All Cloaked Up

For knights and highwaymen, Robin Hood and Superman, capes were no mere fashion. They were a way of life. Romance and adventure might as well have been sewn into the lining: the style guaranteed them. Modern-day versions have even more to offer, with a choice of colors, fabrics and assorted flourishes undreamed of in the days of chivalry. For women this winter, capes are clearly the most popular way to cover up since face powder.

Voluminous Versions. Different cloaks for different folks. The counterculture's fancy runs to officers' capes, Indian ponchos and thrift-shop oldies (especially the heavily embroidered, fringed variety once reserved for' covering grand pianos). Smart young matrons favor practical, less voluminous versions, often reversible and generally hooded. Pacesetters turn out in everything from Revillon's full-length black fox trimmed with chicken feathers and Adolfo's butterfly-wing silk kimono to the all-mink tent that Actress Elsa Martinelli wore over a sequined bathing suit at a Paris play opening. French, Italian and American designers practically all featured winter-weight capes last fall: those sent down the runways for spring are cut in breezy chiffon, ordinary denim and even terry cloth.

"It's dramatic. It's , theatrical. It's warm. It's waterproof. It's just different," said an enthusiastic Boston University coed last week in praise of her cape. For any, all or none of her reasons, cape sales, round the country are still soaring. Both Filene's and Jordan Marsh in Boston report a swirl of business, as do Manhattan's Bloomingdale's, Bonwit Teller and Saks Fifth Avenue, which had a particularly hot run on monks' capes. In Los Angeles, where even the ladies who sell maps to movie stars' homes have been cloaked up for years, boutiques are having trouble keeping capes in stock. A favorite is St. Laurent's Moroccan wool version, already snapped up by Jennifer Jones. The farther-out Reva's Fashions boutique, where Joanne Woodward picked up her reversible Guinevere cloak, has a bestseller in matte jersey, its turban hood framed in ostrich or turkey feathers. Reva's also stocks a show-stopping full-length Levi model, appliqued on the back with a collage of antique fabrics.

Though there are distinct advantages to the cut and flare of capes (swooping into rooms, for example, is hard going in a traditional overcoat), the style has its drawbacks too. Says San Francisco Chronicle Fashion Editor Joan Chatfield-Taylor: "You have to do your swooping out of doors. In a store, you are sure to break everything in sight." Moreover, cape wearers would do well to stock up on small clutch purses: standard-size pocketbooks held beneath the fabric imply that the lady is either pregnant or a smuggler.

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