Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 January 1915 — TIGHT SLEEVES AGAIN [ARTICLE]

TIGHT SLEEVES AGAIN

AMERICAN WOMEN HAVE DECIDED TO ACCEPT THEM. After Refusing for Thres Seasons, Sentiment Seems to Have Changed— The Silhouette May Be Responaibie. The French designers have tried to exploit the fitted Sleeve, with its regulation armhole, but the women would refuse it and go on their way, seemingly content with the kind that was rarely right and never comfortable. True, its shape contributed to that carelessness of figure which has been considered the desirable thing by the fashionables and their vast number of followers. And probably the only reason that It L now dropped is that fashion itself has dropped it by one of

those subtle underground processes which no one woman can put a finger on. For three successive seasons, the new gowns have had long fitted sleeves that reached to the wrists and were rationally placed at the top of the arm into an armhole that was sufficiently large for the arm, but no more. * First our women refused them on the score that the fashion would oust the elbow sleeve, which was far Loo comfortable to relinquish without a protest or without being given something equally easy to wear; another argument which held good was that the designers had foolishly introduced this form of sleeve at the approach of spring and they had not reckoned, as they never do, with the blizzards of heat for which the American has to prepare. After three trials they refused it on every variety of pretext. The truth was that they didn’t want it, and no score of French dressmakers could make them take up with anything they didn’t like. The only reason they accept it now is that they have changed their minds concerning it, or they ha.ve wearied of the slouching kimono, or' they realize that the new silhouette, growing in power each dhy, does not admit of a of this kind. There is no gainsaying the truth of the assertion that the fitted sleeve is a difficult one to arrange, and any lack of skill in its placement makes it as uncomfortable as the kimono with its underpart extending to the waist, which prevents one from lifting the elbows higher than the bust line. There are three recognized feats of

skill in dressmaking—to fit a collar, k long sleeve, and arrange a decolletage that neither sags nor binds, that Is neither too high nor too low. It Is no wonder that the little seamstress and the home dressmaker do not feel confident of success In doing any one of the three. Possibly women will end by being more uncomfortable in the newly revived tight sleeve of the 1870 period, which was a revival of the Napoleonic war period and now comes in with the world war, than they were in' the kimono, which they learned to put up with .as they have the narrow skirt; but, at least, we know it is finally established in fashion, although there are many women who prefer, and wear, the sleeve put Into a dropped armhole which maintains that careless fit across the shoulders to which we are accustomed, and which we like, although'there Is little doubt that the incoming and fashionable silhouette, which demands slenderness across the body, will abolish even this type of. armhole. (Copyright, McClure Newspaper SyndJb • cate.) -----