Personal Style Thoughts: Without Fails ("WOFs")

My Elizabeth Suzann Ella slip dress (mine is navy, not black) is one of my "Without Fails" or "WOFs".

For today's post, I thought I'd talk about some of the things I've learned from Amy Smilovic's Instagram stories about her approach to personal style, shopping, and wardrobe-building. Her style is definitely not the same as mine - it's a lot more fashion-forward, creative, and adventurous by any objective measure - but I believe her way of thinking about these topics can still be extremely inspirational to someone building towards a style that ends up looking quite different from hers. (Oh and keep in mind that my paraphrasing of her personal style concepts throughout this post - in the way I understand them - may not be completely precise and accurate to what she actually means to say.) 

This article does a pretty good job briefly summarizing most of the basics with Smilovic's approach. Smilovic describes her style - embodied in her brand Tibi - as "Creative Pragmatism", with the three elements or "style adjectives" of Chill, Modern, Classic each weighted equally. 

Her Instagram stories over time have given a lot more detail about what each of these style adjectives mean to her. "Chill" is seen in the silhouettes and overall look; it often also incorporates elements of functionality and comfort, including through the use of fabrics that feel good and move and flow well, sometimes in natural fibers or natural fiber blends. "Modern" is often where the fashion-forward design elements come in, and can also include mixing proportions and fabric textures in outfits, or using unexpected materials or details to add tension or irony to the item or look. "Classic" in Smilovic's framework is more difficult for me to pinpoint and articulate because I know she doesn't like things overly classic, it always needs to be balanced out by the other elements. 

To the extent Smilovic's style adjectives apply to me, I'm more Chill, Modern, Classic. 

That's extra-large font for the "Chill" because I love for things to be comfortable and thus functional, and I sometimes prioritize function over form with that interest in mind; a medium-sized font for the "Classic" because I err on the side of classic and conservative in many of my fashion choices; and I wish I could make the font for "Modern" even smaller because, in the end, that's not really an important style adjective for me. I do appreciate the more "Modern" and unexpected details in the Tibi items I've purchased to date, but overall that's not something I really seek out or need all the time, or in every outfit. Maybe I'd swap out a word like whimsical or fun instead of modern for my personal list? But those terms aren't exactly right for me either.

I haven't really been able to think of my own personal list of core style adjectives yet. Chill or easygoing is definitely one of mine, but I'm honestly not that sure about anything else. 

That's an incredibly long introduction to the main focus of today's post, which isn't even supposed to be about these style adjectives! Instead, what I actually wanted to write about today was Smilovic's approach to shopping and building a wardrobe. That part of her approach focuses on three types of items: (1) "Without Fails" or "WOFs"; (2) "In and Outs" or "IOs"; and (3) "Had to Haves" or "HTHs". 

Thinking About Handbags

Unlike with my recent post about summer dresses, I don't think I'm actually leaning towards making a purchase anytime soon, but one other wardrobe category that's also been on my mind recently is handbags. Out of all the types of items in my closet, I think bags may be the area in which I'm the most firmly stuck in my ways, I almost never stray from my rather conservative and arguably kind of boring tastes and preferences. 

My current handbag collection is pretty much fully represented by this Pinterest board. And, well, I think you can definitely tell what I like, it's mostly neutral colors and simple totes or shoulder bags. There are outliers - in particular that pink Longchamp "miaou" tote I found incredibly charming and cute, though I almost never have occasion to wear it - but not many. I clearly have a rather narrowly-defined "type" when it comes to my handbags. 

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For all that one of my big shopping-related daydreams and aspirations from when I started this blog was that I might someday buy myself a really fancy designer handbag, I never actually had a real idea of what that bag should look like. 

Even after I graduated law school and started working in biglaw for a year - such that I had enough disposable income so that I could technically afford a really fancy designer handbag if I wanted to make it a priority right away by cutting expenses aggressively in other areas - I still didn't have any clear ideas about a specific handbag I would actually like. (I named some extremely disparate-looking designs as possibilities in that 2016 post, including the Givenchy Antigona, Mulberry Bayswater, and Saint Laurent Duffle.) These days, now that I know my own tastes better, the only designer bag I seem to be interested in from this general price point is the Celine Seau Sangle. But I probably don't like it enough to actually want to spend that amount of money.

