INDIVIDUALITY OF DRESS.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 3666, 30 October 1912, Page 9

INDIVIDUALITY OF DRESS.

THE SECRET OF THE WELLDRESSED WOMAN.

The art of dressing is an art as complex ami elusive as all the others (says Paul Poiretin Harper’s “Bazaar”). It, too, has. its principles and traditions, known only to persons of taste because they harmonise with their inmost feelings. This art has little in common with money. The woman whose resources are limited has no cause for being dowdily dressed than the woman who is rich lias reason to believe sho is beautifully gowned. Except in so far as money can procure the services of a good dressmaker, of an art ist wlioi can judge his customer’s style and garb her accordingly, the wealthy woman stands no better chances of being correctly dressed than the woman who must turn every penny before spending it. The contrary is very often true. Whereas the rich woman can satisfy her least caprice in a most haphazard fashion, tho woman of average means, simply because she is actually forced to think about her wardrobe, is more apt to .realise what is suitable to her and what is not. Sho leaVns how to choose and what to select. She acquires the art of dressing well. And it is not an easy art to acquire. It demands a certain amount of intelligence, certain gifts, some of them among the rarest, perhaps—it requires a real appreciation of harmony of lines of colors—ingenious ideas, absolute tact, and, above all, a love of the beautiful and clear perception of values. It may be summed in two words —good taste.

Taste is l>y no means developed by riches: on the contrary, the increasing demands of luxury arc killing the art of dressing. Luxury and good taste are in inverse proportion to one another. The one will kill the other as machinery is crowding out handwork. In fact, it has conic so far that many persons confuse the two terms. Because a material is expensive they find it beautiful; because it is cheap they think it must be ugly.

To give you an example! \ All women whose wealth may ho measured, beyond a certain figure, invariably appear with a string of pearls around their necks. Pearls are essentially becoming to certain types only, and cannot possibly be suitable to ail women, but they seem to have become a visible sign of social caste. To how many women does a pearl necklace add any beauty ? How many women choose their pearl necklaces for reasons of good taste and style, that is to say, in order to set off the beauty of their coloring?

At the theatre, in restaurants, you see hundreds of women more adorned than Indian idols. The most sparkling with jewels, the most expensively garbed, are never the most beautiful. Quite the contrary. Those who are most loaded down with precious stones necklaces, bracelets and rings, rarely attract my attention. Sometimes I try to force myself to admire them. But it is impossible for me to feel anything more for them than for the dazzling setting of a jeweller’s window, and the women who appear thus dressed in their fortune only, would not appear one whit less attractive to me if they wore it in their hair as curling papers made out of bank-notes? In order not to appear entirely out of harmony with her surroundings and the place where she lives, a woman is obliged to follow fashions to a certain extent. But let that be within certain bounds! What does it matter if tight skirts be the fashion it your figure demands a wide one? Is it not more important to dress to as to bring out your good points rather than to reveal the bad? Can any idea of being fashionable make up for the fact of ■being ridiculous? I dined the other day in a fashionable restaurant. At the tables around me I noticed at least half a dozen women whose hair was dressed in exactly the same way, with the same number of puffs and switches. All were dressed in equally expensive gowns, although I was not able to judge of the colors because they were all equally over-loaded with beading, embroideries, gold, silver, or steel ornaments, with laces and fringes. . These women, who, I imagine, were neither sisters nor friends, were all shaped in the same mould, that is to say, in the same kind of corsets, and they all wore j ewe’s, pendants, and necklaces, which, if not exactly alike, were at least of the same type. Every woman had adapted her liody, her movements, and her taste to the commonplace desire of being fashionably dressed. And in looking at them I could not help thinking that in case of a panic their husbands or brothers or friends would be perfectly justified in mistaking one for the other. Instead of hiding their individuality why did not each woman try to bring out her personal type of beauty ? Quo woman would have been more attractive without the puffs and switches; another would have been more beautiful in black; jewels were out of place on the third.

But, curiously enough, women fear being called original or individual, but never hesitate to make fools of themselves in following, tho _l_atest fashion. A woman avi 11 submit to any torture, any ridicule, if she believes she is Avorshipping the absurd goddess Fashion. Every year a certain very limited number of types of styles are seen, and almost all women may ho classified under one of them. Only those who do not fit in under any particular heading are worthy of being called Avell drCssed.

I cannot help feeling a vague contempt for those who ask at the beginning of the season. “AVhat is to be tlie favorite color?” Choose the color that suits you, madame, and if some one tolls you that red is to be worn, dare to wear violet and consider only what is suitable to you, because there is only one single rule for the welldressed woman, and the old Romans expressed it in one word-y-decorum- — which means, “that which is suitable.” That which, is suitable! Choose whatever is suitable for the time, the place, the circumstance, the landscape, the place you., are staying, whether it be a large city, a. village, or a watering-place 1 Choose whatever is most in harmony with your character, for a dress can lie the expression of a state of mind if you but try to make it. There are 'dresses that sing of joy of life,., dresses that weep, dresses, that threaten. There are gay dresses, mysterious dresses, pleasing dresses, and tearful dresses.