Four by Four Archives - Page 9 of 12

A Four by Four Whatever’s Clean Capsule Wardrobe in Black, Beige, Marsala and Natural

April 18, 2015 As soon as I launched the newest Pantone Spring and Summer 2015 color scheme file, someone asked me to do some work with the color of the year - Marsala. She had honed in on the black and khaki, and after a bit of discussion we agreed that the best 2nd accent color would be an unbleached linen/natural color. This is the palette we finally chose for a capsule wardrobe.

I started with black, of course! Sleeveless and short-sleeved, cropped pants and "normal" pants, and all from 3.1 Phillip Lim, just for ease of matchy-matchedness. You can, of course, find your four pieces from a different, less pricey, company, or mix them from a few different places.

In fact, in order to ... View the Post

Start with Art: Version 2 Steamboat leaving Boulogne by Edouard Manet

April 1, 2015 I really love the combination of blue and grey! (I often consider including blue as an accent color in my wardrobe...) So I decided to look again at this painting, with an eye to warm weather. I brightened up the blue a little bit - Manet gives you a whole range of blue possibilities - and I equalized the proportions of the four colors:

I haven't built a Four by Four wardrobe for a while, so I thought this would be an interesting project. First up, the core dark neutral charcoal, in linen:

One of the reasons I wanted to do a summer leisure wardrobe - I found this gorgeous blue at L.L.Bean. A perfect secondary color!

The Expansion Four is usually four tops of some sort, since tops ... View the Post

A Black Capsule Wardrobe, with Pearl, Lace, Gold, Filigree and Flowers

January 2, 2015

After thinking long and hard about how I wanted to accessorize the "All-Black" capsule wardrobe, I decided that I'm going to accessorize it in a variety of ways, and give everybody a choice of which they prefer! In this, as in virtually EVERYTHING associated with getting dressed every day, there are no hard and fast rules, and no one "best" or "must-have" way to approach things.

I'm a big fan of finding a handful of key words that define a style, and using those words as a talisman or mantra when I'm choosing items. Using the lace tops as an inspiration, I thought that the first "accessory family" was going to include elements of pearls, lace, gold, filigree details and feelings, and flowers.

Let me clarify - each ... View the Post

An “All-Black” Capsule Wardrobe

December 31, 2014

While I was away for the winter holidays, I received two requests from women who are required to wear "All-Black" for their work, asking about ways to accessorize their limited palette. (if you're not a rugby fan, please be aware that the All Blacks are the New Zealand national rugby team, and the current world champions. If you enjoy looking at handsome, fit young men, I encourage you to look them up!)

This is a really interesting question for me because my capsule wardrobe migrates more and more each month toward unrelieved black. Also, I know a few women here in Chicago who have this same work wardrobe requirement; a surprising number of different organizations ask their "front of house" staff to dress in this ... View the Post

A 4 by 4 Capsule Wardrobe in Coral, Turquoise, Black and Grey

September 25, 2014

Please bear in mind that I prepared this post before I left for my vacation, so some of the links might be dated...This is a great, unique, way to accent black and grey; coral and turquoise are often found together, and there's some AMAZING jewelry available (usually in warmer weather) that combines these two colors. But of course we don't wear real coral anymore - it's pretty endangered...

In both of these Cores of Four, I chose high-necked tee shirts to go with v-neck sweaters. This way, if you want to layer the grey tee under the black sweater, (or vice versa) it will show nicely. These little details can make a lot of difference in how versatile your clothes can ... View the Post

A 4 by 4 Capsule Wardrobe in Bright Plum, Smoky Blue, Navy and Grey

September 22, 2014 I don't want everybody to feel like I've beaten the "navy and grey" horse to death, but I had a lot of requests for variations of those colors, and they all take on their own feel... Please remember that I prepared these posts back in August, so you'd have pretty things to read while I'm on vacation; if the hyperlinks don't work, or an item is sold out, I sincerely apologize! This is the color scheme - three of the colors we've worked with before, but this bright plum color changes everything. What once was a soft and muted palette takes on a brightness and life that can be included in an outfit on a day that feels right, or you can always stick with the softer colors when that's what you ... View the Post

A 4 by 4 Capsule Wardrobe in Lavender, Jade, Denim and Grey

September 13, 2014

One more visit to the denim and grey Core of Four - this time, with accent colors of lavender and jade. All of the shades are cool - some are soft and gentle, and others are almost vivid. Lots of options here!

