The Vivienne Files - Page 179 of 288 - Capsule wardrobes inspired by art and nature

Whatever’s Clean 13 FOR MEN – warm colors, warm weather

September 19, 2015

I understand that some of you are less than fascinated by the assembling of a travel wardrobe for a man; I can understand that. However, I felt that I really needed to respond to the requests that I've received, for years, for such a project. And let's not collectively forget that these wardrobes work EXACTLY like the women's version. With very little adaptation, any of these wardrobes could change gender and be really attractive. Yes, you'd want to toss in a piece of two of jewelry, and swap out ties for scarves. Maybe the 3rd pair of trousers would be better suited to be a skirt, and you don't have to pack quite so many shirts that button down the front, and have a collar. (although you could keep them just ... View the Post

Whatever’s Clean 13 FOR MEN – cool colors, warm weather

I particularly love working with menswear - their garments are so beautifully designed and well made that it's gratifying to put things together into outfits...For a warm weather trip, I'm still including a blazer, cardigan and sweatshirt. Maybe it's from living in Chicago, but I find that there's no destination that doesn't, from time to time, require something warm. At a minimum, the blazer or cardigan comes in handy when you want to be more "dressed" for some activities. And if you never actually need your sweatshirt, that's good!

This starts out like any other menswear wardrobe, but the blazer is cotton, and unstructured (i.e. unlined, but still meticulously finished inside.) The trousers are linen, and the tie is a lighter-weight ... View the Post

Eight Color Ideas, from Ma To-Do List: Dressing by Colleuille and Gontier

September 17, 2015

Yes, we're visiting my favorite fashion book yet AGAIN... Frankly, until I've blogged about literally every page of this book, I'm not going to tire of it, nor find it boring - it's really just that good. If you can read French, or are willing to throw yourself into a translation frenzy, you can find it here. The next time I'm in Europe, I'm going to look for a few copies for us, since it's becoming more and more difficult to find...

Today's inspiration was found on a page about figuring out how to work with color in a wardrobe; to one side, they tucked in this little list of garments with the heading "We love, we dare..."

I love some of them. I might even dare a few of them. What do you think?

When ... View the Post

Building a Capsule Wardrobe by Starting with a Scarf: Cvetaeva by wrq.e.d.

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

Whatever’s Clean 13 FOR MEN – warm colors, cool weather

September 15, 2015 Okay - let's dress up the redheads, warmly complected, freckled gentlemen that we love so much!

In the best of all possible worlds, I'd find a lovely brown tweedy blazer for this guy, but in the interests of providing a wardrobe with maximum utility, I'm sticking with a navy blazer. Navy blazers are an instant signal to the world at large that you're dressed up - even if half of the other men in the room are ALSO wearing one, it's just always the most appropriate option, short of a suit.

If your level of dressiness can step down half a notch though, look for a beautiful blazer in checks, tweeds, or plaids that will combine all of your lovely warm colors. They are available in every fabric from the ... View the Post

Whatever’s Clean 13 FOR MEN – cool colors, cool weather

September 14, 2015

You asked for it, you get it: a Whatever's Clean 13 for men - the first of at least a couple...

Menswear is SO EASY; pick a color scheme and stick to it like glue! I've sold menswear two different times, as well as selling men's shoes, so I can safely admit that I have some experience in this area...

First up, the finished product, designed to carry you through a vacation that will range from rather nice dinners and other events (a concert or opera?) through to a cool weather morning walk in the park.

I started with a navy blazer, just as I would start with one for almost any man building a wardrobe from scratch. While a lot of men can get through life without a suit, in this day and age, a ... View the Post

Building a DRESSY Capsule Wardrobe by Starting with Art: A Bridge in a Snowy Landscape by Utagawa Hiroshige

September 12, 2015

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...

She knows that a simple ivory silk blouse might be usable in any number of different "aesthetic messages" that her employers choose. No frittering away of a that ... View the Post

Building a BUSINESS CASUAL Capsule Wardrobe by Starting with Art: Bridge in a Snowy Landscape by Utagawa Hiroshige

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

Building a CASUAL Capsule Wardrobe by Starting with Art: A Bridge in a Snowy Landscape by Utagawa Hiroshige

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

Mixing Black and Brights

September 9, 2015

One last look at how these 9 black garments can be used to serve as a base for your personal wardrobe passion - this time, BRIGHT colors!

You might be able to put together outfits with just these 9 pieces, but people would certainly see you from a long way away! If you're comfortable doing that, I think you should do whatever delights you - that's really the most important factor when getting dressed! But for those of us who love these colors in smaller doses, I have some ideas...

As always, I'm going to build around a solid, well-chosen core of neutrals. I've used black for these examples the last 2 days, but any neutral can do the trick, with a little bit of thought and ... View the Post

Mixing Black and Florals

September 8, 2015 If you're not mad for monochromatic wardrobes, yesterday might not have been your dream. But this idea has all kinds of potential; what if you're all about floral prints?

Oh my... While each of these garments is quite beautiful on their own, when you pile them all together like this, they could give even the most staunchly pro-botanical among us hay fever...But if you also own at least these 9 solid garments, you're really in pretty good shape, wardrobe-wise. The solids temper the impact of the print, and give them center stage, and make garments that might seem busy or "too much" into pieces that are just perfect.

The addition of the floral pieces to your core black ... View the Post

Mixing Solids and Patterns, or 18 = 108 (or more…)

September 7, 2015

Ever since I started trying to identify my signature wardrobe items, and have worked with A Common Wardrobe, I've pondered the various ways in which printed or patterned garments can be incorporated into your wardrobe. I think for most of us, either non-solid pieces, or accent colors, are pretty important to give a sense of change and variety...

So in my thinking, I started with a wonderful 9-Piece Slot Machine Wardrobe in solid black. These pieces run the gamut from a tank top for warm weather to a cashmere turtleneck for (in my life) about 6 months of winter. Just doing the math, these give you 27 3-piece outfits (3 x 3 x 3), plus 12 more 2-piece outfits. Some of the combinations might be a little ... View the Post