Random Thing I Like: Whimsical Sweaters

Even though I've been overthinking everything to do with my wardrobe and fashion purchases for six years now, I still don't really know how best to describe my personal style. I know my tastes and preferences well, what's practical for my lifestyle, and how to identify items I'll keep reaching for and wanting to wear. But there's a significant gulf between what I like - in principle or in theory; maybe we call this my "ideal" or "fantasy" personal style - and what actually works for my body shape, lifestyle, and budget. 

In practice, my style - as seen in all my shopping since January 2015; keeping in mind it's not a perfectly representative picture because I still wear a moderate number of things I bought before 2015; I don't report gifts, including from my mom, sister, or K, which usually adds something like three or four items to my wardrobe every year; and some of my documented purchases have since worn out, or been resold, donated, or given away - is heavy on neutrals and fairly classic, basic designs and silhouettes, but with many "pops of color," particularly in jewel tones. I'd also love to add more prints to my wardrobe, but in practice it's rare to find a print I like, in colors I think will suit me, and on an item I think will suit my body shape, so I've mostly only bought fairly subdued, more "neutral"-looking prints in recent years. 

One aspect of my "personal style in practice", though it doesn't pop up often, is that I'm fond of occasional, distinctly un-subtle touches of whimsy. Think the bright pink limited edition Longchamp "Miaou" tote and the llama decal Soludos slip-on sneakers. And actually, were it not for the constraints of my budget and practicality concerns, I'd love to bring in even more of these rather in-your-face touches of whimsy into my wardrobe. 

There's been one particular type of whimsical item or design element I really like, which hasn't been represented in my monthly shopping budget posts: The sweater with whimsical motifs, typically flowers or maybe something animal-related. 

As far as I'm concerned, the ne plus ultra of this genre, based on all my online window shopping ever, was the Mansur Gavriel flower sweater pictured above. (I believe it's from 2016 or 2017. They also did a similar oversized sky blue sweater with a white cloud motif around this time, which I also thought was adorable.) If I ever see one of these Mansur Gavriel flower sweaters in my size - in either the pink or navy blue colorway - on the secondhand market for a remotely reasonable price, I probably won't be able to resist. Though if I recall correctly, the fabric composition wasn't ideal, there was a fair bit of nylon in it, and also alpaca (which I've never tried on before and could be itchy for me). 

Link List: On Shopping Diaries and Costume Design

My sister's dog is such a goof! I haven't been able to visit my sister for a while, as we spent our vacation time traveling to Maui together with our mom instead, so I borrowed/stole this photo from her.

It's been a while since my last link list post! K and I don't really have any further travels planned this summer, even though things tend to quiet down at the office (many of our colleagues try to get out early on Fridays to start driving out of the city for the weekend). Although work never fully stops with our biglaw and biglaw-ish projects, summer still tends to be a period where the pace of everything slows down because so many people, whether opposing counsel, our colleagues, or even the judge assigned to the case, will take vacation at various times.

I haven't really found any great long-form pieces to recommend in recent weeks, so this link list is a bit of a grab bag. Some of the most interesting things I've seen recently and that I want to discuss are actually based on comments from other people on Reddit or Corporette! 

1. // I thought this comment on Reddit about the social and economic pressures in the US that might lead so many people to multi-level-marketing ("MLM") or pyramid schemes was thoughtful and observant. I've done some work recently that involves reviewing MLM advertising material, and well, let's just say the language of it can start sounding a lot like the language used in some FIRE discourse online or on some money blogs (the more heavily commercialized one that I don't link to or recommend). While the recommendations made by each type of content are different, they share the trait of relying heavily on the siren's song of "financial freedom" and being able to spend more of your time on the things you care about rather than a 9-to-5 job, let's just say.

For more information on the MLM side of things, I highly recommend The Dream podcast, which gets particularly good and interesting in the later episodes, though it's a bit of a slow burn at the start. You would not believe the people in high places who have been known to do promotional work for or otherwise profit from big MLMs like Amway. 

2. // I was surprised to see that so many people on r/blogsnark enjoy a popular Instagram account (things.i.bought.and.liked) that's basically just a shopping diary, albeit from someone with a witty sense of humor than the average, it sounds like! Then again, I really enjoy shopping diary-like content (in some lights, that's even what my blog is half the time), as long as I feel that I can "trust" the reviews of the person behind it to be "true" to who they are and their tastes. Sure, our tastes and shopping budgets will all be different, but ideally, after reading a person's writing and commentary over a few weeks or months, I get a sense of what they like, whether we're similar clothes or shoe sizes or have similar tastes for some things, and how much their recommendations will work for me. 

