A ROYAL MARRIAGE.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 237, 6 October 1928, Page 8 (Supplement)

A ROYAL MARRIAGE.

JAPANESE HEIR. FBINCE CJaCHXBVS BRIDE. INTERVIEW WITH MADAME MATSUDAIRA. :,..'■ , ) (By MARGARET POE HART.)' {;•'.• —— : (Special to tb© "Auckland Star" and the ■~:,, ' K.A.N.-A.) WASHINGTON , (D.C.), Aug. 30. bright light which beats about a throne lias been directed towards a girl who for three years lias been a member of the younger set in Washington. She is Mile. Setsu Matsudaira, the eighteeh-ycar-old daughter of the Japanese Ambassador and Mme. Matsudaira, and her marriage to Prince Chichibu, brother of the Emperor of Japan, and heir-apparont to the throne, ■will be an event of worldwide interest tliis summer.

Mile. Setsu ie a modern girl who enjoys the pleasures and pursuits of her contemporaries in Washington, but she is not so modern that she can break the Japanese reserve for young people. So Madame Matsudaira, does the talking when it conies to conversation about the approaching wedding.

Madame Mstsudaira, attractive, modishly dressed, received mo in tlio draw-ing-room of the Japanese Embassy. She was eager to talk of her daugther. She acknowledged tliat the choice of the Prince came to her and the rest of the family, including Mile. Sotsii herself, as n surprise, and she was frank in expressing her pride in the honour.

Madame Matsudaira likened her future son-in-law to the Prince of Wales, popular with everyone in his country and in other lands he visits, and since his early youth the centre of conjecture regarding the girl he would marry. Madame Matsudaira belongs to an exalted Japanese family, one of the few privileged to marry into royally, an essential to bo considered whon Prince Chichibu was looking for a bride.

While the future Princess has been brought up on "old-fashioned precepts," she has lived as American girls do, and doubtless will take some of the American ideas of feminine equality to the position sho will occupy in Japan. Madame Matsudaira was emphatic that Mile. Setsu would not forget her foreign friends, and said that she hoped to see them in Tokyo. Madame Matsudaira described in detail the wedding costume her daughter will wear. The gown has been made long and straight, with a' huge roll at the hem-line. With this is a court train, more than three yards long of magnificent embroidered brocade. This creamy white bridal costume is the work of many hundreds of Japanese hands. Over the gown will bo worn an elaborate court robe, lavishly embroidered in all colours. This is fashioned full with enormous hanging sleeves. The Japanese slippers are of hand-woven white brocade.

The most interesting part of the toilette is the hair dross. There are only a few hairdressers in Japan who can arrange hair according to court custom. On Mile. Setsu's bridal morning they will draw the long, shining black hair of the little bride down from a parting in the exact centre to her ears, where it will he arranged in large glossy puffs, graduating-into a soft roll at the back of the head.

Conforming to custom for court dress, Mile. Setsu's attire will include no jewels, but the bride will wear a tiara of hand-wrought gold. No Japanese would be married without her fan, and this princcss-to-ho will carry an ancient one belonging to the royal family. It will be of lustrous lacquer with two huge tassels trailing the floor. All Mile. Setsu's trousseau has been made in Japan. Mine. Matsudaira said, however, that her daughter was so fond of sports, especially tennis, and so likes the clothes English and American girls wear for athletics that she will take sports frocks and shoes to Japan.

Mile. Setsu, who recently graduated with honours from the Friend School, was an eager student. She was considered one of the best players of the basket-ball team and on the tennis courts. Since leaving school she has continued her studies in art and music, and will maintain these interests after her marriage.

. The home of the Prince and Princess has just been completed, and is within ten minutes' distance by motor car from the Emperor's Palace. Among the prized possessions of the bride-elect are several handsome pieces of silverware of American design. These and a large silver bowl presented to her at a party given by members of the diplomatic corps will occupy a prominent place in her home.