Weekend Wrap-up: Friday Readings

I'm in New York, joining the other desperate folks trying to navigate the NYC rental market (more on that later!), but here's some reading for your friday fun day.

Garance Dore talks about her five commandments of fashion.   I particularly like numbers 4 and 5.  She talks about realizing that certain clothes don't work for you and how that's ok.  Something I wish someone had told my 15 year old homeschooled self who insisted on buying low-rise, wide-leg jeans.

A post on creating a 40 hanger closet.  I'm not sure that would really work for me.  For one thing, the first thing I thought when I read it was "Does it count as cheating if you just fold your clothes?".  The sentence about having a closet full of clothes you didn't really like hit close to home.  That was whole impetus for this project in the first place.

Also, if you want to listen to me ramble about where I'm at with my own closet editing efforts . . . this week I wrote about realizing that I had gotten a bit side tracked (also you'll learn a new word in tagalog) and needed to re-visit my big picture questions.

Happy Friday everyone!

Checking the Roadmap: Part 2

Back in February, I started out with five big picture questions.  Now, that I'm almost five months into my project, I wanted to revisit them and to see if I am on track.  First off . . .

What do I actually own?

I've made some good progress on this one.  So far, I've logged data on 173 items.  53 of which I've set aside to be donated and I'm getting a pretty good idea of what's in my closet.**

What do I actually wear and what do I love wearing?

(er, what can I get rid of?)

Again, I'm definitely making progress on this one.  Though I am still working my way through my wardrobe to figure out how many of those 173 items I actually wear.

I learned that, in the past, I bought a lot of things that I didn't love.  Consequently those items just sat in my closet.  I also had been holding on to a lot of items that were past their prime.  (When you've convinced yourself that that white blouse was originally beige, you know it's time for it to go. TMI, I know).  But looking at my clothes in terms of how much I love actually wearing them (versus how much I love hoarding them) has helped me to be a lot more objective.    

What do I need to make my wardrobe more functional?

Have you met me? My name is K__ and I apparently own all pants and no shirts.  It's the perfect wardrobe for a part-time nudist, but less functional for a working semi professional.  Joking aside, I've really only answered part of this question.  I think this is where I could really benefit from moving beyond my piecemeal analysis and take a more holistic view of my closet.  For example, does the number of dresses I own negate my need for more tops? And, other scintillating questions like that.

Also, I should probably define what "functional" means for me . . . 

What is my personal style?

AND

Once I have all the basics, 

what should I buy to make my wardrobe more "me"?

I'm lumping these two together because in order to answer the second part, I really need to figure out the personal style issue first.  Also, I'm still not entirely sure that it's something I can determine using my current metrics.  (Or it might just tell me I have a complete lack of style).  One thought I had was to figure out who my fashion icons are (Audrey Hepburn, for starters, obvi) and then determine out how well my current wardrobe matches up with their style.  But, I'm not convinced that's the best way and any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.  Though if I succeed and you see an Filipino Audrey walking around DC, please give her a high five . . . 

Le sigh. I think all of this is going to take some deep soul searching so please excuse me while I go read  Teen Vogue . . .  

**In full disclosure, I haven't finished entering in all the items I decided to consign yet so this number will be a big higher. 

Checking the Roadmap

What do you do when you're lost?  Let me rephrase, what do you do when you're lost and Siri can't help you?

• If you're Mr. C . . . you walk around until you get a signal and then put Siri to work. 
• If you're my brother . . . you shrug your shoulders and stop for a pint at the nearest bar (after all, you were probably on your way to one when you got lost)
• And, if you're me, you put on your best damsel-in-distress face, maybe check to make sure you're showing enough skin, and then go and find the nearest friendly policeman/sales clerk/friendly stranger.

Side bar:  In tagalog, we call this your kawawa face.  You can go check out the english translation, which doesn't really do it justice, but it really looks like this: 

When that inevitably fails, I go pure old school and go find a map.
 . . . Then I go and find Mr. C because I'm terrible at reading maps.

* * *

Back in February, when I first started this project, I laid out a basic roadmap with the big picture questions I wanted to answer and the criteria I would use in building my ideal closet.  Given my current lack of focus, it seems like a good time to revisit those big picture questions and see if I'm making any progress in answering them.   Check back later for my self-assessment!

**It was either that or make kawawa faces at strangers on the internet . . . which is clearly not a good idea. 

Escaping Tunnel Vision

Last week was a week of not writing thinking and reassessing.  Do you ever have those weeks, where you just think a lot? I seem to have a lot of them which might explain why I was such a lonely introverted child

I thought about a lot of things, mostly some big plans we have for the next few months, but I also spent some time reassessing this project and what I'm actually trying to accomplish.  And, of course there was some wine to go along with all this thinking.  Somewhere in between a glass of cab and a bottle of pinot noir (I kid, I kid . . . two bottles of pinot noir),  I came to the realization that I might have gotten a little sidetracked.

