The Vivienne Files

Capsule wardrobes inspired by art and nature

The Vivienne Files - Page 124 of 269 - Capsule wardrobes inspired by art and nature

How to Choose Neutral Building Blocks for a Capsule Wardrobe

April 14, 2017

So I've been using Neutral Building Blocks for a few weeks as a basis upon which I've built all kinds of interesting capsule wardrobes, but I've neglected to truly address HOW you get those Building Blocks in place. Today, I'll try to fill in this omission!

First up, I settled on the idea of 9 pieces just on instinct, because it seemed like a good number - more than half of a 4 by 4 Wardrobe, enough bottoms that you could include shorts, a skirt AND a pair of pants, four different tops so you could go from sleeveless to short-sleeved, to 3/4 sleeve to long, and then toss in a couple of 2nd layers - a jacket and a sweater.

The more I played around with the 9 pieces, the more I was pretty happy with it, but there's ... View the Post

A couple of interesting things…

I'm quite short of time today, but I did have a couple of things in mind that I've been meaning to share with you....

First, have you heard of an organization called 4Ocean? They clean plastics off of beaches, and thus out of the oceans.  They sell bracelets made from the beach plastics, the funds from which support their work. I need another bracelet like a bad headache, but this would be well worth supporting: https://4ocean.com/

And a project I'm looking forward to is trying on FIVE pair of glasses frames from Warby Parker. This is the coolest system - you give them a credit card number so that they know that they're sending things to a trustworthy person, and then you go to their website and choose five glasses frames ... View the Post

3 FINAL French 5-Piece Wardrobes for Spring: Lavender, Coral, and Labradorite (?)

April 11, 2017

It's apparent that I could do these for a while - I'm going to have to remember to tackle this idea again the the autumn! But for now, I decided to venture into the idea of lavender, confront the controversy surrounding just exactly what color IS coral (well, in many places in the world, coral is turning white...) and then throw in a complete wild-card multi-colored accent based on one of my favorites stones!

And while I'm at it, I thought I would see if I could provide some ideas for those among us who don't want accent-colored shoes, and those who aren't in need of a cardigan!

(Where do you stand on accent shoes? I have very average-sized feet, and wear monochromatic outfits most of the time, but I can NEVER bring ... View the Post

Three MORE French 5-Piece Wardrobes for Spring: Blush, Red and French Blue

April 10, 2017

More accent colors! If greenery, from yesterday's French 5-Piece Wardrobes for Spring, is the "color of the year," then blush must be running a close second...

First up, let's see how blush works with these very classic neutral pieces:

I'd say this looks great!

Will blush look lovely with these very organic-feeling neutrals:

I admit that I'm always surprised by how very versatile olive green can be...

I'm pretty confident that black and white will work well...

It's not an expected color combination, but I think it's all the more effective and interesting for that!

Red is such a classic accent color, but it really never gets boring. Not many women wear it, frankly, because I ... View the Post

Three French 5-Piece Wardrobes for Spring

April 7, 2017

 

Yesterday, I shared with you what I consider to be the "must have" items for warm weather. (although I don't think I can say it enough - there is NO SUCH THING as a "must have" item; if someone tells you that there is, they are more interested in selling you something than they are in helping you figure out what you most need for YOU...)

Today starts the fun part - adding accent colors! I think I'm going to have to do this for at least another 2 or 3 days, because your suggested accent colors were many, varied, and lovely!

But let me start with the "Color of the Year" - another one of those fun marketing gimmicks that really don't mean a whole lot, but that remind us to focus on a color that we might have ... View the Post

Nine MUST HAVE Items for Spring and Summer 2017!!!

April 6, 2017

 

She didn't just write that, did she?

Of course not - there is NO SUCH THING as a must-have item. I know for a fact that there are women in the world who never wear shoes. You could wear nothing but linen dresses all summer. You could wear shorts and tee shirts every day (how ARE things in Georgia?). You could mix it up between capris, skirts, and shorts...

Nobody can tell you that you MUST buy something. As soon as they try to start that kind of talk, you know that they don't have your best interests at heart, and you can take what they say with the appropriate bajillion grains of salt...

But there are useful ways to approach getting dressed for warm weather, and I think one worth considering is to make ... View the Post

How to Clean Out Your Closet – Use Clusters!

April 5, 2017

I personally suspect that there are as many different ways to clean out a closet as there are people on our planet! Since most people tend to wear their clothing one outfit at a time, I have been pondering an "outfit-based" way to go about decluttering and streamlining a closet...First up, let me make it clear what I mean by a cluster; to me, a cluster is a complete (typically 3-piece) outfit, with one more top tossed in to give some versatility and options:

As you can see, a cluster is a bit more than the sum of its parts - adding the 4th piece tends to really expand the number of ensembles available to you. This idea becomes really powerful when you get a few clusters working together; in this example, eight pieces ... View the Post

Four Ways to Wear Denim and Khaki in a Capsule Wardrobe – Start with Art!

April 4, 2017  

So our four friends from last week are meeting up at their hometown, for a high school function that none of them really wants to attend, but which none of them can gracefully avoid! (You can meet these four - the landscape architect, the psychiatrist, the cake decorator, and the day care manager - on the earlier posts from last week...)

To keep themselves amused, they agreed that they were all going to pack the same core wardrobe, and coordinate what they wore to various functions, just for the heck of it! They were pretty certain that nobody would notice, and that was going to be part of the fun...

The first evening, when everyone arrived, there was a sort of informal get-together at the local pub, bar, ... View the Post

Build a Capsule Wardrobe in 12 Months, 12 Outfits – April 2017

April 3, 2017

If you're new to this project, I encourage you to go back to the posts for the months of January, February and March to catch up with what we've accomplished so far...

This month, I'm pretending that spring is coming, and that it's warm enough to expose our ankles, but that we still are in the mood for a bit of sweater snuggling... (one could always wear a tee shirt, and tie the sweater around the shoulders...)

This first capsule wardrobe has had a lot of brown and black in it so far, so I decided to lighten things up considerably!

Somewhat the same story here - this wardrobe has been heavily dependent on beige as the neutral, and hasn't really addressed the lovely soft grey in the ... View the Post

How to Wear Denim and Khaki with a Variety of Accent Colors: Start with Art – Saint Bride by John Duncan

March 31, 2017

I love this painting... What a wealth of details, and vivid colors - plus being carried across the sea by angels sounds like a most privileged (and hard-earned) way to travel!

The range of accent color possibilities here is pretty vast, but I narrowed us down to just four:

She Really IS In Charge... Although you might find her sitting on the floor, happily coloring with a group of 4-year-olds...

Yep, she runs that HUGE day care facility. Inspections, regulations, paper work and MORE paper work...

If she's going to have time for the fun stuff, she's got to be meticulously organized:

Because she's ALL about the fun, especially when there are little children involved!

Happily, it's ... View the Post

How to Accent Khaki and Denim with Softer Colors – Start with Art: Hafen mit Segelschniffen by Paul Klee

Just plain pretty:

A wardrobe full of denim and khaki would still have a lovely feminine feeling with these accent colors!

She Builds Flowers All Day... ... using cake frosting! Some may think that this is just a routine grocery-store kind of job, but she loves it...

Just because her work is very temporary in lifespan doesn't mean that she can't be meticulous, and filled with pleasure at the sight of her finished products!

She's given quite a lot of freedom to choose her own color schemes and other design elements...

So she spends quite a bit of her spare time learning how to construct new flowers - if a customer wants a cake decorated with something specific like hydrangea, or lilacs, she can happily ... View the Post