LONDON FASHIONS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVI, Issue 17110, 15 March 1919, Page 4 (Supplement)

LONDON FASHIONS.

Our London correspondent writes: — There is quite a craze this season for matching. Not only are hats, jumpers, sunshades and bags matched, the craze has even extended to deck chairs and cushions. As a holiday fad it is quite excusable, and\adds not a little to the picturesque appearance of a seashore or cool country garden. A favourite scheme is arranged in stripes, any becoming gay colour and white. For example, rose and white striped batiste was requisitioned for a simple jumper blouse and large shady hat, the colour repeated in canvas for the deck chair, and in linen for the cushions. The sunshade was white, lined with the ! striped batiste, so that when open the | stripe effect was emphasised in a very effective manner. ! To complete the attire a box-pleated white pique skirt was worn, with white stockings and buckskin shoes. i Other notably good results are achieved with rather more sombre expressions, such | as maize striped with black, or putty with purplo, or again a chess-board check scheme will be carried through with much success. The Sea-side Hat. Alfays at th sea special attention has to be paid to millinery that will not fade, a fact that places some charming white lawn hats very high up in the list of available fancies. (i The shapes range from a soft "beret tarn, contrived with a mitred crown terminating at the top in a fussy thread pom-pom, via a pull-on shape with adjustable stitched brim, a shape after _ the style of a Panama, to sailors of various sizes and character. One effective model had a high crown covered with white lawn, very finely gauged, a flat pump bow of the lawn, for all the world like a man's dress tie, marking centre front, while lower down came a wreath of detached marguerites stitched flat, half on the crown, and half on the brim. Applique purple iris formed the trimming of a tussore hat arranged to accompany a biscuit and purple striped tussore jumper, the latter a particularly smart little model, with the stripes cunningly introduced into the scheme in the guise of three-corner pockets, cuffs and collar and little gussets either side the hem of the basque to allow for the requisite fulness. ■ Fashions for Older Women. As usual women past their first youth are being somewhat neglected by La Mode. Indeed, seldom, if ever, have fashions been less well suited to middle age, and yet, after all, it is more a matter of adaptation than anything else. Take even one of the simple "little girl" dresses, for example, 'and in place of some diaphanous fabric substitute a more stately silk, heavier make of voile or cashmere, and half the battle is won, the rest the victory being achieved by building up the ; open heck, square, V, or round as the case may be, with a well-cut, detachable guimpe, ;• Older , women almost invariably find a dark."colour more becoming than one of the paler ,or neutral shades, but dark colours ; and black are so much worn by everyone, nowadays, that this cannot be looked upon as a hardship, more especially with, such a fine range of navy, corbean,. and Japan, blues, nigger brown, and greys tochMßeVfrpm.as are now to be Had. . • '-.'. ~..

,1 ' Voile arid Navy Suiting. Here is a new idea. The coat to a navy surge tailor-made suit we eawy-quite a plron little model—was lined with a pale '.Mae'patterned voile, that turned over at the neck in a not very large, but very telling, collar and fashioned cuffs to the sleeve. . Then the skirt was slit ap either side to form a panel effect, the divided sections' just revealing a glimpse of the same blue-patterned cotton voile. Someone suggested that the seams of the skirt had come undone and the lingerie petticoat was shawing at the sides. This was rather what it suggested there, but we liked the idea of it as a lining to the coat, i Wool Embroideries. On crepe de chine and charmeuse blouses startlingly good results are being achieved with wool embroideries. Prom a coarse darning stitch, applied in rows or squares, : to 'motifs. worked in artistically-mingled colours, this wool embroidery can do no wrong. ' ' A navy blue charmeuse blouse was very effectively embroidered with Indian red wool, to represent a (able neckchain completed by a square plaque. The neck was left hard and square, and the entrance was at the back. But that was not all. The sleeves were of putty-coloured charmeuse—please note the contrast— fulness just above the j elbow and again at the wrists, regulated by more of the red wool stitchery.

President Wilson has evidently been reading about New Zealand women lifting the world into higher ideals by means of Golden Rule soap, Golden Rule candles, Golden Rule school rulers, Golden Rule writing tablets, Golden Rule envelopes, " The Thinker's" pictorial notebooks, etc