“Sometimes, people think aesthetics are superficial, but I think they can be deep. I love the atmosphere and the visuals. So, I do what I love. Some people connect with it, and others don’t. It reminds me of something Anjelica told me in my 20s: ‘Not everyone is going to like you.’ It saved me years of disappointment.”
–Sofia Coppola, in conversation with Anjelica Huston and Philip Galanes
for the New York times (entire interview found here)
From what I have learnt from being a slightly obsessive shopper (and nowadays a cured one!) is that the key to a good wardrobe is consistency.
If you are a jumper-and-jeans kind of girl like me, why frolic yourself into a wardrobe full of tight bodycon dresses? Sure, you’d perhaps please the eye of a man or two, but if you feel uncomfortable in what you wear then what is the point actually?
The same for me goes for layers and light colours. With my complexion I’ve figured that anything light pink, blue, yellow, or whatever colour in the range of pastel just looks odd on my skin and highlights the green shades of it and therefore makes me look gloomy and ominous.
Layers are what makes me feel like a little guppy balloon and makes my clothes feel tight on my body – a feeling which I hate. For me layers strictly mean a t-shirt and a blazer/jacket at most.
Having learnt what works best for your body makes shopping a facile, check a box kind of activity rather than a tedious and often unsatisfying hunt. Sometimes it is truly better to admire things from afar and keep consistency into buying things you will actually look good in.
Some say it takes a lot of effort to become effortless. This is my tenue du jour, and frankly this has been my tenue du every jour of this winter season, besides the jumper which I happen to replace for a shirt every now and then or a striped top. Also, when the days will be getting lighter I will replace the darker Dicker boots with my beige coloured pair. On days that there happens to be rain I will religiously wear my chelsea boots out of fear of suede damage. They give a ‘rougher’ edge to outfit, I happened to notice. Alas, this still remains the skeleton of all my outfits.
A.P.C. Jumper / Zara jeans / Oversized coat / Isabel Marant Dicker boots / Omega wristwatch / Chanel ‘Coco’ Perfume / Chanel ‘Mademoiselle’ Lipstick / RayBan Wayfarer Sunglasses
I sometimes get asked whether I mistake dressing in a basic way as dressing in a boring way. As a serious outfit repeater this question is an unavoidable one, but I dare to say now that I have never spent less time picking an outfit than I did before.
Take my two pairs of Isabel Marant Dicker Boots. Both styles were utter investments, first one I made while still being at university and the latter one was made last year, as a self-given celebration gift for switching jobs. Both are worn for complete contrasting occasions; the beige ones are the everyday-type of boots, but the black pair instantly levels-up a simple ensemble, sprouting their casual chic wherever I walk.
I am at a point where I experience the joyous moment of picking an outfit in the morning in less than five minutes while maintaining one level of consistency when it comes to my style. I have a closet consisting of basic items, which after a couple of years and wear need replacement. Every now and then I decide that my basic wardrobe would need a new staple, and go through a rigoruous search for the perfect style. But to call myself somewhat of a ‘minimalist’ would be considered downright blasphemy.
Frankly, I am fed up with the fallacy of calling one-self a minimalist. Nowadays, talks about ‘minimalist fashion’ are nothing but a hold-up for ambigiuous fits and androgynous one-layer ensembles, where girls wear twenty different versions of the ‘palazzo pants’ and the shapeless sweatshirt/jumper to look in-style for a month or three. I can tell you with a hundred percent sincereness that I find it rather hard to call someone with an exaggerated shopping habit, a closet full of gifted and/or sponsored clothes and a contemporary shoe collection consisting out of a four-digit number a ‘minimalist.’ Though I also find it hard to express what minimalism then consists of. But I certainly do know that it is more than dressing up as a Stella McCartney/Alexander Wang worshipper or proudly wearing a pair of simple Celine sandals and a white t-shirt while proclaiming you have endorsed ‘minimalism’.
