MODERN DRESS PROBLEM.

New Zealand Herald, Volume L, Issue 15234, 22 February 1913, Page 6 (Supplement)

MODERN DRESS PROBLEM.

HOW FASHTON3 REDUCE CLOTHING. A new problem confronts the dress manufacturers and retailers who are now anxiously awaiting details of fashion's programme for 1913. No longer are they wondering, as in other years, what women are going to wear next. What they now want to know is, what will women cease to wear in the coming season The situation from the point of view of the powerful tsade interests which v ars behind the changing fashions in dres.«, is a very serious one, and the "tendency to go unclothed," as one of the leading journals of the dress trade describes this new and curious development on the part ci women, is forcing itself on the attention of the multifarious firms who supply tho dress needs of women. On recent occasions when the voice -A the Church has been raised against the fashions of the day it has not been the extravagance and ostentation of dress thai has been censured, but the hick of cloth.iit;, the skimpy skirt, the | decollete walking gown which exposes the neck and chest, the bared aim and. the open-work stocking. Steady Elimination. The record of fashion for the last five year?,, in fact, has Nae.. Mttle more than a procsHs of steady elimination. Beginning with the vogue of the Directoire gown in 1908, or:-.> sjwjiisnt after another lias been shed by tht followers of fashion, and none ] have token their place. Among a few of ib> irrir':?, of fe, iinine attire found in e ■"*' r.,*j.-droh« which have been conci.p- ■ - .'' ".'ivio'ls of more or l>ss complete ''. » luring the last fe?) seasons haw . the following : —Petticoats, bloui '.alts, hat tsinyninjjs, veilings, dress it:'lags, high collars and neck supports. Petticoats were not re quiiec'. racier Itbegl" •'.Ming' ''Directoire" 'roj;n. Beit,v, \",r~ .} \„ -mt of action owing v) the inte>-jfiu.'-t n i the c-OraeleJ- skii;-. T'. * nop. id •oi c-.i,. -ess B3ck» Hfi*-."ia collar supports a jC'.-7g la tli.^' markst aad the blotse trade jsuuered 6eve»«'y .i the '.xiptflarfry of i the one-p«>»:' ?;vv 2'ho dis?u,trous e feet 3 of-the hoi it« tjrii..., wi?: ;..',> re<iv.ccd the demand !■:■* H.r*K2. materials by something like 50 per cent., have, been gravely discussed by financiers at the annual meetings of the textile companies. Evea court gown of 1912 had its train pruned, thereby effecting a lurther economy in velvet and brocade. Vanished lihiings. The gradual disappearance of dress linings is another instance of the reduciag process which i;as been going on. The linjivigs have been viraoved in sections first fro,3? t;ie back and sides of the skirt, then hem the front pan?l and the bodice, and finally from the sleeves, until at hat the i7ii'lined dress has taken the fieM. The hatless vogue .had few adherent, but. the milliners have by no means entirely ec-aped the prevailing trer i. Trimmings lof the simplest character appears on the hats of the present season, and in the summer of last year, it will be recalled, a sudden boom in velours hats lined with tagel and destitute of adornment save for a narferow hat band brought idleness to the workrooms of the milliners. The cue?.Mori of I tho moment is, Has the limit of reduction beep,'reached?;-. An authoritative answer will bo Bought in, the spring fashions, the first : arrivals of whisk will be due very shortly.