Capsule wardrobes inspired by art and nature
You've certainly figured out that I'm an avowed scarf fan, and so working on posts that center around scarves is a delight for me. These are a few that stand out in my mind:
Start with a Scarf: Capri Scarf from Radical Chic
Start with a Scarf: Le Voyage de Pytheas by Hermes
The "Difficult" Scarf: Sepia and Light Grey
Start with a Scarf: Gentian Blue by Yuh Okano love, Janice ... View the Post
I love Start with Art, and Start with Nature, but some of the most interesting posts I've ever done have started with a vase, a cabbage, a photograph of eggs, and a photograph of a pigeon!
Start with a Vase: A Qianlong Vase, and packing for China
Start with Nature: Ornamental Cabbage - a Four Pack
Start with Nature: Bird's Eggs photograph from Kevin Fleming Photography
Start with Nature: Pigeons love, Janice
... View the Post
October 10, 2015 I'm not sure exactly why I love these so much, because I never wear camel! But I really love the way the richness of the color works so beautifully with deep jewel tones, or soft pastels. If I had the coloring to look gorgeous in camel, I'd be ALL over it...
Four Pack: Camel and Burgundy
How to Pack for a Long Weekend: Teal and Camel
How to Pack for a Long Weekend: Navy and Camel
How to Pack for a Long Weekend: Camel and Wine love, Janice ... View the Post
September 28, 2015 So when we last visited our heroine, former family caregiver become corporate Public Relations executive, she was thriving in her new position. And it didn't go unnoticed by her employer's competition!
Headhunters began to emerge from the shrubbery...
And one day, she was called into the Director's office.
10 minutes later, she's holding a VERY large retention bonus in her hand, in exchange for her signature on a two-year contract.
VERY LARGE retention bonus.
She went back to her office. She closed the door, burst out laughing. With a bit of silly, breathless squeaking mixed in.
And she cried, just for a second.
Then she called her husband. And then the travel agent...
She ... View the Post
September 24, 2015
And, as promised, another look at this scarf, with a completely different color scheme!
Doesn't this look completely different when folded and worn this way?
I'm eschewing all accents this time, and going strictly for some interesting neutrals:
She Doesn't Mean to be Difficult... But the prototypes were entirely wrong. Wrong color. Wrong sizes. Wrong details. You have to wonder if the had the specifications upside down...
So she's off to Milan, to have a serious chat with the knitting mill management!
It's not that she doesn't like Milan - she loves it - but this isn't a good time to have to make this trip. She won't have time for more than one really amazing ... View the Post
September 23, 2015
One last visit with our friend who spent so many years taking care of her family...
A Well-Deserved Move Up... She put her head down, learned everything she could, pitched in wherever she was needed, and became more productive and more indispensable every day. She didn't complain about menial tasks, nor repetitious projects. She was pleasant but not ingratiating, helpful but not servile, and intelligent without making anyone want to whap her in the head. She was, in short, a dream employee.
Of course she was - she was mature enough to know what really matters!
So one day, when the manager wanted to talk to her, she had no concerns that she was in trouble for something.
And in fact, it was ... View the Post
September 22, 2015
Let's come back to this great painting and color scheme, and see what our wonderful care-giver is up to...
A Shift of Focus As time passed, our care giver discovered that her responsibilities gradually diminished. Her parents were in a facility that gave them the kind of attention they deserved, after their life of work and service. Her children were grown and starting their own lives as adults. And her husband - like all of the best life partners - only wanted for her to be happy and fulfilled.
So she decided to get a job...
First thing was to make sure she had something interview-worthy, so she found a navy skirt that she could wear with her navy blazer. While the fabrics are very ... View the Post
September 21, 2015 I love this painting; it lives just down the street from me at the Art Institute of Chicago. Severini isn't well-known, and I think that's a shame - his Cubist works are lovely...
This painting lends itself to a color scheme firmly grounded in versatile neutrals, but sparked with some extraordinary accent colors. In addition to the pink and blue that I've chosen, you've got some beautiful yellow, a hint of true red, and some aqua too!
Care-giving as Art She took care of them all - children, spouse, parents, neighbors, and never missed a beat...
And she always looked lovely while doing so! Never over-done or fussy, and ALWAYS appropriate to the occasion and the activities. But ... View the Post
September 16, 2015
Another beautiful scarf...This one, entitled Cvetaeva, is from the amazingly talented and creative team at wrq.e.d. The images include collages, ball point pen illustrations, florals, and a poem, by Marina Cvetaeva. It's written around the border: the dear art of oblivion the soul has mastered all the way. some overwhelmingly big feeling melted within my soul today. This is the wondrous object:
The first time I looked at the scarf, these were the colors that I saw. I was always envisioning this with burnished brown accessories, to reflect the beauty of the border of the scarf:
She's a Poet Yes, she earns her daily bread as an office manager for a real estate company. But if you ... View the Post
One last look at our beautiful art, and the very unusual, but workable, color scheme that I chose from it:
You Must Always Look Elegant and Refined That's what they told her when she accepted the position. They even give her a clothing allowance any time they change the color scheme of the business, which is every 4 to 6 months, sometimes more often!
But she's clever, and knows that they aren't going to ask for receipts, so she chooses timeless, elegant, classic clothes that might be "recyclable" into a later scheme...
Cashmere cardigan – Uniqlo; wool skirt – J. Crew; Silk shirt – Stella McCartney; trousers – J. Crew
She knows that a simple ivory silk blouse might be usable in any number of different "aesthetic ... View the Post
September 11, 2015
Yesterday, I put together what I thought was a pretty casual wardrobe, based on this painting. It wasn't the MOST casual thing imaginable - it included skirts and nice sweaters - but it would certainly be appropriate for most non-work activities that didn't include garage cleaning, painting, or basement mucking...This is our art, and our color scheme:
In order to take yesterday's wardrobe to work, I upgraded the skirt and the pants from the more casual cotton to nicer wool pieces. Depending on how casual your office actually is, you might easily have been able to wear yesterday's pieces to work too!
For the off white - same thing; the tops were keepers, but the skirt and pants were moved to slightly ... View the Post
September 10, 2015
It's a question that comes up from time to time, and I'm long overdue to respond: "does the color scheme dictate the level of dressiness?" I don't think so, although I can easily see how it might seem logical. Often, by the time I've incorporated the aesthetics of a piece of art into a particular wardrobe, it can seem like there was no other POSSIBLE way that it could have gone. But in fact, I think that there's a lot of versatility possible in most color schemes.
Let's start with this simple, but gorgeous, little work, submitted for our consideration by Belovedest!
This gives us the possibilities of every sort of cream, ivory, off-white etc. shading through to any depth of warm grey we want. The ... View the Post
