AMERICAN CHIC

First impressions are vivid, illuminating, often accurate. No great city in the world, on first sight, gives one such a vivid impression as New York. Mentally, one holds one's breath while impressions crowd on one almost too quickly to grasp, and it is only after some days that one can think them out or be conscious of their meanings. Especially is this true of returning Americans of whom it is said that after five years' absence they can scarcely recognize their own New York, so changed is it in line and color and so many more years has it grown up. But I feel that never again will this be so true as now for suddenly the atmosphere which clings about the city has crystallized and become something definite to one's vision like an object. Long has it been a great city, conscious of its force but never till now has it realized that it has a chic all its own. Not for a moment do I hesitate to apply this word to New York, just as one applies it to Paris, - for New York has a great chic, a chic as unique as the skyscraper and just as much its own production.

Chic can be applied to a type of mind or a point of view but for the moment my attention is held by the chic of the women and their clothes. Of course, as before one sees the familiar Paris model of dress and hat and cloak but it is worn with the added touch of New York. The American woman has long been the best dressed woman. Hers was the French chic, but more French than the French; and she was content that Paris should lay its best at her feet. But now New York can turn its women out on its own! And with what splendor and what magnificence and real genius, too!

AMERICAN CHIC
continued - 2

During the last five years in this country all vendors of luxury
in dress have been strained almost to the breaking point to bridge the
gap caused by the calamity at the source of supplies and so there was but
one thing to do, - become their own source of supplies. This possibility
we have always possessed, that is proven by the result, but the necessity
has forced recognition of this fact with royal success and produced our
great chic; now definitely established for all time. When last summer
the American buyers flocked to Paris to sample the last creation of French
effort they didn't for a moment hesitate to express their disappointment
at what they saw. They complained of the lack of originality and the
lack of that for which they were searching, "new stuff" and also new stuffs!
The days are passed when a New York courtiere timidly puts forward a model
which does not bear a famous Paris hall-mark. But with confidence and
justifiable pride is now shown their latest efforts. Constantly can one
see on our stage an "all New York production" in the form of a beautiful
costume. Everywhere in the shopwindows and on the street one notes the
most delightful combinations of materials and unusual usage of stuffs.
Almost any medium is used to gain an effect and women fearlessly wear that
which suits them best, regardless of style. The effect is perfect.
And then one discovers that an ordinary material bought by the yard has
passed through the hands of a thoughtful designer and develops into a
fabric beyond the possibility of any loom. This is all evidence of rich
imagination and fantasy and yet one is impressed with the note of dignity
and distinction that is the surest proof of a real and natural sense of
taste.

Everywhere the eye is charmed by the arrangement of color.

AM

AMERICAN CHIC
continued 3

The brightest colors are worn with perfect conviction and the scene is
that much more gay. The city seems grateful for color. And where
else in the world do the shops serve up their wares so that no woman
can resist?

I would not suggest for a moment that we should relax our
interest in what the guiding star of the chic of Paris originates or
dictates, - for it is through the desire to obtain form anywhere and
everywhere the best that the present manphatton of creative genius
has come about. It makes one hope, rather, for an interchange of Paris
and New York chic. The first great Paris house that sends a designer
to New York to indulte in an orgy of "first impressions" will be well
repaid for the impetus received and it will make only an added link between
America and the place where all good Americans go when they die.

John McHullin
21 East 49th St
NYC

THE VOGUE OF THE DINNER COAT

Dress is influenced by the type of entertainment in fashion just as much as by the seasons or the locality. Now-a-days all entertainments tend more and more to informality. Parties are much smaller and more informal than ever before and therefore men are less formal in their evening dress.

There are very few occasions when the dinner coat is considered less correct now than the dress coat and men welcome this change. Given the choice, a man will always choose his dinner coat in preference to his dress coat for to his mind it suggests greater comfort and an easier and more pleasant intimacy. A few years ago the only correct use of a dinner coat was for the club, when a few men had dinner together; for country houses; and dinner informally at home when only a few intimate friends were present; and occasionally at the play. But for the opera, for smart restaurants, for dances or the usual round of gaiety it was never seen. In fact, during the season a man had little use for his dinner coat. Now it is just the reverse and the question of which is correct is greatly a matter of the man's inclinations. There are very few occasions left for which the dress coat is essential. However some men prefer their dress coats to their dinner coats for to certain types of men they are more becoming and are never out of place where women are present.

With the dress coat there is very little choice as to the accessories of a man's toilet. He is forced to wear a stiff fronted shirt, a white tie, white waistcoat, high wing collar, a crush or top hat and if a flower in his buttonhold, none but a white one. But the dinner coat allows of several types of shirts, waistcoats, ties, et cetera.

The dinner coat buttoned over a black waistcoat and worn with the usual black tie presents such a sombre picture that men are not adopting the contin-

- 2 -

ental fashion of wearing a white V fronted waistcoat worn with the coat open.
Such a waistcoat is very effective with a wide rolled revere and is well
adapted to the black onyx diamond rimmed button so admired just now, but which
is too sharp a contrast when worn with a dress coat and its expanse of white linen.
At the first performance of Aphrodite at the Lexington Opera House the other
night, I noted a very smartly dressed man in dinner coat and white waistcoat.
His waistcoat was double brested out low and short and fastened by four white
and grey enameled buttons. His coat was worn open, he wore a plain stiff
fronted shirt with one medium sized pearl button rather grey in tone and the
usual black silk tie, a little more full than usual, was worn with a straight
bat winged collar very open at the front. His pocket handkerchief was of the
finest cambric marked in black letters. He wore a black wide brimmed felt hat
bound with a narrow silk edging during the entire act. Pumps and plain black
silk socks completed this attire. He looked very smartly and correctly dressed
with the one unusual touch of the double brested white waistcoat.

Last summer at Biarritz a very smart Frenchman wore during the entire
season a dinner suit of thin black mohair and he looked very cool and comfortable.
When an overcoat was required he wore an unlined short raglan without a belt of
light tan twillette. He wore it well oven in the front in a careless manner.

Every dinner coat should have a brest pocket to carry a white handkerchief, for this affords another opt of contrast to the inevitable black of the coat. A plain or self-figured black tie is the only possibility in neck wear at all times with a dinner coat and is preferable made of a soft dull silk cut full and wide at the ends. The use of a gay button hole is quite correct with a dinner coat. A red flower is quite suited to this attire and always adds to the gaiety of the scene.

John McHullin
21 East 49th Street
March 4, 1920.