I was feeling fairly motivated today, so I decided to clean out my wardrobe and sort through all of the spring/summer items that I had stored away at the end of last season. I previously posted a blog about my thoughts on
‘Organising Your Wardrobe’, and I use these steps as a general guideline for how I approach my wardrobe every season. I admit that I did things slightly backwards this season because I didn’t take full stock of what I already had before writing up my
spring/summer wishlist – so I’ll now be able to cross quite a few of those items off of my list. (“hooray!” my bank account cries) Now, I would absolutely love it if the weather could instantly change at the start of every season but as we all know, the world does not prescribe to my insane state of organisation. So this is a work in progress, as there needs to be some flexibility with my wardrobe in this transitional stage between seasons. This is my summer wardrobe – dumped onto my bed prior to stage 1:
Nice and messy! So, the first step is to
consider your personal style. Unfortunately for me, I have no real ‘summer’ style. Autumn/winter is my favourite season as far as clothing goes, as I absolutely adore dark shaded clothing (yay!black!), cardigans, coats, tights, jeans, boots etc. Summer in Australia is a b*tch, I’m not going to lie. And it’s very hard to make all of the above work in 40+ degrees celcius temperatures. For me, summer personal style is all about comfort. I am yet to find the balance between looking stylish and not melting. Hopefully this season I’ll be able to work on that! As a general outline, my personal style for this season will include –
[casual] boyfriend fit rolled cuff jeans, american apparel tri-blend v-neck tees in athletic grey or tri-black, canvas slip on shoes, linen blouses in safari shades, cotton sundresses, cropped denim jackets, flat sandals, ray ban wayfarer sunglasses or chloe leather aviators.
[event] dark denim straight leg jeans, peep toe flats, lightweight blouses in floral print or black silk, gold jewelery, peep toe wedges, brightly colours clutch bags.
[work] black pencil skirts, lightweight blouses in floral print or black silk, peep toe wedges. My work clothing is pretty uniform throughout the year – though in the cooler months I wear black opaque tights and cardigans in the office.
The next step is to take an honest look at your wardrobe, which I did today. I sorted through everything I had stored away from last season, and put it into three piles – keep, maybe keep and donate. (which is in fact the next step in my guidelines) Because I had already been thinking about my personal style, and had mentally put together a few outfits in my head for the season, it was easy for me to figure out what I wanted to use and what I would keep in storage for possible use next year.
Note: That may sound strange, not to just have my entire wardrobe out at the one time, but for me it’s really about wearing the pieces I love, and getting the most out of each piece that I buy. It’s also a matter of closet space, as our wardrobe is relatively small and I’ve already had to kick Mr B out to a separate wardrobe even with these guidelines that I follow to make sure my wardrobe is as ‘capsule’ as possible.
Because I had thought of the outfits that I already had in mind, and had written up my spring/summer wardrobe list for this year the next step time to shop was easier than usual. I was able to cross quite a few things off of my shopping list just my shopping in my own closet. For reference, I frequent the following places when it comes to shopping for my wardrobe… (and yes, I do like a varied mix of high and low end pieces in my closet at all times) Basque, (which is stocked exclusively at MYER) for work clothes like dresses and blouses, American Apparel for t-shirts (I stick to the tri-blend v-neck style), Shopbop for Ella Moss and Elizabeth & James blouses and House of Harlow jewelery, Sportsgirl for jeans, Cue for pencil skirts, Jacqui E for really pretty work pieces like embellished cardigans, dresses and blouses. I also love Veronika Maine for beautiful work pieces. GAP for beautiful cotton sundresses, ASOS for the occasional printed sundress (with sleeves – yay!) Ray Ban or Chloe for sunglasses, (and in a dream world – handbags). Country Road or Lanvin for leather ballet flats, K-Mart for canvas slip on shoes. Wittner for Boots. This is just a general list of the places that I frequent 95% of the time when I am looking for things for my wardrobe. I do stray occasionally…
The last rule I really stick to when it comes to my wardrobe guidelines is be organised. I’m sure will not come as a surprise. All of my out of season coats and dresses are stored in a separate wardrobe in the house, and the rest of the clothing is stored in one of these nifty things from IKEA, under the bed. Out of season shoes and bags are stored at the top of the closet in two of these nifty things, again from IKEA.
I am actually looking forward to the warmer weather at the moment (famous last words) and can’t wait to clear out all of the heavy coats and blazers for my closet and start replacing them with cotton sundresses! These are all set aside ready to go when the season finally changes over. Bring on spring!
