khaki Archives - Page 3 of 6

How to Build a Capsule Wardrobe 1 Piece at a Time: Brown, Khaki and Pink

July 22, 2016 No More "Dress For Success" Every day, every year, the same....

Navy suit, white shirt. Grey suit, white shirt. Navy grey white navy grey white....

It served her well - she was very successful. She worked 7 days a week; she really didn't have a leisure life - her idea of being dressed down was to wear an old work shirt with old pants from a pantsuit. Jeans? Not in her vocabulary. A cardigan? Would get you a visit from the chairman of the firm...

But now that she was leaving the office world, her heart cried out for brown. The color of dirt. The color of chocolate. And khaki - sand, and stones, and natural things....

And PINK. Because she would never have dared to wear pink in her old, very conservative, work ... View the Post

Build a Capsule Wardrobe by Starting with Art: Branch of the Seine by Claude Monet

July 12, 2016

It's hard not to love something this beautiful:

The Last Laugh She's been saying for ages that the photographs of the structure don't look right, and that there are integrity issues. But did they listen to her? (you know the answer to this, right?)

So she's flying in to do an in-person inspection, and recommend what needs to be done in order to make the entire rig safe for workers.

They won't be thrilled to see her, but she will only need to be there a couple of hours...

There are some amazing restaurants on the mainland. and she's flying a really LONG way. So she plans to stay for at least 3 days. Nobody's going to question her, after all.

Not only does she find the ... View the Post

Building a Capsule Wardrobe by Starting with Art: Macaws over River, Peru by Frans Lanting

April 11, 2016

A truly breathtaking photograph:

The most straighforward of color schemes:

Freedom She just needs to be free. Mostly free to sleep late if she wants to... to eat what she wants, when she wants... to get dressed without thinking about it...

She she settled on khaki. ALL khaki. Mostly from 1 store. With bright colors. Tee shirts and scarves. She walked into 1 store and bought all of her jewelry. She wants bags that keep her hands free. It's all about FREE...

She's not even sure where she's going, yet. But she knows that it's going to be someplace where she doesn't know anybody, so she will be free to be as quite or as outgoing as she wishes...

And she's going to find a ... View the Post

How to Build a Capsule Wardrobe of Accessories, 1 at a Time: Beige, Sage and Blush

March 10, 2016

Adding the accessories is fun - I'm going to do a few of these in a row, so we can all see the system, and the cumulative benefits that accrue when you get a nice core of accent pieces, growing bit by bit.Here's where this second "1 at a Time" started: (you can see the original wardrobe post here)

Shoes will ALWAYS be the first thing to make sure you have, for obvious reasons. It's entirely likely that you already have the shoes that you need, but it's always wise to be absolutely certain.

A bag is, to me, the second most important accessory to have. This time I've put the tote bag first...

From those two essential pieces, everything after that becomes much more discretionary! I love a small ... View the Post

How to Build a Capsule Wardrobe One Piece at a Time in beige, pink and soft green

February 20, 2016

I'd be happy to do more of these - suggest colors, and I'll give it a try! Today, we're going into warm colors, starting with a favorite outfit of a woman who wears and loves warm, soft colors:

I can see the appeal of a comfy tee, broken-in chinos, and a cuddly cashmere cardigan!Although her "seed" outfit doesn't include green, she makes the deliberate choice to include it in her wardrobe plan:

I may have beaten this poor horse to pieces by now, but a great place to start to expand a wardrobe is to find pieces that are different colored versions of your current favorites. In this shopper's (now nicknamed TS) plan, a green tee shirt, just like her blush one, is a simple and foolproof place to ... View the Post

Wearing Unflattering Colors: Khaki

Khaki turns out to be another one of those colors that means absolutely NOTHING, in absolute terms. I saw things all over the spectrum that answered to my call for khaki jewelry, bags and shoes!This, in my mind, was what I expected when I started searching for khaki; I really quite like this with black; it's unexpected, a bit earthy, but rather sophisticated, too.

And then I saw this more brown-ish color, which I think looks glorious with the brown outfit. Again, it's not an expected choice of accessories, but it has a richness that is quite nice.

