Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 206, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 August 1916 — MAKING USE OF RIBBONS [ARTICLE]

MAKING USE OF RIBBONS

About the First Thing Is for One to Become an Adept in Tying a Bow. This is a ribbon season, as we all know, and the shops, naturally, have put forth a big and goodly supply of attractive ribbons in response to the demand fashion has made for them. Do you know how to tie a bow? Probably not. In this day of specialization few women do know how to tie more than a lingerie or hair ribbon. We leave it for the saleswoman at the ribbon counters, for our dressmakers and our milliners to tie bows of every other sort. To begin with, If - you would tie bows successfully, buy a reel of fine covered wire and use it to tie the loops in position. This, for instance, is the way a professional ties a sash rosette for a child’s frock. She takes one end of two or three yards of ribbon and measures off about thirty Inches to go around the # waist. Then she makes as many loops as she wishes, gathering the ribbon for each through her fingers. Next she measures off with her right hand, holding the loops In her left, enough ribbon for the two ends, and, at the end of this ribbon makes one more loop. This leaves a long loop of ribbon, later to be the two ends, and with one of them ties around the rosette loops, so making one end shorter than the other. Moire ribbon is perhaps prettiest for children’s sashes, although a stiff quality of taffeta answers the same purpose well. The soft satin ribbons are not so pretty on children as are

the stiffer ribbons. For women, velvet ribbon of three-inch width forms a good girdle. It can be finished at the back with an upstanding loop and a down-hanging end to cover the secure closing made by means of snaps or hooks and eyes. Hatband ribbons are especially terestlng this summer, a tailored bow, flat but not pressed dowm, finishes the left side of the hat when these ribbons are used, and in most shops lengths of ribbon with bows attached are sold for varying prices. Brocaded ribbons, with raised velvet figures on thick satin ribbon foundations, are also smart. One such ribbon sliow r s pansies of black, blue and purple velvet on a cerise ribbon. Another show’s overlapping pellets or big polka dots of three colors —peacock blue, old gold and plum—on a black background.