Everybody's Oscar

Into the Manhattan premiere of the film Camelot swept Socialite Drue Heinz, resplendent in her pink brocade Oscar de La Renta gown. Then another limousine and out stepped Socialite Jean Tailer, proudly wearing her pink brocade Oscar de La Renta gown. And then came Socialite (and super saleswoman for Bergdorf Goodman) Jo Hughes, equally chic in the identical Oscar de La Renta gown.

Nowadays, women take such once dreaded confrontations in stride. "We all laugh when we see ourselves in duplicate or triplicate," says Jo Hughes. Besides, the situation could have been a whole lot worse. For the same $500 dress is owned by no fewer than 150 women, including such other notables as Ethel Kennedy, Cee-Zee Guest, Mrs. Douglas Dillon, Mrs. John R. Drexel III and Mrs. Arthur Gardner. Worn on those backs, proclaimed Society Columnist Suzy Knickerbocker, "it's the dress of the year."

Huggy Feeling. The gown is made of soft metallic brocade in a muted floral pattern, has short sleeves and a deep, slotted decolletage that can be hooked shut modestly or opened all the way down to a softly pulled obi sash in front. "If you feel sexy, you can open all the snaps," says Jean Tailer. "And if a woman has any figure problems, the dress disguises them." "I'm sick of the flowing dresses that have been around--I love the huggy feeling this dress gives your figure," says Noreen Drexel, who wore hers to dinner at the White House recently and got compliments from all the men. Says Socialite Ames Gushing, who works as De La Renta's assistant: "I feel beautiful in it. It's regal, but it's comfortable too."

It is also a sample of the kind of dress that has made debonair, soft-spoken Oscar de La Renta, 34, the most talked-about and envied new young designer. Born in the Dominican Republic ("Most of my family were diplomats; my father was in insurance"), Oscar opted for art, switched" to fashion in Paris, where he designed for Lanvin before coming to the U.S. to work with Elizabeth Arden. On his own for only two years, in September he picked up his first Coty American Fashion Critics Award ("Winnie") as the best U.S. designer of 1967.

Nothing Exaggerated. De La Renta is strictly a wholesale designer (exceptions: his wedding dresses for Anne Ford Uzielli and Minnie Gushing Beard). Among his customers are Babe Paley, the Duchess of Windsor and all the Kennedys except Jackie, whose loyalty is still to Rome's Valentino. Says De La Renta of his dress of the year: "It's very feminine. There is nothing exaggerated about it, and many different types of women can wear it."

The same could be said about De La Renta's clothes generally, for he designs with the woman of over 30 firmly in mind. "There is no other age for a woman," he says. "When she is over 30, she is just starting to live her life to the fullest." A man of his word, Oscar de La Renta during a lunch hour last week slipped down to New York's city hall to marry Franchise de Langlade, 36, outgoing editor of French Vogue. By mid-afternoon he was back at work, putting the finishing touches on his spring collection.

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