Long or Short Skirts?

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 916, 8 March 1930, Page 26

Long or Short Skirts?

That there should be a violent battle raging about the length of women s skirts would at the first thought seem rather futile, but managers of industrv take it most seriously, and are naturally trying to encourage women, through the machinations of fashion experts, to use more material in their clothes. The question to be decided is whether women are going to be strong-minded enough to keep to the freedom of the short skirt and brave the terrifying glances of the longskirted women, or whether they will follow the lead of fashion experts like sheep. A writer in an overseas journal says that another stage has been reached in the London and Paris dress war by tbe announcement from Paris designers that spring frocks will be the same length for both afternoon and evening, with all the way round lengths varying from halfway down the legs to the ankle. Declarations of revolt against the decision are coming already from two clases of British women. Midlde-aged women are seriously alarmed at this attempt to take from them the increased span of youthfulness which short skirts has given them since the war. "Women,” said a London society leader, “have taken a great deal of trouble to acquire slim, pretty legs, and spend a great deal of money on smart stockings and shoes. Is all this to be in vain?” MEN IN A HURRY Sports girls, too, are contemptuous. They declare that, with the rush of modern life, with its passion for motoring and sport, long skirts are impossible, and girls would have to choose between young men who are always in a hurry and long dresses which impede movement. The long skirt has. however, definitely come to the ballroom, and short dresses must soon disappear almost entirely for evening parties. WINTER WEAVES The usual rules of weaving for the autumn seasons has been reversed this year, and classic fabrics we have always known to have certain weight and texture are made much more supple and finer, and are extremely light in weight, exhibiting none of the stiffness and bulk of the tweed and homespuns of yesteryear. This lightness of weight and firmness of texture are truly an indication of today’s attitude toward clothes. Costumes themselves have been induced to their most sophisticated simplest, fabrics follow logically, «tnd become the modern descendants of their old established elders, when fabrics were made to “give service, and the quality was judged by body and weight.