IN FASHION’S REALM

Otago Witness, Issue 3513, 12 July 1921, Page 49

IN FASHION’S REALM

WEEKLY UP-TO-DATE DRESS NOTES

By

MARGTRRNB.

’Ware spring, if wliat comes across the Pacific is true. If the importation is going to rule, then we shall see an end to women, unless in uniform or elderly. All, yes, a'l will bo girls, and small girs to girls suggestive of the tom-boy age, of the swing and the skipping-rope, -not to mention rounders. It is all through following “my leader” in Paris a little too closely. Skirts, in a word, have been ordered to their knees, and, contrite and humble, they have obeyed. All Paris having worn them, all .America is wearing them, and for all I know to the contrary all England may be doing so—skirts to the knee, just such and nothing more, spring skirts, skirts for the up-to-date and skirts, incidentally, that are the subject of sermons, leading articles, and endless controversy and chit chat. That the skirt so short locks well enough on a very slender or unformed figure is only natural ; but that it looks anything hut grotesque and vulgar on (hose who are- not of this order is absolutely certain. Assuredly there may be and should be a reaction. To speak truly, the designers will always carry anything good to extremes—that- is, before they have done with it. Look at the collars that, are going, meaning that are being worn. Tho large collar being so becoming, presto! it becomes large and larger still, till it is so large one wonders how it oan bo accounted a collar at all. As in tho picture, for jn spite of its na-turo what you see is a collar in effect. Is it pretty?

1 Well, some say yes, and some, again, no; but, of course, everything depends on the way it is made. The mere suggestion of a

shoulder in the shaping atones for much. Opportunity providing, I have sketched one of the little hats in. vogue—a. simple winter ■type, with a plume for its decorative feature * Observe the buttons, for, observing them myself, I am reminded that buttons of the same material as tho dress are mostly the vogue, especially for the tailor-made. We are bound to have a very dressy winter, if only because of the enormous stocks with the drapers. They have got to go, and that is all that there is to it, even if it means cutting and cutting again, which is just what is being done- —or, at least, it so appears to me. But as soon as present stocks are exhausted it will resolve itself into a question of cost. Assuredly goods will not be made to give away, and so, if they are being sold under cost just now, it is clear enough that it is not going to last. Yo-u see, without intending it, the designers have got down to something like a standardisation, even with variety. Take the suit in the illustration. It is one of many in a certain category, which, being declared “the thing,” will take a lot strip. Women, in short, have been directed to dress on common-sense lines—coat and skirt, one piece, etc., etc., and having e.njoyed

this experience, will not be persuaded to set it aside. The decorative additions to what you see are' a concession to '‘femininity”—just that and nothing less. They vary i,n thousands of selections, and in accordance with the bent of mind of those responsible for the work, but remove them and what remains unless a kind of stan dardised design which, being such, is practically as much in season one t-uue as an ot her. Apart from the fact that the furriers of the old world are such clever fellows, they can turn hare into "fox." kid into “lamb,” wood chuck into "mink,'’ fitch into “sable,” nutria (the eoypu rat) into "otter,” opossum into "beaver,” and rabbit into “musquash”—apart, 1 say, from the fac-t. that they can do so much, whether they do do it or not, there is the difference in value, and it is not established wholly by rarity, which may account for comparatively little. Thus the hair of the animal, which goes bv the name of fur just because it is best described in this way, is built up of what they call structural units. There is the medulla or pith, which i.s composed of cells, the cortex, which surrounds this, and is composed of cells again, the pigment granules, the cuticle or outer covering, and certain colourless scales which may overlap one another like those of a fish. I may remark that the fur hair, when placed under the microscope, differs with every animal.

Yel there are many furs that are quite beyond the ordinary purse, and bo, if it is