Messrs J. Ballantyne and Co.’s Spring Show.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 6943, 17 September 1892, Page 2

Messrs J. Ballantyne and Co.’s Spring Show.

Messrs J, Ballantyne and 00. have got their first lot of spring and summer goods opened out and ready for distribution and consumption. The show windows are all very tastefully dressed wjtb samples of numerous lines in stock, and present a most attractive appearance. The large central window, devoted to ladies* dress stuffs, contains many new fabrics and new patterns of old ones, to be seen in piles inside. The millinery window is full of bats and bonnets, trimmed on the premises with enviable skill, and with materials for these and all kinds of milliners' work. The windows of the men’s department do not vary so much from year to year, or season to season, as the others, the sterner sex being decidedly conservative in their attire, while their sisters are extremest radicals, desiring change for change’s sake, the materials for dress and costume this season contain many real novelties. In the Manchester or cottons department the crepons are quaint stuffs, in which the manufacturers seem to have tried, and with a good deal of success, to imitate the crinkling of loaves (the leltnce or cabbage for instance). In patterns of frizzling, and in various quiet colouring', this is a very taking new materiel. Pongee cottons, in imitation of pougee silks, are wonderfully surfaced. In muslins and sateens there are many new patterns and pretty colourings. '1 be dress and silk department contains, be.-ide standard fabrics of the best quality, many novelties which must go off well. The silk weavers are turning out beautifully glossy and soft goods, and the dyers are no whit behind in playing their part. The woollen fabrics are as surprising in their variety of texture, and it is no wonder ladies are fond of shopping, or that they should spend a long time over it, when they have to select anything in so great a range of choice The woollen weavers soon took the bint from the cotton workers (or was it the other way about ?) and have also produced frizzled “erbpori” stuffs. Corduroy is another new fabric, resembling in appearance the Bedford oord once so popular amongst cur stockmen. It would be useless to enumerate the mere names of the various stuffs, they must be seen, and handled. The making up of these materials will soon set the dressmaking department busy ; already orders are coming in and customers are consulting the fashion plates, or the head of the department concerning the styles to be adopted. Long, or trained skirts are '‘ in’” and Etons, Obis wicks, Ascots, and fiandowns, have been ordered. (These sound rather horsey, some of them ) Xbe showroom is full of , pettinesses, Parisian and Londonian, for ladies’ and children’s wear. The modistes must spend a lot of time devising new things, to throw old ones out of fashion. Cloaks, capes, and mantles must differ from those ever worn before, and also from each other as much os possible, even when conforming to some acknowledged type. The “ Watteau bow ”is one of these types. Ihe milliner has an abundance of beautiful and quaint materials to select from. “ Straw ’’ hats are made of a multiplicity of materials, straw, grass, reed, rush, chip, cord, horsehair, a fibre very like that of phormium tenax , and other materials unrecognisable. The shapes are more and more variable, from cheese plates to “ jam pots.” There is a teudenoy in some plainer ones for the brim to work its way upwards. It will be on the top in a year or two, or we > shall see a circular college cap j later on it i may become an umbrella above the crown. I Anything fur novelty. Among the ornaments the convolvulous appears for the first time among the artificial flowers, the perfection of imitation in which increases year by year. Another novel adornment for hats —(garden bats?) —are sprays of ripe fruit, such as poaches and plums, looking good enough to eat. Amidst a groat variety of ladies outdoor garments, some pretty jot simple cloaks for girls are pointed out. Downstairs the house furnishings in art muslins, cretonnes, carpets, linoleums, rugs and mats, make a good exhibition by themselves in their variety of material, of patterns, and of finih. The men’s department as remarked above, is now turned upside down by change of season, but lighter clothings replace the heavier in the fore front, and straw hats assume to lead in head gear. It is sufficient to say that this department is equal in its way to the ladies' side. Altogether Messrs Bal’antyne’e stock will compare favourably with any in the colony—we doubt very much whether it is surpassed for variety and beauty, and it is a nutter of perpd ual surprise to us that a small town like Timara, with only a small country population around it, can maintain the demand for such large quantities of materials for clothing and adornment. There they are, however, as our readers are invited to go and see for themselves.