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Personalizing a Favorite Capsule Wardrobe

April 3, 2020

Today I'm looking back at one of my all-time favorite blog posts, and choosing how I would interpret it in my own wardrobe!

My computer screen savers are all images from The Vivienne Files, that change ever 20 seconds or so. Although they are supposed to be randomly chosen from a huge file of images, in fact I see the same wardrobes fairly often, and this one I see EVERY DAY:

Something about this just feels so right to me...

So in my dream travel, I'm going to... either Ireland or Paris - it doesn't really matter. If I'm in Ireland I'm going to have some business to transact, and if I'm in Paris, I want to look lovely...

After much consideration, this is what I would pack. I don't own these exactly same ... View the Post

Start with Art: Building a Travel Capsule Wardrobe based on The Swan No. 21 by Hilma af Klint

April 1, 2020

Yes, this should be the "Six Scarves, 12 Outfits" post, but I forgot that I was working on a post for the first day of April! Frankly, I'm thrilled to see the end of March - aren't you?

I will get that post for you tomorrow, I promise...

Our heroine had hoped to see the Hilma af Klint exhibit in Malmö, but she might not make it...

But she's still a massive fan of the artist!

Now that she's free to travel, she's going to Stockholm for a long weekend to the Moderna Museet, to see some art! This is going to be her color palette for her travel capsule wardrobe:

She has decided that she's beautiful. After spending so much time alone, it's finally dawned on her that her body has done wonderful things for ... View the Post

Start with Swimwear? Building a Travel Capsule Wardrobe

"The say that we can go up to the island, if we voluntarily observe social distancing for 14 days..."

please note that this is the same style swim suit that I bought for myself, and I can recommend it without hesitation; I look splendid in mine, and THAT's saying something!

She had realized about a week ago that her life was changing, and her attitudes were... surprising.

After decades of being self-conscious about wear a swim suit, or going into the ocean around other people, she realized that she was worrying about ALL THE WRONG STUFF...

And so she planned for things to be different, now.

She was going to participate fully. In everything. Including splashing, and building sand castles, and just plain sitting under ... View the Post

Start with Art: Building a Travel Capsule Wardrobe based on Sea Change by Helen Frankenthaler

May 20, 2020

Such calming colors....

It's not a complicated color palette, but it's certainly beautiful!

She's Ready to Dress Up... Now that she's free to travel again, she does NOT want to pack jeans, nor sweatpants, nor a sweatshirt. Frankly, if she doesn't see her casual clothes for a LONG time, she won't mind!

They're going to take the train into the city, and stay in a hotel near the harbor. She wants to be able to see the sea from their room; it's been too long.

They've had months to plan this trip, and dream about it. Leisurely walks, holding hands. Lovely, lingering dinners. Sitting in a cafe by the sea, watching the waves and sipping a cocktail.

Nothing strenuous - they don't have a ... View the Post

Accent a Black and White wardrobe with Magenta Purple and Green Sheen

February 28, 2020 She Doesn't Want to Go... to this week-long "professional development" seminar. She's made it clear that she's not the right person to go, and that there are other members of the staff that are MUCH better suited to attend.

Worse yet, the weather there is uncertain, and nobody seems to know how dressy this whole shebang might be...

So she has her own plan... She's going to very quietly do her own thing, in colors that might daunt a less annoyed woman!

She will be perfectly appropriate, and will behave impeccably. But a little bit of acid green from time to time is going to be her way of showing a bit of... ire, shall we say?

She understands that she will, in fact, probably have a great time. ... View the Post

Revisiting A Start with Art: Winter Scene in Moonlight by Henry Farrer

A couple of my friends have asked me to revisit this color palette for spring and early summer - that transition time of year! It's not quite right for this snowy day in Chicago, but it's a beautiful daydream...

We first saw this heroine when she went on vacation at the farmhouse, in the dead of winter! Her wardrobe was then expanded into a true 16-piece "Four by Four" wardrobe. And THEN, our heroine added on some essential accessories to make this a more complete winter wardrobe...

Now, the weather is warming up at the farm - the tenant farming the land told her that she was seeing crocus and some daffodil sprouts! She's got to go up and investigate.

