denim Archives

Start with Art: From the Lake by Georgia O’Keeffe

Planning a wardrobe with mostly neutrals doesn't mean that your wardrobe will be predictable...

Let's start with this most wonderful painting:

It's pretty simple - we can start with the same neutral clothes that we used a few days ago...

Ah, but the accent pieces are quite different. One of the neat things here is that this heroine could have 5 neutrals... the brown and the grey would both be excellent secondary wardrobe neutrals, don't you think?

This wardrobe feels very different to me than the earlier version with bright accents:

I've kept the silver earrings, and then added in brown and aqua...

Same with the bracelets - her neutrals are still perfect for her wardrobe, but she now has the ... View the Post

Can You Have Too Many Neutrals? Start with a Scarf – The Tropical Scarf by Pig, Chicken & Cow

I am often asked if it's possible to have a wardrobe that's TOO neutral...

Hmmm. My first thought is that if someone is concerned about feeling this way, maybe their wardrobe is too neutral for them. Conversely, maybe these questioners are perfectly happy with their wardrobe, but they get critical feedback from others. (how often do those of us who love wearing black get criticized for being Goth, as if that made any sense...)

The answer, I think you already know, is NO, no wardrobe is too bright, nor too neutral, nor too pastel, unless it doesn't suit you, and doesn't make you feel beautiful and happy and free to do your important things.

But in the interest of investigating a wardrobe that's 75% neutral, let's ... View the Post

Another Wardrobe Disaster…

This is almost the same wardrobe that we saw back on February 7th; I've made a couple of changes so that our new "dilemma" is clear...

This is her starting wardrobe; there's nothing really WRONG here - they're all perfectly nice clothes, but she struggles, and often feels that she doesn't look... pretty...

So she goes through the same exercise that we've seen before - does she have the right general assortment of pieces? Yes, this seems fine...

Is it the colors? She feels in her gut that she's got a color "issue..." She's always been told that she was an Autumn, but the colors feel muddy and heavy to her... She's got blue eyes, and freckles, and she feels more... light? than the colors that are suggested for her...

She ... View the Post

My Casual Wardrobe is a Disaster….

She got really sick of the struggle - it wasn't like climbing Mount Everest, or building your own home by hand, but it was still a bother...

She has some things that she really likes, but just can't seem to get dressed for evenings or weekends...

This is approximately what she has right now:

What to do? Is the problem that she doesn't have enough of a particular "category" of clothes - not enough tee shirts? or sweaters?

Nope - her ratios are pretty good, and there are no glaring omissions. Is it a question of color?

Immediately, when we see that mass of warm green with some "outliers" of cool green that just don't blend in, we can start to see the issue...

And here's the gut-check moment - does she really prefer warmer colors? ... View the Post

Traveling from Cold to Warm?

She has no explanation, nor does she feel that she needs one. She loves her denim culottes, and she wants to wear them as much as possible...

Thus, she is wearing this when she leaves, from her snowy home:

But she realized that she didn't want to pack very much - she's really only going to be there for 5 days! But how to take her travel outfit and translate it into a travel wardrobe?

How about breaking out the colors, and working around that? She's not really sure about how the final wardrobe proportions will be, so she just assigns each of the 3 colors an equal share of the palette...

First up, what does she do when she lands, and the temperature is in the 70s rather than the 20s? Duck into the restroom, peel off boots and socks, ... View the Post

What are Good Accent Colors for Denim and Khaki? How about Teal and Camel?

Denim and khaki go with everything - I'm convinced! - but some of you wanted to see a capsule wardrobe with a very different feel than the relatively soft and cool pastel version that used mauve pink and dark pastel blue...

How about this for colors?

I don't have any really exotic travel vision for this heroine - she's more someone who wears a uniform most of the time, and only needs a relatively small wardrobe to accommodate her "not work" activities outside of her home.

So I'm starting with the six neutral pieces that were in last Monday's wardrobe, and I finally grabbed a pair of dark navy loafers for her. (although with brown in a wardrobe, don't discount the gorgeousness of beautiful brown leather goods...)

I'm NOT going to get ... View the Post

Can I Pack Denim and Khaki and still look Pretty? What about including Mauve Pink and Dark Pastel Blue Accents?

A few people have asked me recently about packing for early autumn - needing a jacket, and probably a sweater or two, but still wanting a few lightweight tops. And others have been eager to see denim switched out for the navy that we've looked at for weeks! And then there are questions about how denim and khaki might be too... boyish?

So I'm starting with this color scheme:

The first thing to be addressed is the need for something warm to wear on damp, cool days, or in the evenings:

Realistically, I should have included a pair of dark blue walking shoes... But these four pieces have lots of possibilities - one could include shirts and tee shirts in literally any possible color and you'd be able to get dressed pretty simply!

But let's ... View the Post

What to Pack for Ireland? Start with Art: Etude de Mademoiselle Pogany by Brancusi

Ireland? I used to live there! If you're going there, you're in for a treat... but be warned, much of the year it's a somewhat colder treat than you might be expecting...

Let's use a beautiful, simple painting to focus our color choices, and just to treat ourselves, eh?

This is NOT going to be a "Whatever's Clean" wardrobe - it would certainly be possible to do it with this color scheme, but I'm going to recklessly include both pink and red pieces here that will not play nicely together. You don't have to have every last little thing matching, so long as you've got the basic neutrals in place...

You might feel really foolish leaving a fairly warm place and getting onto an airplane while wearing or carrying a hooded rain jacket, and ... View the Post

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

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, restaurant, karaoke place and ... View the Post

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

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 all fun for her - changing diapers, cleaning ... 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 oblige!

Her love for ... View the Post

Accents for a Denim and Khaki Wardrobe – Start with Art: L’Ombre by Pablo Picasso

Could be a dream, could be a nightmare, could just be a sweetheart - the enigmatic nature of this image is striking:

When I saw L'Ombre in the Picasso Museum last year, I knew that I would want to share it with you all!

Her Work is Complicated Enough, Thank You... She's a psychiatrist. A shrink. She sits, quietly, and listens to people. Takes notes. Tries to formulate the perfect, pithy question to open up the hidden pain in her patient's mind, and help the healing start...

She's always watching people, listening to people, learning from people. So she doesn't really want to spend a ton of time worrying about what she's going to wear - it just plain and simply isn't all that interesting to her!

She does, however, grasp that she ... View the Post