GET READY FOR THE COURTS

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLII, Issue 20607, 22 December 1936, Page 12

GET READY FOR THE COURTS

TENNIS PROBLEMS SOLVED Grass courts in the club grounds are being rolled and cut, and rolled and rolled ready for the New Zealand tennis championships. Enthusiasts who chase the white balls are not concerned so much with the grass—that is the groundsman’s job. Their problems just now are planning the latest fashions in clothes—shorts or skirts, jumpers or dresses, which socks to choose with different outfits, and numerous other points that are important if the players are to look and feel right. The first thing to do is to inspect your tennis wardrobe and decide which, if any, can find a place in your 1936 wardrobe. ”

Inspect white shoes first to see if the rubber soles are good or perished, if the uppers are soft and pliable or stiff and likely to split.

If they are still good then give them a good wash and then a generous application of Meltonian white shoe cream. This will bring them back to their original fresh whiteness. Remember your socks this season should be In plain colours to match your bandeau or your cardigan. Striped socks are “out” this year.

Cardigans and bandeaux are also plain colours, and all eye-shades and tennis caps white. Tennis dresses all have high necklines. Mostly with little flat collars round the neck that button in front so they may be worn open in very hot weather.

Pockets are to be found —four of them, two above the waist and two below—on all dresses, and there are more pleated than flared skirts. Dresses that have shorts attached to them instead of a skirt are most popular. The shorts portion being cut full with inverted pleats so that it is difficult to see that they are shorts. Of course, there are the separate shorts worn with shirt tops. These also have high necklines that can be worn open.

Some have tiny sleeves, others none. They are of washing silks, uncrushable linen, linen tweed and very fine pique.

Though there are woollen fabric coats to wear over tennis outfits, the newest ones are linen and linen tweeds in all colours, including brown, black and white. There are tailor-mades and swaggers, and short waist-length jackets. No lawn tennis player with any ambition to succeed at the game can cultivate the tournament habit too early.