This is the painting that inspires her color palette:

It's a lovely spring ... View the Post

Paris Part 1: The Most Simple Travel Capsule Wardrobe Possible, and Lots of Good Food…

I'm back! And it was glorious... Any time I get to spend that much uninterrupted time with Belovedest is going to be great, but this trip was truly special. Today and Friday I'm going to try to share some of it with you. If you're planning to go to Paris any time soon, I've got some suggestions, and if you can't make the trip, travel along in your imagination!

We left mid-day Saturday, with stunningly cheap tickets on Aer Lingus, the Irish airline. This of course meant that we connected through Dublin, which was quite simple. The most difficult part for me was wanting to just stay in Ireland! But Paris beckoned...

What did I wear for this epic 2 day trip? Why, my argyle cardigan of course! (This isn't the one I have - mine is about 15 ... View the Post

Start with Art: Flowers and Flames by Kay Nielsen

You'll notice that this heroine is packing many of the same garments as the heroine from last Wednesday! It's amazing how much difference changing up some accent colors - and the accessories that bring everything together - can make a wardrobe look completely different... It Calls to Her...

She's been working for years on a species of eucalyptus that won't catch fire quite as easily as the existing plants. It's suddenly a timely subject... And she's been invited to a conference about post-wildfire reclamation, at which her new plants will be a subject of conversation.

Since she's only going for a couple of days, she's packing according to the Perfect 10 Packing template:

Normally, this heroine is pretty reserved. But when ... View the Post

Start with Art: The Black Duck by Marsden Hartley

As I start sorting out my brain to pack for Paris, I'm looking a lot at the Perfect 10 Packing Template... Bird Watching

Nothing rigorous - no cameras, no sitting in a blind somewhere waiting for hours for the sighting of the rare crested whompalicious swamp duck... Just lounging by the lake, on the deck, sipping a warm beverage and watching the birds come and go...

Her plan is to keep it simple:

She loves the unexpectedness of using brown with black. Why don't more people wear them together? Lots of birds pair the 2 colors in the plumage...

She will be going out at night with friends, so she plans for a couple of slightly dressy evenings...

She reviews her template carefully...

And when she gets to the ... View the Post

Start with Art for Cold, Wet Weather Travel: Saints Genevieve and Apollonia by Lucas Cranach the Elder

Remember our art/architecture Gothic specialist? She was a guest lecturer back in 2016, took a group of students to visit the Cloisters, and then was invited to lecture in Paris...

Nobody has the first clue how old she is; her white hair is braided into an intricate crown (how DOES she do that by herself?), her fingernails are always a practical length, but red and flawless... I still suspect that denim has never touched her body, except in passing!

She's inspired by these 2:

The Saddest of Projects

She's off for a couple of days in Venice. Things are going to have to be moved, and she's going to make some suggestions about what needs to go first... The flooding isn't going to get better with time, and some things ... View the Post

Analyzing 2 Wardrobes: When Your Color Palette is Challenging

The last two wardrobes! These were the most difficult - no question. And I made a couple of early strategic mistakes that I would re-do...

First up, this excellent scarf!

I should NOT have tried to make white one of the neutral colors. White as a neutral really only works well if you live in a hot place and don't mind laundry...

A smarter move would have been to use brown and navy as "co-neutrals" and then white, red, turquoise and orange as accents. This would still have been a big stack of colors with which to work, but it might have been a better balance. It's always easy to look back and say what I might have done differently, isn't it?

I went off the rails in a big way in February - I had designated navy as an accent ... View the Post

Analyzing 2 Wardrobes: When Everything Looks Pretty Good…

Let's jump in and see the good, the bad, and the just plain misjudged from this year's wardrobes!

First up - I'm really happy that I chose this scarf. The color palette is delectable, and the clothes were reasonably easy to find. When tied, this scarf would probably look really interesting. All in all, I'm giving myself a pat on the back for this choice!

2 concerns from the first 4 months:

multiple shades of blue aren't the best possible option - for example, the February scarf can't be worn with the January, nor the March sweaters. It's not a huge issue, but if you're really working toward the smallest possible wardrobe, looking for a consistent accent color in the early stages would be helpful. That February handbag is ... View the Post