One of the nicest things with the shades of lavender - they can easily be blended so long as you have the same basic tone.

Once you find someone who's selling a color that you love, it makes some sense to stock up!

I looked for moonstone jewelry for this collection. Moonstone has such a lovely iridescent, almost colorless quality that picks up the colors that you wear. I think it's beautiful (and it's one of the three birthstones for those of us born in ... View the Post

A 4 by 4 Capsule Wardrobe in Pink, Rose, Denim and Grey

September 12, 2014

This color palette felt to me like it was giving you permission to indulge in a variety of shades of pink, and so that's sort of what I did. I also took this opportunity to pretend that the person choosing this capsule wardrobe had a deep and abiding passion for stripes. That sort of fondness/obsession is great in a wardrobe, if it's deeply and truly felt. You should definitely wear your heart on your literal sleeve if you know what you like, and you're happy sharing it with the world. It certainly makes shopping more focused, and you project a clear point of view to everyone around you!

Why yes, the grey and blue shirts are the same, except for the color. When you ... View the Post

A 4 by 4 Capsule Wardrobe in Denim, Wine, Grey and… (AWOL)

September 9, 2014

One of the unstated goals of The Vivienne Files is for all of us to benefit from the mistakes that I make or the problems that I encounter. That was brought painfully home to me today when, after HOURS of looking in all of my secret stashes of garments for sale, I could NOT find anything in leaf green. Well, I'm pretty sure Target has some things, but they didn't have good photographs, so that puts them out of the literal picture for me...

I think it's safe to assume that someone out there right now is thinking about working on a color scheme for which one of the colors is very scarce in the market. Like completely missing. So how do you handle that - what do you do?

This was the capsule wardrobe that I ... View the Post

A 4 by 4 Capsule Wardrobe in Teal, Wine, Olive and Camel

September 8, 2014

Camel and olive are pretty versatile - here's a much more subtle use of these two neutrals, compared to the vivid gold and red from last week. But let's talk teal for a second: If you look around for things which claim to be "teal" in color, you get a range anywhere from an almost emerald green, all the way over to an almost navy blue. That's annoying when we're trying to describe colors, but in the case of this capsule wardrobe, this flexibility was useful for me. When I initially started working with a couple of tops closer to green than blue, I found that I had all kinds of clashing nastiness when putting the teal garments next to olive. It was basically trying to blend ... View the Post

A 4 by 4 Capsule Wardrobe in Bright Gold, Tomato Red, Olive and Camel

September 5, 2014

Looking for the right items in this color combination caused me to hit the wall - at some juncture, I was at a loss to find more camel garments that were suitable for this capsule wardrobe!But then I thought about you all for a moment (as I think about you all constantly when I'm working on The Vivienne Files!), and I realized that if I was having trouble finding garments, then you must have the same experience, right? I spend hours a day working on this - you certainly don't have the time to devote to shopping that I do to my full-time job of blog creation. So rather than throw the towel in on this wardrobe, I figured out what a reasonable approach might be, and I'm sharing it with you all.

The ... View the Post

A 4 by 4 Capsule Wardrobe in Burgundy, Pearl Grey, Black and Petrol Blue

September 3, 2014 I love burgundy - it has subtlety and richness, while still maintaining the complexion-flattering qualities that it shares with red, pink, peach, and all of those rosy-ish shades. For those of us gradually migrating away from black, and toward grey in our capsule wardrobes, I could see that burgundy would be a very wise accent color to consider for those days when we're feeling a bit pale.

This is a pretty casual wardrobe - no skirts...

In my mind, this color is distinctly different from the color of denim - it has more grey to it. It's a very difficult color to find - if you're a fan of petrol, definitely also look for slate blue, smoky blue, and dusky blue.

This ... View the Post