October 2026 – Building a Wardrobe Starting With Common Shelduck by Dennis A. Jones

October 12, 2026

She’s a statistics expert, and she works with BIRD data – what a great combination of technology and nature! Her inspiration for her personal style is this dapper creature:

Going into full-tilt autumn, our heroine felt that she was relatively well prepared for most of what life had to offer:

I have to share this with you: in the year of my birth, 1960, the average woman’s wardrobe (in the US) was 42 garments. That would be the wardrobe above plus two.

And when I really try to remember what I wore through high school and college (when I was not interested in clothes much at all!), I may have had this many pieces. But I don’t think so…

Now, the average wardrobe is OVER 150 things. What has changed so radically in 66 years? Your thoughts are of great interest to me, since I suspect that quite a few of us have lived through this transition!

But on to our heroine’s accessories. I find the power of accessories to be astonishing:

After returning from the Vermont college adventure of analyzing data from all kinds of new (to her) birds and meeting ALL kinds of bird people, our heroine is amazed to find that her “professional/social” calendar is filling up! She’s now a recognized expert in her field, and she’s welcome at all kinds of luncheons, cocktail parties, one-day conferences and the occasional small dinner party.

Thus, her shopping this month is dressy, with just a whisper of the upcoming winter holidays:

The bird brooch was intentional, buying flats from a company called Birdies was strictly a coincidence!

Now, when she fills in her wardrobe template, she has filled in those “2nd layer” spots and everything lines up perfectly! 

How does it look in her closet? Pretty delectable!

Her bird brooch brings a certain je ne sais quoi to her accessories!

Our heroine bought her velvet jacket and skirt without ANY intention of wearing them together – the jacket is just long enough that it’s going to hang down over the tops of the gathers of her skirt, and she knows it will look lumpy and draggy…

But that’s no reason NOT to buy two velvet garments! Everything doesn’t have to be worn in every possible combination; she has plenty of other ideas:

Some people get their holiday wardrobe in place really early, like this heroine. Others wait until the stores are jam-packed with beads and sequins before they start looking.

And some of us wear the same things we wore last year! And the year before…

love,
Janice

Would you be interested in “flashing back” to the earlier posts in which is heroine assembled her wardrobe? Those posts are here: Christmas Eve Preview, January, February, March, April, May, June, July, August, September

p.s. Ten years ago, we were almost finished building a wardrobe in navy, beige, pink and soft blue; in this post we added a complete outfit of a sweater, shirt and shorts!

p.p.s. If you’re shopping at a website that you don’t see in my links, but you would like to help support The Vivienne Files, check out this page, where I’ve put links to a lot of retailers with whom I have some kind of business relationship. I’m not going to get rich, but I can at least afford plenty of coffee!