Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1918-12-22
Fashion Has Made a
Quick Change in the
Way Go,vns Are Gut
at the Shoulders.
Women Change From,
Uniforms to Gay Aft
ernoon and Even;;nq
Go,uns.
BY ANNE RITTENHOUSE,

T is time to change a few things
in women's apparel. Women are
leaping from uniforms into me-
dieval gowns Of gold and crystal
and tulle in brilliant colors. and into
smashing furs and red street apparel.
There are significant changes work.
ing up from the ground. There Is the
new decolletage which was prophesied
in this department weeks ago. and
which is coming into view as smart
women exploit it. Half dozen new
ways of cutting the neck line have
leaped into existence, and dozen
new collars claims the blue ribbon Of
excellence. No matter whether we
dress differently about the hips and
the feet we are dressing decidedly
differently about the neck and even
the wrists.
1t is in these significant changes
that the great mass of women are in
terested, who do not feel that they
can afford entirely new gowns for the
midseason.
The artist who said that all changes
in fashions for women consisted in
ShC Placement VI VIC DulSc, vi lIlo
absence of it, should have added that
the open spaces in costumes were Sec
ond in Importance.
Cut. to the bone there is no doubt
that he was right. The contour is the
thing. 1t is where garment"goes in
or out that determines it's fashion.
Few women there are who are brave
enough to go against the contour of
the hour, even though it may not sug-
gest the best there is in their figures.
If the designers of clothes were to
reduce their work through the CEN
turtles to Its component parts, realiz-
Ing that they merely play the changes
lose hope and interest. They might
feel that after all their efforts in APP
parel were like child's efforts to
blow out balloon; to partially fill it. to
half fill it., to blow it into a perfect
curve. and then to watch it collapse.
Neither is it inspiring to remember
that all our life is governed by the
number - times we breathe each
cost Of vor b stop bs to fount the
process one would feel like dying.
The artist who told the dressmakers
that all their work was determined by
the bulge in the clothes they made
was discc,lraging with malice afore-
thought. The dressmakers. might have
retorted that all the work of his class
was merely p question, Of mixing pig
ment.| It 1.-the diversions from the
fundamental work of making clothes
and painting. pictures that lift the
two into inspirational heights.
No doubt the dressmakers realize
that for the sake of trade and their
own comfortable living they must
hull the fabric out here and suppress
II theretip building gowns They real
izs that they carry the public With
thenbf and that a woman who knows
that the curve in fashionable gown
Is on the hips and the flare absent
on, the hem will not reverse the situa-
tlpn IN. her new apparel. She would
lrefer, to- stay in the house and wear :.
q, klim'ono. 49,,
,W"15 80 TX
The preface wlll make the reform
sistent and hopeless manner; that is,
IT :, reformers read fashion stories,
which is not improbable. To Judge
froan the attacks made on the work
OF fashion writer's it is not only prob
able that, they read everything pub
lished on this subject, but they seem
TO digest and memOriZe 1t In order
that they may be better able to criti-
else it.
1t does not seem to enter the minds
OF these reformers that if they were
consistent in considering dress too
unimportant to pay any. public or pri-
frain from reading the written word
about 1t. 1t would also be we'll for
them to realize that human nature,
singly and in mass, would resent the
absence of all beauty, coquetry and
triviality in dress, and that if law
could be passed that would compel it,
would become uninspired and drab of
mind. Even convict might regard
mis- prison with more cheerfulness if
ne could change his garb.
the very interest. that the world
takes in clothes, and which the dress
reformers pretend to ignore, or wish
TO eliminate, is evidence of the fact
mat they know so much about it that
they can constantly contend against
IT by the quoted word Their interest
Is merely expressed in different
tangent. The other women express
theirs through the purchase and eX-
pioitation of new apparel. 1t is mere
~ the way the mind grasps the in
terest. The truth rests in the alb
sorption of the feminine mind in
clothes.
The host of the reformers are crying
aloud in the land today. Throughout
me war they have had things more