Breaking fashion down to it’s bare essentials, it’s nothing more than sheer consumerism, while minimalism is a live-long search that goes way beyond the simpleness of fashion. So in my humble opinion, combining the words ‘fashion’ and ‘minimalist’ is a bit contradictory. And honestly, how is someone participating in the idea of a basic wardrobe when there are five different pairs of Celine shoes in their closet? It’s rather odd – I would advice every single one of them to look up the meaning of the word ‘minimalist.’
I’m the kind of a gal who does not feel at ease in any type of dressing I would declare ‘fancy.’ Don’t get me wrong – I love being chic and looking taken care of, but it is something about wearing something fancy that makes me me feel completely self-conscious and not like myself at all.
Take, for instance, the dress. I have a penchant for dresses and feel a bit helpless whenever I acquire one and am unable to work my way around it. Frankly, I even feel a bit of a wit from time to time when i see these Mediterranean ladies sporting the loveliest of ensembles on, for example, The Sartorialist (here and here).
Truth be told, in this society where I thrive to think men and women are at equal (sadly, hardly ever the case in reality) I think the dress is becoming very slowly an obsolete piece. Sure, by wearing the classic garment we might fill up to society’s idea of the ‘feminine woman,’ but nowadays, dolling up like that feels often a bit unnecessary and frankly a hassle to a jeans-and-shirts type of girl like me.
Anyway, I wasn’t supposed to broach this matter today but merely pop in for a couple of words on dresses. The type I would wear would be a dress that has to offer comfort, ooze a certain type of ‘chic’ and in the meantime would not make me look the overly feminine type of girl. Sounds hardly impossible doesn’t it?
The dress pictured above is one I’d wish I could wear with panache one day. It’s terribly elegant and I would not feel anywhere near self-conscious while sporting this piece. It is done by The Row and you can find it, among a couple of similiar styles here. A less splurging version under 100 euros (by Alexander Wang) can be acquired here.
I’m known for being somewhat tough on myself when it comes to style.
When I look back on my younger years I realise clearly that I’ve had periods where I preferred quantity over quality, which implied going to the shops just to buy ‘something’ for a dinner date or any other specific event. I had a wardrobe that was bulging and at the same time a chronic feeling of dissatisfaction on not knowing what to wear. When I’d buy a magazine I’d encircle the trends that I liked, or perhaps only colours and styles and I would kind of namelessly go on the hunt for a similar item, while I would forget about it one month later.
The second time in my life I had to move places (I moved to Madrid, Spain for a job) I was given the hard choice of only packing one suitcase for a (minimum of a) one-year period. Knowing myself (and therefore knowing the fact that my style changes as my mood…a couple of times per day) I zipped in a coat, a scarf, a bunch of shirts, one pair of jeans, a pair of black slacks and three pairs of shoes. A decision I haven’t regretted since.
Even though I was seen as a serious outfit repeater in Madrid (sorry, stylish Madrileno friends!) I did have the most consistent, easy to assemble and matching wardrobe I ever owned. Those pieces were simple, sleek and of good quality and were so easy to put together in the morning that I even had time to treat myself to a cup of coffee AT HOME (goodbye spilling coffee over your all-white ensemble in the metro on your way to work-kind of mornings).
Moving to France however made things a little trickier. Where Madrid was the easiest place to not be tempted into buying-madness (although ZARA did unfortunately pull me in a couple of times) France was a little different. Being constantly surrounded by all the beautiful clothes, style and charm of the French I felt a sudden need to ‘refresh’ and ‘update’ my wardrobe. That’s when I decided that a little list would bring order in my life.
Hence my little list of so-called ‘must-have’ basics. I will always, however, insist on finding basics that work for your style – and even more important your figure, so a little experimenting is at its place. Call me compulsive, but I think that sticking to a list can help getting a grip on your buying impulses and even on your spending habits. And everyone likes to work towards a goal, don’t they?
