Spring brings to mind images of garden parties presided over by ladies in floral tea dresses, ladies on a first name basis with Miss Manners.
It's not easy being gracious; those ladies get trained at boot camp, by Lady Margaret, for whom manners are a business.
Twice a month during the summer, Margaret JoAnne Tavener, owner of Victorian Fancies and Tea Society, presides over Victorian girls day camp in Reno.
The weeklong camp is designed to produce polished young ladies well-acquainted with the skills that girls once learned from their mothers: cooking, baking, needlework and, of course, etiquette.
In that one week, Tavener teaches girls to dance the Virginia Reel and Victorian ball dances popular during the Civil War era.
She teaches women's history and the history of tea.
Toward week's end, she oversees the now-polished young ladies as they attend a formal tea.
The idea grew out of Tavener's former business.
She had catered private tea parties at Lake Tahoe for 11 years.
She then operated Lady Margaret's Tea Room and Treasures, an Incline Village restaurant and gift shop, for seven years." Is tea time coming back into fashion? "At first it was slow moving," she says,"but in recent years business has picked up." That's when she started the Victorian day camps for girls, held for two years at Incline Village.When Tavener moved to southwest Reno, she brought along the camp concept.
No marketing is required, she says, because word-of-mouth fills her finishing school."Parents are wanting their daughters to be more feminine again." Lady Margaret's prices: $175 per girl to attend each week of class, which accommodates up to 10 girls aged six to 14.
Has she thought about expanding, or even franchising the business? No, says Tavener, she's happy with the part-time schedule for now."I've been in business 24/7 since I was 21 years old.
Since I sold the tea room two years ago, I've been easing back into it.
It's such a fun business, I really enjoy what I do." Recently, says Tavener, business women in downtown Reno asked her to teach them how to entertain.
This fall, she plans to roll out a new class for adults to teach dining and entertaining etiquette.
Good manners are not just for girls.
Each spring and fall, Lady Margaret runs a six-session co-ed class on etiquette, evenly split between boys and girls, and bracketed into four age groups.
She charges $35 for each one to two-hour class.
