Ladies Column.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 4715, 5 August 1893, Page 3

Ladies Column.

ON BONNETS*

MiBS Mantalini writing in tbe fall Mall Budget on the great subject of bonnets say s :— Surely there has never been a season when hats and bonnets hava been so quaint, so pretty, or so audacious. Certainly one has never been so entirely free to find that which is most becoming ; the styles are bo varied and so different that it would be Btrange indeed if every [ pretty woman did not find something specially adapted to her, quite her own. It is some ten years now since the ideas instilled into us in our, early youth, that bonnets should be " quiet " and hats "simple," passed away, apparently for ever. Since then there has been a steady progress from uniformity to 'originality, every season showing a marked difference. When first the wreaths of roses came in, with plates of flowers and 'growing' plants, they were regarded with wonder and amazement, though admitted to be pretty enbhgh. But now all these Btrange. variations upon tbe primitive idea of a head-covering no longer excite the smallest comment. The difficulty is to wear something sufficiently unusual to be even noticed. A woman can wear a few rose-stalks twisted together and call it a bonnet, with perfect impunity. . It is tine that doctors* sometimes marvel at these unsubstantial head-dresses, and talk of neuralgia ; but women are not readily to be convinced that there is any more neuralgia than there used to be. And even if tbere be, side by side with it is a powerful compensation. Women have h4d much brighter and healthier hair since the solid bonnet became- a thing of the past. ".'.'.''' In describing bonnet's and hats, we ore * obliged, to use some old-fashioned words, because the language has not followed the fashion. We have to talk of "crowns," but we do not mean, as we used to, what a man means by the crown of his hat. A " crown" now usually consists of a scrap of open-work lace whioh is placed in the middle of a wreath of roses, or a morsel of Sinohed straw pinned to the centre of a uted brim. There is no longer anything •at all serious about hats or bonnets j they are of no definite shape, and they are not even ' ,c tikqmod." '. £he old idea' bf "trimming" has r ehtjlr^ly passed away. They are decorated now, and (they are in themselves decorations^ Tba aims of the milliner are, first, to suit the face and head and add beauty to the wearer; secondly, to create something sufficiently original to atfcraot every eye.