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22 - Sunday, March 17, 1991 - North Shore News

FASHION

A return to refinement

FASHION STATEMENTS

TIME HAS not run out for the
hourglass silhouette.

Dress styles this spring may
seem too varied, with shapes that
swing from top heavy trapezes to
bottom emphasized poufs. Your
best bets, however, still lie in
dresses with feminine form and
proportion.

These dresses don't follow the
froth of 60s fashion; instead they
are designed with a refined intent.
Reminiscent of the chic side of the
60s, they take their influence from
Jackie Kennedy and Audrey Hep-
burn, Just as nostalgic and as
feminine is the return of the Bar-
bie doll dress and the Brigitte
Bardot dress. Yet, they also have
anew modern attitude.

The best styles gently rcund
over the body’s curves, emphasiz-
ing the hips, diminishing the
waist, accenting the shoulder and
bust.

Hourglass shapes are shown in
the softly fitted sheaths, the tank
dress, the waist —- cinched
chemises, the short -shifts, the
curve clinging little black dresses
and the leg-revealing shifts.

The dress is forecasted to be
“the icem’’ of the 90s, according
to Vancouver's Wear Else?
clothing stores. This boutique
shows a variety of retro and new
dress styles, with the ocean pro-
viding inspiration for this spring’s
colors.

Wear Else?, winner of the best
women’s fashion retailer award in
Vancouver Magazine’s recent
fashion awards presentation, of-
fers sporty, sophisticated, and ex-
pressive clothing. If offers a selec-
tion of North American designer
stvles which re-dress fashion for
women who enjoy their feminini-
ty.

President Tom Shiffman says,
“We are seeing more relaxed and
feminine lines in the 90s. Gone are
the tweed suits, exaggerated
shoulder pads and the menswear
dresses for success suits in
women’s wear.”’

Wear Else? stores cater to up-
wardly mobile clients with discern-
ing tastes. They carry a complete
collection of dresses for the con-
fident, active woman to have the
freedom to match her own per-
sonal look to her many roles. And
the women who shop here dress
well, choosing every element from
the hat to the hose, for its endur-
ing sense of being ‘tright"' — for
the look, the season, the mood.

These women know that though
dresses get top priority in a closet
this spring, they have got to be
spectacular. Nobody needs
another simple lite black dress.
They need to seduce women into
wanting them.

Wear Else’s dress designs typi-
cally have a versatile easy going
fashion sense with unexpected
touches, as each classic stvle is ei-

THE DRESS is back for the 90s in racey, feminine sty!es. Left is a Gillian Right's latisse-back dress,

right is Albert ‘vipon’s sleeveless organza-back dress.

ther newly interpreted in novelty
fabrics and colors or with added
fashion forward details. And
many of these dresses can easily
slide from office to evening wear,
with only a slight change in ac-
cessories.

Designers featured in the Wear
Else? stores shrug off their
tailored image for spring and add
lots of color and sex appeal to
their feminine dresses. They wrap
and drape them, give them halter
necklines, add strappy details to
sleek shapes, crisscross the front
or the back, create alluring
sheerness with chiffon, and reveal
the leg with knee-grazing
hemlines.

Liz Claiborne dresses show
creativity in her luxurious blue
sandwashed silk shirt dress ($245),
her softly flowing dotted dress in
aqua ($190), and her sexy fitted
red cheinise ($185).

Lida Baday explores new forms
in her wedge dresses that resemble
a V-necked shift, shown in hot
pink, citron or electric blue
satin-backed crepe. Her coat dress
in navy and white is Hepburn-like
($575) as is her classicly tailored
white sleeveless chemise ($375).
Feminine flirtation is the theme in
her elegant bustier dress with
organza added to the neck and
sleeves, in black or white ($450) as
is her black stip dress with an
organza cover ($495).

Gillian flatters with bold colors
in a fuchsia silk button-front dress
($315), a tangerine flora! silk dress
($355), and a standout silk tank
dress with blocks of fuchsia, pink
and khaki ($260). Feminine details
are added to a pewter jersey dress
that has ai fully shirred and
gathered collar on a drop shoulder
($380). A fatisse style adds four
crisscross straps to the low back

of a little dress ($245).

Anne Klein adds a little some-
thing extra to her Anne Klein UU
dresses which include a faux wrap
front on a classic sheath dress
($295).

Albert Nipon knows how to
turn up the heat on his dresses.
He bares the entire back of his
sleeveless sheath dresses and
covers them with a thin layer of
organza, in black or white crepe
($295).

Wear Else’s owner Tom Shiff-
man and his wife, Molly, opened
their first store on West Fourth
Avenue in 1978. In 1986 the firm
set up a second shop in Oakridge
Shopping Centre. The retai! com-
pany then shifted north to
downtown Vancouver, to a third
location at Pender and Howe
Sureet. Travelling further north, it
setded in West Vanvauver’s Park
Royal Mall for the fourth and

Crenna’s
quick
snips

FASHION-NATION ... There is a
new promotional T-shirt for the
fashion industry entitled Fash-
ion-Nation which has been in-
troduced 10 ‘“‘encourage people
who love fashion to resist the
tendency to stereotype each coun-
try’s fashion identity and, instead,
to celebrate the universality of
fashion and great ideas.”’

The T-shirt design seems to be
in response to a quote in Canada’s
national trade publication, Style
Magazine, that said ‘‘Canada as a
fashion nation is hard to market.
it is huge, it is diverse, it has
wilderness and cities. With the ex-
ception of outerwear, a cohesive
market is impossible to latch on
to."”

The makers of this black with
white T-shirt explain that fashion,
like art, needs no boundaries, and
great fashion, like great art,
should be international.

lt is the individuals in each na-
tion — the fashion designers, the
trend setters, the innovative
unknowns, on the street, the imag-
inative youth and the notable
names in the news — who make
the country’s fashion identity.

And, how could Canada
possibly be any further from a
‘collective fashion consciousness’’
than the U.S., which groups such
fashion stars together as the
way-out Christian Francis Roth
(quoted in WWD as being “off in
his own world this season’’) and
the homegrown cowboy Ralph
Lauren?

Beats the fashion sense out of
me,

Fashion-nation T-shirts are

available at R.B. Yuenn, 315 West
Cordova St. in Gastown, Van-
couver. Phone: 685-8378. The cost
is $20 for a 100 per cent cotton
T-shirt in black only, sizes large
and extra-large.
JEWELRY TREASURE FOUND
«.. If you have an interest in rare
jewelry, the richest treasure ever
to be recovered from a_ ship
wreck, the Nuestra Senora de
Atocha, whick sank off the
Florida Keys in 1622, is on display
at Birk’s Jewellers.

A portion worth $20 million is
on display at Birk’s Jewellers
Granville and Georgia Street loca-
tion March 18-21. The treasure
was recovered by American Mel
Fisher after a 16-year search. The
items are for sale.

Mos{ recent expansion. This shop
has been recently renovated.

Having prior experience in an
import retail clothing and = ac-
cessories outlet for Central
America and a primitive art
gallery in Gastown, this innovative
couple has a diverse business
background.

Molly attributes their success to
service and merchandise.

“Our people come back because
the stores are friendly and because
the lines change regularly. We buy
small quantities and lots of
them,’ she says as Tom adds:
“And, we stay ahead of the
trends."*

With these four locations at
well established points in the city,
40 employees and 12,000 square
feet of retail space, the couple has
established themselves among
Vancouver’s top independent
ladies’ fashion firms.

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