3. // This isn't exactly something I would only have learned about from Corporette, but one of the topics that came up recently was that silly non-story about some of the legal fees Senator Warren previously charged. The rate was $675/hour, which I can assure you was probably modest for someone of that  level of expertise, and was also "at or below market rate" for the nature of the work being done, as people attested to in legal filings contemporaneous with when those fees were charged. Representative Ocasio-Cortez had a good take on it (venture into the comments on that tweet at your own peril, however).  

Anyway, I can personally vouch for standard biglaw billing rates these days generally starting at ~$450/hour for freshly graduated first-year associates (though it may be that there are other arrangements between firms and their corporate clients that mean the clients aren't paying for every single hour worked by first-years) and ranging up to over $1000/hour for various partners, not all of whom even have the specialized experience or credentials she did. Incidentally, the last time I recall biglaw-ish legal bills being in the news was in connection to the seizure of Michael Cohen's files last year, where the special master (a former federal judge who'd retired to the private sector) charged ~$700/hour, which is, quite frankly, likely also below market for an attorney of her stature. What was unusual there is that partners typically don't spend that many hours working on any single matter in such a short time, as they delegate a lot of the time-consuming work to their associates (they supervise those associates closely, though). 

4. // Now this is a super-old story that I never got around to sharing, but I enjoyed this Vox piece about how a few different authors approached "designing" a particular outfit for their book characters. One of the authors featured is Kevin Kwan, discussing Astrid from Crazy Rich Asians.

Recently, I've been thinking a lot about how I would describe my personal style, and how to make sure new purchases fit into it, so that I will love and put to good use anything I buy going forward. I personally find it helpful to think about this from a more "costume design" perspective: What kind of character would I be if my life were a movie or TV show, and how do my clothes, shoes, and accessories reflect that? Thus, I found this particular article, from an actual costume designer about how she approaches her job, to be super-interesting. (Sadly, it didn't attract much discussion when shared at r/femalefashionadvice.) 

5. // A few fun links from other blogs I follow: Maja has raised a remarkable collection of houseplants; I definitely learned some new things when reading about Jess's home-buying process, sadly, it'll be quite some time before we can think about buying a home; and Bitches Get Riches wrote some good food for thought on what types of spending from their parents felt or didn't feel impactful on their childhoods. Though one challenge with trying to make plans around such ideas is that I'm not sure one can easily predict what will be helpful to a particular child. I hated sports and all athletic activity, and also didn't particularly enjoy the idea of being a "team player" over the pursuit of, er,  personal glory. But I feel like I'd have ended up learning some valuable new skills if my parents had pushed a team sport on me for at least a few years. I'd have shrieked and complained about it to high heaven, though, and would have hated it. I certainly wouldn't have had a chance of acknowledging or appreciating the benefits until sometime in my mid or late 20s, at the earliest!

I also enjoyed the discussion of people's favorite colors for their wardrobe over at Talia's. I don't have restrictive rules about colors. If it looks good on my skin tone and can be worn with the other things I own (that one's not too difficult, because most of my clothes are neutrals), I'll be happy to wear it. Of course, just having those somewhat open-ended two "rules" or guidelines can end up being quite restrictive in practice. A lot of the colors that get popular or trendy some years (anything pastel, almost all coral shades, and most colors in the orange or yellow families, even if one of my favorite coats is bright red-orange) tend not to work well on my skin tone. My wardrobe definitely ends up heavily favoring certain colors (neutrals, darker jewel-tones) over others. 

Does anyone else think about their personal style from a more costume design-type perspective? Do you shop for your closet with any "rules" or guidelines about colors in mind? 

Shopping List Thoughts

It's still far too early in the year to know how my goal of reining in some of the slightly careless, not always well-thought-out, excesses of last year's shopping will ultimately turn out. January was fine, but February was less promising. It's too soon yet to tell how March will be, though it's looking reasonable so far. When I first declared that lofty intention to rein things in a bit last December, I didn't have the clearest sense of how exactly I thought I should go about it. 

Well, fine, I did say one concrete thing, that a few-months' shopping ban might be a good idea, something that clearly has not come to pass. But I also did mention how that was an idea that had never quite worked for me before. Another thing that changed my intentions on that score was that certain plans shifted and were postponed, in part because I balked at what turned out to be a far briefer than expected downturn in the stock market (a protracted one would affect the market for legal services and, therefore, my long-term job stability) and when the federal government shutdown looked like it might be here to stay (if federal courts close due to lack of money, an event without true precedent, my work would be seriously disrupted). I still want to go ahead with my plans, am still very certain of them, but at this point, working around my planned vacation schedule, I'll only be able to set a date in July or later, more likely in September or October. Once the procedure has actually been scheduled, then I think a shopping ban (at least as to clothes for which the fit would be seriously affected) in the few months surrounding the formal date would be a good idea. 

