WASHING DRESSES.

Globe, Volume XXI, Issue 1758, 8 October 1879, Page 4

WASHING DRESSES.

[“ Milliner and Dressmaker.”] These who wear cotton are to be congratulated this season on having the prettiest goods to choose from that ever found their way into market with cotton as a basis. The manufacture of all goods of this description has been steadily improving for several years, and there is now little to choose between the wide, fine gingham, with its delicate check, and the summer silk, except that one requires only half as much as the other to make a dress, and costs just about half its price. The chintz satines with their close, satinlike finish, and the somewhat coarser “mummy” cloths, very badly named, ate almost equally fair [representatives of tho chintz brocades, and raw silks at from four to ten times their price, and possess the additional advantage of being made fresh and good as new, by careful laundry work. All these styles are suited to the exceptional occasions of country life in summer, and take the place of the troublesome white muslin, the more expensive summer silk, and the easily tom barege of the olden times. Naturally tha light tinted grounds and delicate flower patterns of some of these goods render them unfit for church or everyday wear of married or middle-aged ladies, but for toilets for garden parties, croquet parties, morning wear at watering-places, and tha indoor wear of ladies in country houses, or country hotels, nothing can be more appropriate, or more in harmony with nature in its summer dress. No violent contrasts are required or permitted with chintz coloring in printed cottons. A plain solid color may be used for trimming in small quantities, but white needlework ruffles, or lace, are considered much more desirable. There are few important changes in the designs of these suits. The polonaise is retained, and the long sacque paletot, halffitting, is still used as the simplest form, with a round skirt. But the most popular styles consist of a shorter paletot, or jacket, and two skirts, the second one draped according to fancy, and more frequently turned up on the front, a la laveuse, than in any other style. Linen and cambrics in solid colors are very fashionably trimmed with a black and white stripe of different widths, according to taste, the hair-stripe being the most distinguished. Ginghams have had embroidery specially designed for them in colors of the check, but they are more stylishly trimmed for ladies with linen, lace, and narrow bias bands of the material.