The Guardian

Play Clothes Run
Gamut of Rainbow

Riotous Color Is Feature of
Sports Wardrobe.

By CHERIE NICHOLAS

Riotous color will transform the playgrounds of America this summer into one giant palette of vivids and pastels, for play clothes are running the gamut of the rainbow.

This major portion of every feminine wardrobe gets the iron test for the days of spectator sports for women are over. Once a violet bathing suit would be carefully shielded from the sun's fading rays and salt water's deteriorating effect by remaining on the beach under the protection of a parasol. Now that suit takes to the surf and is dried under the sun with careless indifference.

Tennis shorts and dresses are forsaking white to splash color on the courts. Stains resulting from spills on the clay or grass will have to fight it out in the washtub—with color and fabric the winner.

Even jodhpurs, riding breeches, coats, vests and stocks are getting away from the conventional gray, brown, and white, and appearing in sage green, brilliant orange, French blue and daffodil yellow. Cleaners' bills are taboo on a limited budget—so the battle of the washboard rages.

The textile manufacturers thus challenged by the feminine sports contingent are rushing to the laboratories for help. Color fastness, washability and wearability are as important as design and price to wise Miss America.

One large manufacturer of cotton and rayon fabrics, after a survey of thousands of women, has put a "fact-tag" on all its material, giving the woman the information which she demands. She now knows the exact facts about the material and understands just what she can expect of the garment she has purchased.