Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 27, 1994 TAG: 9403290136
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By KATHLEEN WILSON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Today's dresses are unabashedly feminine.
Some look more like boudoir wear than boardroom wear, but designers recommend that you just add a jacket.
Donna Karan is calling the dress ``uncomplicated.''
But dresses of the past have been anything but.
Remember corsets and hoop skirts and crinolines?
Me neither.
But surely you remember the many forms the dress has already taken in the '90s.
What about the skin-tight\ what-in-the-world-does-one-wear-under-this-black-hanky- sized nearly naked creations of just a few years back?
Madonna making underwear outerwear? Cone bras? (And we all know just how complicated underwear can be on its own without parading its discomfort around on the outside!)
Flea market flower-power gypsy grunge paired with combat boots and sweat socks?
The convent-inspired black shrouds encircled in chains dangling with crosses?
This season designers reached into the past and pulled out a classic.
The dress.
The feminine, bias-cut, twirls-when-you-do dress.
It's long and loose, and its shape is defined by your body as breezes whoosh all around you.
The soft silhouette is entirely yours.
This season's dresses are ever-so-slightly Gatsby era-inspired.
Reminiscent of the days when a woman's perfume filled a room when she entered. Her ethereal chiffon skirts and scarves trailed her as she left in a way that convinced men she could almost take wing.
``Feel like a woman? Wear a dress!'' declared Diane Von Furstenberg back in the '70s.
``Today, femininity is a weapon - it's a force,'' said Christian Lacroix. ``Just because a woman works doesn't mean she has to wear pants.''
So, this season, slip on a dress and rediscover femininity. And its force.
Dresses.
They're not just for Easter anymore.
by CNB