I don't miss dress check. I'd always get stuck behind "that girl" that had the inappropriate outfit. I'm glad that I got the classic black dress though as it comes in handy now. I think that its a necessary evil to make sure that the girls look their best and the clothes are ok.

Hootie, the individual in question was 2 years behind me, so she's graduated by now. Unfortunately I now live too far away from my chapter to really help out with anything. :(

I have a thought on the dress thing - I once saw a choir perform, where all the men did the standard "concert wear" tux, but instead of standard black and white, the women all wore different brightly colored dresses - like jewel tones. If you did something like that, you wouldn't have to worry about matching colors. You would just specify sleeve and hem length, and things like "no backless dresses", and let everyone pick out her own. That way, everyone gets something she likes, and you really stand out during pref.

I think that would be pretty but we already have a day that we wear solid colored dresses. At pref we look for some kind of continuity. The reason I thought red or green is that they are our colors. A room full of red would be striking I think, but green would probably look better on most people.

In the spring, our rush chair picks out the exact outfits, brings samples to the chapter house, and everyone tries them on and orders the correct sizes.
Last year we wore:
Day One: khacki shorts, tank tops, and sandals.
Day Two: Capris, Shells, Strappy Sandals*.
Day Three: Black Pants*, Boots*, bright tank tops.
Pref: Black Dresses*.
We were responsible for getting all the starred items, the rest were ordered for the chapter.
We do another dress check when school starts to make sure it all works.

lyrelyre,

I think the green would be better just because there are a lot of sororities that use red. Green would be OK if it was a mossy or celery-type color - not screaming kelly green. Then again, you have to make sure it doesn't look like you're wearing camoflauge. :)

Dress....I have a couple of thoughts.

My chapter back a few years ago, we hired a PR consultant. She comes every year and does dress checks (head to toe) during work week. Interesting, but worked. And no, we didn't go to a big snooty campus, just wanted to be great!

I agree with individuality, but think some conformity is great.

Pref dress idea: We had dark purple dresses, very nice. Our colors are white and royal purple, so that was appropriate.

I really don't like seeing women in "bar" clothes during recruitment though.
Great topic!

I agree somewhat. I think a sage green would be pretty. On my campus every chapter wears black or white, so any color would be different. I was thinking red because of the statement it makes-an eye full of red is much more stunning as long as it looks good.

paying for all the same clothes
 

When the chapter orders the clothes, we all get billed for them, so it is not the chapter paying for it. It's actually cheaper than buying your rush clothes on your own since we get a discount for ordering in bulk. We have used different companies. We never get all of our stuff from the same place. I know we have had stuff from Gap, Old Navy, Speigel, Express, etc.

How early do the clothes get there? Is there time for alterations if they are needed? Do people throw a fit about the costs? About how much does it cost? Where did you find a pref. dress?

I know I'm asking a lot of questions but I'm an advisor and my rush chair is trying to eliminate wardrobe problems.

OOOh, I really like the idea of pref dresses in sorority colors!

What if you did classic red dresses (sleeveless, knee-length) with green scarves tied around the neck?

Or solid hunter green with a red carnation pinned on?

Does your house line up in the hallway to greet the PNM's at the door? If so, I also think it would look beautiful if every-other girl wore solid red/green.

You don't think it would look like Christmas with all the red and green?

Well, no I don't. I mean, those ARE your colors. I think the PNM's will all be aware of that and won't associate it with the holiday. I may be a little biased as my boyfriend is a Kappa Sigma, but I always think that as long as it's done in a very classy manner the red/green thing always looks fantastic!

Rush clothing is extremely important on our campus. People will talk for weeks about ABC's dresses, and XYZ's skimpy tank tops. This past year we had dress checks at our spirit week, the week before rush, and our VP Membership told us if we needed to get something else. I think our outfits were really cute, and worked for everyone.
Each day has a theme for us. On the first day, it's school spirit day, and everyone is supposed to wear shirts that say USF on them, or sometimes sororities will have their members wear shirts from other prganizations that they are in on campus. We wore black baby T's that said USF Kay Dee embroidered in gold, jeans and black sandals. The second day is philanthropy day, and we wore fitted polo shirts, either light pink, light blue, or black, and khaki capris, with brown or black sandals. The third day was video day, and our theme was Glamour, so we got the fitted t shirts from Express, in all different colors, and wore them with nice black pants and cute accesories. For prefs, we wear black cocktail dresses, with black pantyhose and shoes. And on bid day, you just wear your bid day shirt and jeans, or shorts, or khakis.

I think a red/green combo or either by itself would be pretty. We've always worried that with red, green, lyres, and angels that things will start to look a little Christmas-like. I saw the cutest sweatshirt once but I couldn't bring myself to get it. It was solid and it had letters embroidered in red and green and next to them a blond-haired angel playing a lyre. It was so December, if you know what I mean. So anyway, we always try to be careful about too much red and green. Then again the university isn't worried about Halloween (orange and black) so why should we worry-right?

KD, that sounds almost exactly like what my chapter wears. I mean, right down to the descriptions of the shirts and the khaki capris...:)