LONDON AND PARIS FASHIONS.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume X, Issue 5, 4 February 1893, Page 118

LONDON AND PARIS FASHIONS.

STYLISH MILLINERY AND DRESSES. (SEE ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE 117.1 To be quaint, to be picturesque, to be severely simple, and yet quite in touch with the latest ideas, the best designers and the most approved trifles that go to make up the perfection of current styles in dress, to be attired in an organdie or a lawn made upon a Worth idea or trimmed with some garniture which gives it a distinctively characteristic air and removes it entirely from any possibility of the ordinary—this is the ambition of the well-dressed woman of to-day. And so it is that the material has much less to do with the geneial t fleet of the dress than the fashion of making and the decorative portion of this most important garment. So with hats, the best effects are often produced with the simplest materials. In the first sketch this is clearly shown.

No. 1 is a white leghorn hat, with large white ostrich feathers, curling high at the back. Coquile of lace, fastened with paste pin. Long ostrich feather laid under the brim. No. 2. Dress of heliotrope foulard, covered with a fine pattern in black. Skirt bordered with two ruches of satin libbon. Jabot of the beige-coloured lace. Black straw hat with bows of heliotrope satin ribbon and white daisies. No. 3. Young lady s dress of white English embroidery over pink silk. Skirt bordered with a full flounce of Valenciennes lace, festooned on the right side with bows and loops of satin ribbon. This trimming is very stylish and much improves the appearance of a plain skirt. Bebe bodice, with high sleeves, ribbon bows, and belt. Hat of Tuscan straw, with bows of lace and pink and crimson roses.

No. 4. Dress in cream gauze, with a pattern of violets. Skirt with a double frill of Valenciennes lace put on with a gauging of the gauze. Long sash of white faille ribbon. Fichu of gauze, edged with lace, and sleeves to match rucked down to the wrists. Hat of white lace and foliage.

If ladies do not weary of wearing blouses, surely one need not be expected to tire of hearing about them. Indeed, there is nothing which we hear so much about, for the blouse is one of the leading items in the girl’s summer wardrobe. And she need not be especially girlish in order to don it, either, for matrons and maids alike have set their minds on it, and whether of fine sheer linen lawn and white silk, like those recently ordered for a lovely old lady of sixty-five or seventy years, or of pongee, foulard, surah, mull or percale for the younger members of the fashionable family, it is all the same, the blouse suits the times and is for the time the special fad, as it is one of the most becoming and unquestionably the most comfortable garment which fashion has ever given us. Whether plain, with the fullness in tucks at the yoke, or full around the neck, with the waist defined by tucks, or with yoke and cuffs of embroidery or insertion and lace, it seems to matter but little, as all styles are fashionable.

Light, thin grades of wide lace edging are in demand for neck-wear. A ribbon band serves as the foundation for a collar, and over this the selvedge edge of the lace is turned and shirred, the ribbon answering the purpose of a drawstring. The lace is made very full, and is worn in capeshape, and either caught up on the shoulders with bows of ribbon or permitted to fall loose all around the shoulders. The guimpe dress is the favourite for small girls. Whether of wool, silk or cotton, there is no model which is better liked for all materials and occasions. For cool weather there are little dresses of velvet, with guimpes of wash silk, cambric or linen lawn. Warm under-vests are worn under these thin guimpes, and thus they are suitable for all seasons of the year.

Mull or lace fichus or those made of both materials are worn. One end is crossed over the other, the lace edging forming a drapery which fall to the waist line and in some cases conceals the belt.

Some of the new English skirts are entirely without fullness at the top. One model of this sort was very wide at the hem and trimmed with many rows of narrow braid matching the fabric in colour.

Long gloves are gaining in popularity as the sleeves of dresses grow shorter. Elbow-sleeves are to be revived for the coming season.