Photoplay Magazine June 1922

Lillian Gish’s Summer Frocks Designed by Le Bon Ton with Patterns for You

You May Have One of these Patterns!

MISS LILLIAN GISH is as individual in her ideals and ideas of dress as she is in her acting. Celebrated for her tragic portrayals on the screen, she is equally famous for her quaint costumes, her quiet tastes, in real life. Fashion 1922 3

Photoplay and Le Bon Ton have never presented more charming frocks than those on these pages. On her dressing table Lillian Gish has a powder box of gold, with blue and pearl shines in an intricate design. It is an importation front France An exquisite lace handkerchief, presented to the star by lite Brazilian consul general and his wife, is here shown.

Miss dish’s favorite collar and cuff set is of ruffled voile. The collar has a black ribbon tie. Just the thing for a dark dress or suit.

Individuality in Dress

As told to Carolyn Van Wyck By LILLIAN GISH

DRESS is largely a matter of instinct. Good taste may of course be acquired. But the true feminine intuition- for what is most becoming must be born in one. If you are fortunate enough to possess this instinct, you need never worry about being well dressed. On the other hand, you may with careful study, learn what is best for you to wear. The woman without good taste might buy the most expensive gowns from the most exclusive house, and still be dowdy. The woman with the flair for clothes looks well in a gingham gown.

Simplicity—first, last, and always. And imagination.

You don’t like to pass, on the street, five women with costumes exactly like yours. You don’t have to. You may not be able to afford importations but you can always, add to a dress or a suit your personal touch. I don’t get as much time as I’d like for shopping. I am not clothes-crazy. I love pretty things; but you may remember that I seldom get a chance to wear them on the screen. And I am “on the screen” almost two-thirds of my life ! In “Broken Blossoms” I was a child of the London slums. In “Way Down East,” I was a poor little country girl, although I did have several charming dresses in that picture. In “Orphans of the Storm” I play a girl of the French Revolution.

So I do not select my dresses with their film appearances in view. My wardrobe is my own. It belongs, except as far as Photoplay readers are concerned, to me and not to the world. Consequently, all my frocks represent my own taste. My clothes have been called “quaint” and “old-fashioned,” often. Perhaps this is largely because I so rarely play modern girls in pictures, and that I may, unconsciously, have followed this type of thing in selecting my own dresses. It is true, I suppose, that I do go in for the more conservative styles ; that I favor the longer skirts, the more graceful sleeves.

The more modest and quiet a costume is, the better I like it. To be well dressed one should be conspicuous only by one’s simplicity. It’s not the size of your wardrobe, but the things in it, that counts. I grow attached to the things I own. One of the nicest dresses I ever had is four years old. I have it still. I never wear it now, of course, but it’s an evening dress, and the only dance I have attended in recent years is associated with it. It is—again! — quaint ; it looks like a gown grandmother would have worn, except for a few decidedly twentieth-century touches. I remember the Editor of Photoplay was present that evening. He came directly over to me. “I like that dress!” he said. Editorial commendation! I like to have every frock I own absolutely individual. I think every woman should. And it isn’t impossible at all. All it requires is a little planning. It is so very easy to take the first frock you come to in a shop, if it pleases you at all. I don’t believe that’s the way to do it. So many frocks are just—frocks; things to wear. Consequently they never seem to belong. They are not part of you. They should be so distinctive that when people see them they exclaim, “That dress belongs to you!” .

Expensive things are not necessarily good. I think it idiotic to dash into a shop, buy something, and dash out again, no matter how much money you may have to spend. Mary Pickford, one of the world’s wealthiest young women, exercises the same care and discrimination as you or I would do or should do.

She doesn’t believe in the careless purchasing of priceless dresses or furs or hats. So don’t feel rebellious if you haven’t all the money in the world to spend on clothes. Select your style, find out what you should wear. Discover whether the long, straight lines, or the fluffy silhouette is more becoming to you. Then dress to your idea of how you would like to look; don’t imitate someone else.

I think the Photoplay Le Bon Ton pattern idea is a splendid one, and that every girl and woman should take advantage of it. These frocks combine good taste and style and you will, I am sure, want to make at least one of them for yourself.