The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1931-08-20
BY JULIA BLANSHARD
NEA Service Writer

capital
BY JULIA BLANSHARD
NEA Service Writer
PARIS. Aug. 20.-Visualize the
impressive splendor and dazzling
brilliance of the opening night at
the opera in a year of plenty.
Add to it the excitement and tense
strain of horse race where every
body is betting up to the hilt.
The combination gives you an
idea of the French fashion openings
in this capital of style.
For these fashion events not only
launch new styles and present each
new costume as if it were a prima
donna itself.
Writers, Buyers Attend
They draw as audience both fash
ion writer's whose professional repu-
tation rests on their unerring ability
to predict what the well-dressed
woman is going to select from these
collections and eminent buyers and
stylists whose very jobs depend on
their picking winning models for
their stores in America, Germany
and England.
The atmosphere is tense with
their competitive strain. Smartly
gowned, jeweled, groomed and Golf
fured, they all keep an eye on each
other as we'll as on the mannequins.
Criticism is sharp and smiles are
barred.
Evening openings are breath-tak-
ing for their old-world splendor and
the magni1cence of their settings.
Crowds line up outside to watch fine
ladies and top-hatted escorts leave
their taxis.
In Old Mansions
You go through impressive arched
doorwayS and are uShered into
stately old mansions with lofty CELL
ings, softly carpeted winding stair
ways, crystal chandeliers, and huge
gold mirrors. Salons are upstairs,
shops on the first floor.
Since the tiny lifts carry only
couple or so, nearly every one trails
up the stairs in leisurely manner
and with dignity alien to rushing
America.
You must always present your
card of admission. Copyists are the
terror of French couturiers.
IntruderS OuSted
At Maggy Rouff'S brilliant evening
opening, with the two huge salons
heavy with the fragrance of baskets
of flowers, the orchestra playing
Happy Days Are Here Again." and
500 guests arrayed in all their splen-
dor, an exotically lovely woman in
ermine and diamonds swept through
the door.
She was stopped and politely
asked for her invitation, bowed to
with great courtesy but bowed out
nevertheless.
At Lucien Lelong's, located in a
former marquis mansion, four peo-
pie checked every card of admission
at the foot of the stairway.
Openings Day and Night
The high spot of excitement at
Worth's was when handsome, sleek
brunei in a gold cloth ensemble was
called politely from the showing,
uShered into an ante-room and
asked for the sketching pad she was
hiding in her gold sleeve, which a
little barefooted mannequin with
blood-red toenails had spotted.
Every house has it's own tradi-
tional manner of presenting its COL
lection. Jenny, Irene Dana, Helm,
Redfern, Ardanse, Chantal, Jane
DooYou hT01xy1oo4,v DoY,I pOiYot
Schiaparelli, Vionnet, Mainbocher
and most of the others have day.
time openings, morning or after
noon, with the suites of salons re-
splendent with flowers, the walls
lined with spectators chairs and
the mannequins moving from one
room to the other in turn.
Patou, Lelong, Lanvin, Worth and
Maggy Rouf have evening openings,
beginning at $50 and lasting be-
yond midnight, when a bounteouS
supper is served, after drinks have
been passed all evening.
The couturiers themselves are
mere spectators at their own open
'ings. At the perfectly scrumptuous
Lanvin collection, Lanvin, dean Of |
couturiers, was an outstanding fig
ure, however.
Short, dignif1ed, with her yellow
hair that still is not all white, |
though she must be 10, pulled back
into braids at the back of her head, |
she looked like an old Dutch lady |
out of a painting, wearing her ia
nous diamond earrings and rings and !
her Legion Of Honor red stripe, a
decoration indeed, in her black Sc
quinned jacket.
All of the women couturierS wore
black at the openings except Jane
Regny, who wore an ice-blue satin
overblouse, lovely with her blue
black hair with it's attractive
widows peak right in front, and
Schiaparelli, who wore one of her
new black and white sports suits, |
and has a new wind-blown Antoine /
bob.
Even little Madame Lelong, the
Princess Paley, wore a black gown
at her husbands opening.
Next: The mannequinS the |
first women to wear the new Paris
modes.