THE TEMPLE OF FASHION

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXV, Issue 4700, 19 May 1924, Page 1

THE TEMPLE OF FASHION

I MODERN VOTARIES. I • Women's singleness of purpose is never more convincingly demonstrated than in these days, when the magic sig l ' •'Bargain Sales" flaunts from almost every shopfront. Governments may turn turtle, monarchies totter to their doom—their fate leaves women cold. The Singapore base and reparations arc so much idle chatter as compared with the vital question <’l the moment: “Will short skirts actuary return, and, if so, when ?” Evidently London itself is quivering under the shock of impending revolution, for the cables informed the world a few days ago that fashion would be compelled to bow to the obstinacy of the designers and that "some of the new dresses bareiv reached the knees, and bad a slightly hobble effect.’’ Is it any wonder, in j the face of news like that, involving I the wholesale scrapping of entire | wardrobes, that women are rushing | the dress goods departments of every drapery shop in town; any wonder that hosiery counters are besieged by a solid phalanx of'feminity three feet de p p 1 WINTER CLOTHES IN SUMMER. The recent spell of hot weather lias given women a real chance of don - j ning real summer plumage, and the sight of men languishing in thei ' heavy winter suits, with stiff, white collars sawing their necks and stifling felt hats binding their damp foreheads, is one which has aroused in many an airily-clad young demoiselle a feeling of mingled pity and amazement. Why is it the archcritics from time immemorial of women's garb, even the designers and arbiters of the world’s fashion, have not yet discovered the secret of the art of dressing for themselves ? The woman who bares her shoulders and shin bones to the winter blasts h: made the subject for ridicule and censure of all the world’s uoetprs an.l preachers and pressmen, but to date no campaign has been started to draw public attention to the folly of wearing winter clothing right through a summer when the thermometer climbs daily up .to the eighties hi the shop; and offices where men .spend piactically all their daylight hours I Here and there, it must be admitted, one sees a citizen in a light, linen suit, but he numbers only about one in five hundred, so the odds are heavily against.him. THRALDOM OF THE PAST. Men, in short, dress as it pleases them, or perhaps it would be more correct to say, as they thing- they ought to. Women show more of a spirit of adventure, and if that spirit .sometimes leaves discretion in the rear, at least they have blazed a new trail, and shown .that the pioneering strain is still actively at work. To appreciate this thoroughly one has but to think of the revolutions they have worked in the standards of feminine attire in the last 40' years, bow they have evolved from the hideous absurdity of the “bustle,” the “waspwaist,” and the whale boned bodice the graceful and becoming fashions of to-day. There is a delicious soupon of plausibility in the story of the Sydney girl- who, when asked whether she would l:ke to hav.’ sit new frock delivered, or take it herself, icplied that she would take it •herself,-"there was just room in her •purse!” . ■ • But despite these flagrant offences against the rules of good taste there i,s not the slightest doubt .that women’s fashions to-day .are saner, and simpler, and infinitely more becoming than-ever they have been before. The home dressmaker's task is sheer joy in comparison with the drudgery jf 20 years ago. when skirts and “bodices”.—hateful word ’—-had to be fitted and boned, when transparent lace collars with wire supports dug into the lobes of one’s cars, and, 40 or 50 yards of frilled ribbon was often used in the trimming of a single skirt. From that thraldom wpmen have long since, emerged, and even though they may be going to the other extreme,, and making themselves as straight as cigarettes and slim as caterpillars, their lines will at least be more pleasing to the eye than those of the wasp and the hour-glass! PROMISE OF THRILLS TO COME. Starch and whalebone alike have been flung on the scrap-heap, and if the pendulum has swung a trifle too far in the elimination of the super-., fluous. at least it is better than blind adherence to stuffy and uncomfortable styles moulded on the fashions of 50 years ago. j

But the future is full of thrilling possibilities. The spirit of revolt -s abroad Whispers come from the world's fashion centres, London and Paris, of green and pink and yellow waistcoats for gentlemen, of hats ol' feathers and plush, of trousers with trimming and shirts with frills. Per? hans it is the aftermath of jazz and Bolshevism ; perhaps the dress designers, musing over the revealed glories of the Pharaoh’s tomb, feel tint a challenge has been Pung down the centuries, and that it row devolves upon them to create new .splendours that will out-Tut Tutankhamen. Whatever it is, one thing is sure, the ago of change or revolt againstthe old-established order holds the world enthralled. Tn dress fashions, as in monaehies and Governments, there is no longer stability, and one feels that even yet men may be seen in muslin and women in the intriguing costume that adorned the belle,s of old Egypt before the days of the Shepherd King.