Anyway, I think I have a clearer sense now of how I want to approach my shopping-related goals. Although I fussed about 2018 being a year of somewhat excessive "joy" in shopping, upon further reflection, something resembling "joy" can be good. A form of it tends to correlate with an item becoming one of my "best" buys, my most-loved and well-used items, which is about as ideal an outcome as I could want. It's just that, as I mentioned to Jessica a few months ago in the comments, I can't always reliably differentiate between the fleeting "joy" of a super-impulsive purchase that I will get tired of in a few months and the deeper-set "joy" of something that becomes a well-loved favorite item that I will wear for years, and will want to admire out of the corner of my eye, or every time I pass by a reflective surface, each time I wear it. 

I've also been thinking about how to organize and make more effective use of my one central, consolidated shopping wish list for my wardrobe, the only other particularly concrete idea I had for guiding my shopping this year. It's taken a bit of time to work out a method for making the board well-organized, and to find a way to keep track of things I've tried and rejected, or what ended up getting purchased. I still don't have a perfect system, it's definitely a work in progress, but I've now added more internal organization to the board, by making several sub-boards. Those sub-boards will track items in four different categories, and I'll be moving items from one to the other where appropriate. 

• First is things I've now decided against, whether or not I actually tried them on first.
• Second is items I ended up buying. To the extent that I originally picked a different brand's store image to portray a general category of item, or color and type of item, I'll usually swap those images out with ones of the item I actually bought. 
• Third is things that are essentially "fantasy" items for me, whether because they were discontinued or are long since sold out, or, in some cases, if there's some highly impractical-for-me detail about them. Another factor is if I think the only realistic prices I think I could potentially find the item for, if one was available on the secondhand market, would definitely be too expensive for the purchase to be a good value to me. 
• Fourth, the list that's illustrated above, is items I'm still thinking about possibly trying and buying, some of which are vague and extremely unlikely fantasies, and some of which are much more likely to be actual potential purchases. In some cases, for the much fancier items, I would need to cut a lot of other things out of my budget, both for shopping and for some other expenses, if I was serious about making room for getting the item. 

And I must say, I'm having a lot of fun using Pinterest recently! I was so very late to the party when it came to making active use of Pinterest, given that I've only really been using it in earnest for a year or less. It's just one of the many ways in which I've proven to be a bit of a dinosaur when it comes to new-to-me social media platforms. (I still haven't figured out Twitter, for instance, and am still mostly too shy to actually interact with anyone or even put out much of anything in my own words there. I pretty much just use it as a kind of weird, mostly law nerd-y, and less visual Tumblr.) Over the years, I used Pinterest only occasionally to find photos to use in some of my posts, and I did keep a personal style inspiration board since the earliest days of this blog, but I didn't log in often until much more recently. 

Please follow the link below for some additional thoughts on the current state of my shopping wish list!

Wardrobe Life Lately

Some of my favorite personal style inspiration photos recently. I keep a smaller, more tightly curated board for a small number of photos that I feel like best and most accurately capture my current ideal aesthetic.

We're only a few weeks into 2019 and what I'm hoping will be a year of more restrained shopping than in recent years past. I think it's going well enough so far, though it's obviously far too early to even attempt to claim victory or success. I've stuck to only browsing for things on my consolidated "wish list", or items substantially similar in design, and have generally not gotten distracted by anything else. With certain items from the original list, I've had the chance to try them on, only to realize that they won't work for me after all.

Spoiler alert, I have shopped this month, but only for jewelry so far, and I think it's likely to stay that way. One item technically hadn't gone on my formal "wish list" before, so I sort of broke my "all shopping must be from the central wishlist" rule, but it was something I'd tracked on another of my Pinterest lists for at least a month or two before, so I gave myself a pass.

Changing Plans

Some of my plans for the first part of the year may be shifting. Savings-wise and spacing of time off work-wise, everything's in place for me to start scheduling a certain procedure, something that should, in practical terms, keep me away from most clothes shopping for quite some time. However, now that I'm finally so close to actually being able to take concrete steps towards getting this longtime goal accomplished, I may be balking a bit, mostly because of the expected price tag. Outside of my law degree, it would be far and away my most expensive single purchase ever (keeping in mind that I've never needed a car, and that I'm not yet in a stage of life where the purchase of a home is a feasible and sensible possibility). On the one hand, I've thought about this for years, saved in earnest for nearly a year, and wanted it badly for most of my adult life. I've rarely been so sure of anything. On the other hand, such big purchases should never be undertaken lightly, so if I'm feeling any sort of doubt or hesitation, however faint, I should certainly wait until those feelings have all dissipated.

