THE DRESSING TABLE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 25 June 1938, Page 4

THE DRESSING TABLE

SHOULD BE IN GOOD LIGHT. There is a place in your bedroom which is most intimately yours: There, where your dressing table stands. This is the most feminine corner of the whole house, harbouring all those small matters devoted to 'the mystery of the toilet. There you create the personal picture, the facade, as it were, which you present to the world; and if that facade is as pleasing as you can make it, behind it you will be able comfortably to cultivate your real self,. having averted, by trouble taken at the dressing table, . anxiety about your outward self. It.seems rather obvious to insist on the necessity of placing the dressing table in a good light. But perhaps you have not heard of the awful experience of the girl who, descending at the last moment to receive her guests, presented a horrid surrealist mask hectically crimson in one cheek and rather below par in the other. She had moved her dressing table to a new position, where the light fell from afar and from one side across it. Provided your bedroom receives plenty of light from generous' windows. you need not worry about daytime lighting. Ideal positions are against a side wall of a room lighted from both ends, or in an angle formed by two walls, both of which contain a window. If there is not a good supply of daylight, it will be well always to make use of artificial lighting. This may come from above or from both sides of the mirror. Preferably it should be mercilessly bright, for a flattering mirror, like an insincere friend, is dangerous. A single, strong light with an effective shade —such as one will find in a theatre dressingroom—above the mirror is the simplest satisfactory arrangement. Some modern mirrors are partly surrounded by a tubular electric lamp: this is an extremely neat device, and the mirror, acting as a reflector, throws out a revealing flood of light. Bracket lamps on either side can be both elegant and effective. The form of your dressing table is, of course, a matter for your own choosing. The principal thing is to see that you have plenty of drawers and compartments which permit an orderly arrangement of numerous pots and bottles and other accessories. Not only is a dressing table littered with these things untidy and unsightly, but for the job of making up one needs to have every requisite at hand, for the mood of exasperation induced by having to hunt about for things is not the mood in which one's best efforts before the mirror are made. As with all domestic operations, so with this most intimate one—efficiency is the thing.

The height of the table in relation to the chair chosen for it should be carefully judged A stool is often preferred. That again is a matter of personal taste, only we suggest that, while a stool is certainly more apt to encourage one to attend strictly to business, the habit of dreaming before the mirror is not ne'cessarily to be dis[couraged. and for that a comfortable chair is desirable.