The very lightest shades that answered the "khaki call" were my choice with grey. I wouldn't have normally put these together, but I think one could wear this ... View the Post

Building a Capsule Wardrobe by Starting with Art: The Blue Pool by Augustus John

July 1, 2015

Wow...

A color scheme that just cries out for some cotton khaki, and some turquoise...

This felt to me like a quick weekend away to the lake - leaving the office early, and doing nothing more strenuous than maybe rowing a canoe... The prevailing feeling that I was looking for was outdoors, active, sunny and relaxed.

The jewelry looks great with your outfits, but isn't terribly expensive, so you can wear it without being obsessive about it. A little clutch is handy in case you dash into town for drinks or dinner.

If it's cool, you have your cardigan and trousers from work; if you want to be "dressy-ish", you have your culottes, and if you're going to get wet, you have shorts! This should ... View the Post

Start with Art: White Ship by John Singer Sargent

April 23, 2015

That time of year is fast approaching when the lucky ones among us get all kinds of great invitations for weekends! If you have friends with a lake house, you know what I mean - lots of time in the water - in a canoe, a kayak, or an inner tube! Chilly evenings, cooking out, laughing 'til your sides hurt... The last thing you want to worry about is what to pack!

Sargent's painting put me very much in the right mood for this scenario:

Maybe you're driving to the lake, taking the train and being met, or taking the Jitney, but under any circumstances, you want to look nice - casual, but still pretty, with attention to detail.

Two swimsuits might seem like overdoing it, but if you're going to wear ... View the Post

Color and Proportion – Step 2: Adding Shoes, and the Occasional Solid Scarf

April 3, 2015

For this 2nd step in my pondering about proportion, I want to introduce some shoes into the equation, as well as a solid-color scarf. I didn't find that I felt the scarf was "necessary" as often as I had expected - sometimes a pair of shoes made enough difference in the proportion of the outfit that the scarf, while fun, might be superfluous.

For these first two outfits, shoes that matched the cardigan lent enough "gravity" to the outfit that I didn't really reach for a scarf. Out fit 3 is more problematic - in screaming hot weather, white sandals might work, but white shoes made this look really "uniform", in the medical profession sense. Maybe the beige scarf and loafers would be better?

These outfits felt a lot ... View the Post

How to Choose an Hermes Scarf: Le Songe a la Licorne

November 11, 2014

This isn't a question I get every day: a reader has decided that she wants to buy this particular design of Hermes scarf - Le Songe a la Licorne. (it means the dream of the unicorn - I have no idea why...) She stated that she wears a lot of camel/tan/beige, and was leaning toward a winter coat in either blue or rose. Whew...

But this is really an interesting question - how DO you choose from among a variety of colors (for anything, not just an Hermes scarf), when there's a wide variety available? My suggestion is that you think about what the other items AROUND the potential purchase might look like. Do you already own the jewelry, or shoes, or whatever, that will make ... View the Post

How to Build a Capsule Wardrobe from Scratch – The Wardrobes, Finished (for now…)

July 17, 2014

Remind me, when trench coats are back in stores, that we want to revisit these capsule wardrobes and make some additions. If you think of anything else we should address (December holiday attire?), send me a note at theviviennefiles at gmail dot com.

I broke everything out into two pages; I might have been able to fit everything on one page, but we wouldn't have been able to see anything - the earrings would have been teeny little dots on the page!

And I think the links are working - let me know if you find some that are broken and I'll look into it...

thanks, as always!

love, Janice

PS - For more color inspiration, you can find the latest Pantone Color Planner ... View the Post

How to Build a Capsule Wardrobe from Scratch Step 17: A Few Finishing Touches, for now…

July 15, 2014

Many of you have written to me to ask how this capsule wardrobe compares with my earlier 24-piece wardrobe - excellent question!Just as in the 24-piece wardrobe, this Starting From Scratch includes to two core "Four by Four" assortments in your neutrals, it works with two accent colors and a light neutral, and it includes the concept of the "bridge" garment, which is something that incorporates both of your neutral colors and allows you to wear piece from both neutrals seamlessly.

So I decided to look at each wardrobe one last time (for now - I'm sure we'll be back to revisit this concept when trench coats hits the stores, and when there are other requests/needs), and see how things stacked up in terms of a 24-piece ... View the Post