Making Lounge Wear More Daring, Intimate, Enticing

“Luring is a beautiful ceremony--a deft, calculated choreography. It’s a baited breath, a heightened heartbeat . . . the imagination spurred by what is hidden and only partially shown.”

Sound like a bit of daring dialogue from a Sidney Sheldon movie? Not quite.

It’s advice from Bill Tice, whose new book, “Enticements” (MacMillan, $24.95), is similarly sensual. And why not, coming from the Coty-award-winning designer who has spent hundreds of hours in lingerie fitting rooms of women around the world?

Tice--the first to bring lingerie out of the boudoir and into the ballroom--has seen some of the best. He’s created lounge wear for such socialites as Happy Rockefeller, Nancy Kissinger and Jacqueline Onassis, not to mention a host of movie stars.

For Tice, writing a book about looking beautiful in bed was not only a natural but a necessity.

“I’ll never forget the time I was at I. Magnin’s, and a famous man’s wife and mistress happened to be shopping for lingerie at the same time,” he recalls. “I couldn’t help but switch the hangers in front of the dressing rooms. Of course, they screamed when they saw the selections. Now, if I could only have gotten the wife to take the hint and rid herself of the boring pink peignoir sets, it could have changed her whole life.”

Whether for passion or pure relaxation, getting in touch with “your best bedroom self” requires learning about your most intimate self, he adds.

“Working women want to relax and look feminine when they come home,” he says. “The problem is that most just don’t know how.”

Tice tries to show them by giving textbook transformations. “The-Mom-in-the-Robe,” for example, is a busy woman who “lives for her family. But she looks so lived-in around the house that no one’s spirits get the (visual) boost they deserve from the warmth she has to offer.”

Tice’s diagnosis: “Mom’s big fear is that pretty clothes are impractical.” His prescription: She must understand that her family would feel more nurtured if she nurtured her own intimate look. She must take the dowdiness out of her at-home clothes, drop the knee-length button-up housedresses, the sloppy belted chenille robe, the 24-hour jogging suit and “all slippers that look like small, furry animals.”

Instead, she should wear vivid front-zip caftans or cotton hip-length tunics with pants in happy colors, such as blue (which is calming), jade green (which heals), yellow (which projects wisdom) or pink (the color of love).

When she does wear a robe, he insists it be a sherbet-colored fleece (rainbow and sherbet colors enhance and soften the face.)

The self-described “clothes doctor” diagnoses and prescribes remedies for six other classic cases, including the “pajama preppy,” who clings to her frill-free, tailored and classic look 24 hours a day. For her, he suggests softer interpretations in glamorous fabrics--a white, hip-sashed, hammered satin tunic over wide-leg pants, for example, a la Katharine Hepburn.

“But once you decide what you’d like to wear, you must choose the style that minimizes figure flaws,” he cautions.

“Anyone, even a woman with a thick waist or sagging fanny, can look good in figure-revealing clothes” if they’re designed to turn the eye away from what shouldn’t be seen.

For instance, if you’re short and fairly slim, he suggests you stay away from mid-calf or knee-length styles because they cut the body in half. Stick to very long or very short styles.

For unusually tall or full figures, he recommends caftans or djellabas with interesting necklines.

“But enticement,” Tice admits, “should go beyond clothes. It’s important that you not only dress yourself, but your walls, your tables, your light bulbs. Everyone looks good at Elizabeth Arden; they’ve been using pink light bulbs for years.

“And don’t forget flowers and candlelight by the bed.”