Yes, it's been helpful to look at how many tops I own to figure out which ones I like and which ones I can get rid of.  And, it would be easy to keep on with this path, looking at pants and skirts next, then dresses and so on, and so on.  But, doing that only gives me a piecemeal analysis, only letting me look at one part of my closet at a time, instead of taking a more holistic approach.  (Not to mention that it's a little bit of a snooze fest)

Sooooo, with that said, I'm going to dedicate the next few weeks to getting back on track, looking at the bigger picture, and probably enjoying a few glasses of wine.

Weekend Wrap-Up -- The Derecho that Wasn't

So . . . about that big storm that was supposed to hit DC this week . . . I don't pretend to be the weather gods (at least not publicly) but somehow instead of epic thunderstorms, we got 80 degrees and almost no humidity.  I don't know what happened, but it's fabulous.  I'm hoping this weather lasts all weekend, since Mr. C and I have some fun plans, including attending at wedding in St. Michaels.  I've never been there and am pretty excited to check it out.  And, possibly enjoy many a few classic cocktails while overlooking the Chesapeake.

Not that I need an excuse, but I will be celebrating the fact that I somehow managed 4 posts this week, which is a first for me.  (I'm not entirely sure where that productivity came from, but please don't expect it in the future).  In case you missed them . . .

This week I:

• Took a closer look at the items I consigned 
• Confessed that I was suffering from "Shoppers Block"
• Took (over) analyzing my closet to a new level by looking at my clothes by color
• Then shared some of the items I'm thinking about buying

Happy weekend!!!!

Summer (Top) Lovin'

. . . had me a blast.  Summer loving, happened so fast . . .Anyone else feeling in the mood for some Grease? No?

Looking at my clothes by color yesterday was surprisingly helpful.  Looking at my closet, I've always assumed that most of my work bottoms fell into the black/gray/beige spectrum.  So, when I'd look for tops, I tried to find items that worked with those colors.  While it maybe true that my wardrobe, as a whole, my summer skirts and pants have a lot more color than I originally thought.  Given that I only have 11 summer bottoms, I'm a little embarrassed that it took making a color wheel for me to figure this out.  

This probably also explains why I sometimes have trouble putting my clothes together into outfits . . . it's a lot easier when you try to buy things that actually go together.  Excuse me while I go teach myself some basic logic . . . 

Moving on . . . I started looking around to see if I could find some tops that were a better fit for my summer wardrobe.  And, having those colors (blues, greens, pinks) in the back of my mind made narrowing down my options much easier.  Also, I don't know if the manufacturing gods heard my rant against polyester, but suddenly I'm seeing a few more cotton options than I was before.  Here are a few of the items I'm considering:

Summer Tops by kpcullen 

See! A lot more color.  Though it seems that with the exception of that green peplum, I'm gravitating toward one shape: boxy.  At least those items are easy to belt, right? Anyway, I'm not sure if I'll end up buying all some of these items but at least I have some more options and a better idea of what I'm looking for.  Though, by the time I decide on something and actually buy it . . . it will probably be fall.

Color Wheel

After yesterday's post, I figured I should take a page out of my own play book and try looking at this situation from a different perspective.  Maybe getting a better idea of what types of tops I'm looking for will help me in focus my efforts a little more.

Let's start with what I know . . .
I know I'm looking for versatile, easy pieces that are easy to dress-up or down.  From my tops breakdown, I know that the one summer top  I like is a grey, sleeveless blouse that I can throw a blazer or cardigan over wear into the Fall or even late Spring.

           Ok . . . that's kind of helpful, but I've sort of already been applying this without much luck.  But maybe I've been looking at this the wrong way.  I've been focusing on versatility in terms of style and season, but I haven't really thought about what items will fit with my current wardrobe. I decided to try and look at my work wardrobe in terms of color and see if I could learn anything.

Closet Colors | Create infographics

Ok, so I own a lot of black.  Perhaps I should consider a career as a funeral director (or start hanging out with Chazz Reinhold).

Based on this data alone, my best bet would be to only buy items that go with black.  But, things change a little when I narrow my focus.  I decided to only look at the colors of my pants and skirts (since these are the items I need to match my tops too) and also filter out anything that I can't wear in the spring or summer--since that's the season that's the biggest priority for me right now:

Closet Colors: Pants and Skirts | Create infographics

There's a lot more room for color here.  There's still a good amount of black but those tend to parts of suits, which I (thankfully) don't have to wear every day.  While I do break up my suits, I would say that I tend to steer away from black in the summer (DC summer survival 101), unless it's an unusually cool day.   So, maybe my best bet would be to focus on items that can go with the other colors in my closet.

Not sure if this will help break my shoppers block, but it's at least a starting point to help me refine my shopping efforts a little more!