I think I'm also feeling a bit of anxiety about the risk of another protracted economic downturn. Given my age, where I grew up, and the industry I chose to enter, I've always felt like a "child of the recession", always expecting a market slowdown to cause serious disruptions to life and career at the worst possible time. It is, to be frank, a specter that has haunted every year of my life since I started law school, and that haunts me still. When I matriculated, I was well aware that recessions were highly destructive to the careers of junior attorneys and, almost more importantly, to their ability to pay off their typically massive student loan balances. I don't think I can be completely free of that kind of fear until I'm completely done with my student loans, which is likely to take another three years (though within another year or two, I should have enough cash saved that the remaining loan balance won't be as big or scary a concern any longer). And when I'm feeling nervous about the economy, I want to save more cash, not spend it.

There's also the question of whether there are other things I should spend on first, namely some cosmetic dental work. One unfortunate and otherwise permanent aftereffect of my 2017 accident is that I still have a front tooth that doesn't look quite right and is a little out of alignment. I've never actually looked into what it would take to get it back into place and looking pretty again. From what I know about cosmetic dental work, it'll probably be extremely expensive, and maybe I should prioritize that first, before any other elective medical procedure!

Shopping Lately

Sweaters are among the things almost guaranteed to fit differently if I go through with the plans I'm currently hemming and hawing about, but because we've got plenty of winter weather to look forward to, I still get tempted to try on more sweaters, the cozier the better. I'd also been so busy at the office that I was feeling some stress-induced urges to shop. Though actually, I also discovered that when one is truly busy (for the first half of the month, I was on pace to bill 3,000 hours in 2019 if I worked at the same rate all year long, a formidable number for even the busiest of biglaw associates), there is barely any time to really think about shopping or even to make some online orders. Though because I like clothes and get excited about sales, I still made some orders nonetheless. And well, things have quieted down considerably at the office now, but hopefully that doesn't increase how much I shop.

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With regards to this year's rule that I only buy things after they've spent some time on my one consolidated wishlist, it may need to be amended slightly to allow for items that are substantially similar, including in color and design, to ones on my list. I tried on a gray Club Monaco waterfall cardigan (sold out, other colors available) that was very similar to a Bloomingdales cardigan on my list, and also a funnel-neck Club Monaco sweater I thought might be similar to the one from Vince that is on my list (both items now sold out). Neither of the Club Monaco sweaters worked, though, I think their items better suit people who are a bit taller and less busty than I am.

In terms of other items on my list, I also ordered the Bloomingdales tie-waist cardigan in burgundy, but didn't like it, it had awkwardly high side slits and the waist tie didn't sit in a flattering spot on me. Outside of sweaters, there haven't been any other types of clothes I'm interested in, except maybe that, if I end up deciding not to have that procedure in the foreseeable future after all, I might want to try the MM. LaFleur Etsuko dress in blue and black brush jacquard print. Although I generally find MM. LaFleur overpriced, they don't have that much competition when it comes to workwear, especially now that I tend not to be interested in most of Ann Taylor's and J.Crew's new offerings.

Thinking About: Weighty Gold Jewelry

It's no secret that I've had a jewelry phase recently. By now, because of my sudden and intense obsession with Alighieri, which resulted in purchasing two pieces in two months, I've spent enough that it's unlikely I'll be buying anything else in that price range (or upwards of it, but that was always a given) for quite a while, unless I cut clothing expenditures significantly in coming months. Still, jewelry has long been a category I window shop and plan for, sometimes for years, without actually buying anything (mainly with that opal ring I've been thinking about since 2015), so I might as well keep up that tradition. At the very least, it doesn't hurt to look and admire, but not buy!

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Lately, I've developed an interest in what I call (for lack of better or more accurate phrasing) "weighty" gold jewelry, items that, while fairly simple in design (though with a bit of interesting or unusual detail), have a bit more substance or texture to them, a bit more weight or boldness than a lot of the smaller, super-dainty pieces that have been popular (i.e. most of Catbird's catalog), though they don't quite rise to the level of being "statement" pieces or particularly "big", at least when compared to some of the louder jewelry I've been interested in and worn in the past. This new interest of mine is mostly in earrings, bangles, and rings rather than necklaces, though I suppose the J.Crew Chain Tassel Necklace from two months back could also count.

