals the entire le £ t profile and half the head, the hair being arranged in coils and ringlets swept up and forward. Universal acceptance at this time of the high arrangement is, hov/ever, by no means predicated, for the majority of models are posed on heads whose tresses descend into the i - There is no doubt about the continued trend of the off-the-fa e movement, and it is being taken up by matrons as well as girls. Even bretons and berets, coned toques and shakos are plac, d back on the head and are tip-tilted also. Hats with bowl brims, however, are usually placed in the normal position even when tilted. One of our illustrations shows a new pose for a modified pillbox, which is made to zoom forward over the forehead. It is not strange that the great variety of shapes, head sizes and poses is causing considerable criticism among designers, who feel that the matter is getting out of hand and that on this account the season’s models are scarcely dated, being too li versified to be recognised as this year’s crop. Among the new shapes are a Phrygian bonnet, a scoop bonnet, which wears various brims, a square Papal cap, borrowed from Renaissance paintings, calots with definite crowns, that are squared; and old shapes that are transformed by grims with padded rolls, such as pillboxes and tambourins. The stiff sailor

of the 1890’s has returned, tolerating, however, perky bows in front and streamers behind.

Bows, Streamers, Sequins.

The exotic straws —such as panama, baku, ballibuntl—are in evidence and also the sewn braids. A picot braid appears attractively interwoven with grosgrain. Entire toques are made of ribbons. Felt is chosen for some of the smartest models; crepe appears in allover stitched effects, and sheer woollen commends itself for its draping qualities. Bows and streamers and absurdly angular ribbon ornaments (such as that on our new illustrated pillbox) are in the spotlight, as are also fringe and cord tassels. Colour may be introduced by means of striped ribbons in the contrasted colours that are approved, and there is a new rayon jersey ribbon. Biases of grosgrain, velvet and taffeta in such colour combinations as Bor-deaux-red, violet and pale parma, are employed for crown draperies and facings. The übiquitous sequin is used to embroider felt bands (another instance of the unexpected association of incongruities—sequins and sturdy felt). Feather flowers are a favourite trimming and tall quills shoot up diagonally on coned toques. Some milliners prefer to applied ornaments such organic trimming as inverted tucks, modelling shapes by their means.