This isn't a category I've ever really shopped for, so I don't know the market well. I would need to do lots more research to know what I actually wanted to get, and for how much. So the things I've been looking at while window shopping are completely random, from a range of wildly different price points, and may not be from the best or best value places to shop for anything in this genre.

I've never had an interest in hoop earrings before, for instance. I generally wear the same pearl studs every day, including to sleep, and only rarely switch to a pair of small dangle earrings (from Porcelain and Stone) on special occasions. In the distant past, on occasions when I wore anything bigger, I always worried that the earrings would get tangled in my hair or on my scarves, and I found them fussy. (With bigger earrings, or ones that dangle down too low, I start getting paranoid and worrying about outlandish and unlikely accidents, the earrings getting caught on something and causing injury.) Still, I've now become very taken by the idea of small, but not exactly dainty, hoops. The closest thing I've seen are the Mejuri Bold Hoops, or their Dome Hoops. In fact, I'm quite taken by the entire Mejuri Dome collection, which also includes a bangle and rings (all pictured above, with some of the other pieces named in this post).

As for bracelets, I have this simple gold bangle from Coach, a Christmas gift from K's mom, and I adore it, it seems to go with everything. (There's nothing similar in stores now from Coach, the most similar thing I've seen is one of Kate Spade's simpler bangles.) I'm also quite fond of the idea of bangles with similar heft and thickness, but an edgier design, something like Meghan Markle's Shaun Leane Tusk Bracelet (which she wore here, but with diamonds, and it's definitely not at a price range that's amenable to being impulsively purchased!), or the Mejuri Dome Bangle. Rings are probably the category I have the fewest opinions about, because I never wear any (and again, I've been balking on one particular purchase in that category for years now), and so I'll probably also never actually get one. I do like the look of signet-style rings though, particularly the Alighieri False Promises Ring. (Their Wreckless Pursuit Ring is also cool!)

The widget below contains some other random, mostly costume jewelry (except for one pair of thicker gold hoops, which are fine jewelry from Saks Off Fifth) choices that also sort of fit the general look I'm thinking of. It was actually surprisingly difficult to find items that had the right look, particularly with a costume jewelry budget constraint in mind. Anyway, I don't know the jewelry market well at all, so I'd need to do considerably more research before I actually thought about buying anything, and these are not things I'm currently actively shopping for. 

Where do you shop for jewelry? What are your favorite styles of earrings or bracelets? Do you prefer silver or gold-tone metals? I personally think the look I have in mind here lends itself a bit more to gold jewelry, though I'm probably biased because I generally have a strong preference for gold-tone metals over silver or white metals on me. I guess it might be because my skin has warmer undertones!

Style Inspiration: Elizabeth McCord from Madam Secretary

Madam Secretary is, more often than not, an extremely silly show, with some outlandish storylines involving secret agents and the wackiest foreign policy situations (including one where Mongolia was voting on a referendum to become part of China, which is... wild), sometimes involving fictional countries, but I actually kind of love the show nonetheless. The actors all do a great job with the not necessarily high quality material, and generally are likable and funny, especially Tea Leoni as Elizabeth McCord, the titular Secretary of State. It also shares some of the traits I loved from The West Wing, presenting this idealized vision of government and the people in it as these larger than life, smarter, and just all-around better than real life people (even when they've made mistakes) which, well, was fun back in the day, and makes me sad now, given the officials we've got.

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It's hard to find enough screenshots to fully illustrate this, one may need to watch the show, but one strength of Madam Secretary is the costume design. It may not be realistic for its setting (I've not spent any time working in DC myself), but I think it's an accurate take on how these particular characters would approach mostly business formal and sometimes business casual if they had a bit of freedom and well, infinite money, to do so. In particular, I find a lot of workplace style inspiration, and even some general personal style inspiration, in how they dress Elizabeth McCord. 

Some of it may just be that I'm totally jealous of Elizabeth McCord's fictional life. She's written to be  an impossibly perfect person, incredibly intelligent and capable and simultaneously warm, personable, down-to-earth, and good-humored. (And because Tea Leoni does a good job, it's not annoying.) She has - literally - been able to "have it all", spending much of her life in a high-intensity career until shifting gears to be a professor before getting appointed Secretary of State out of the blue, with a professor-slash-secret-agent husband, and they've somehow still managed to raise a happy family with three kids and spend a lot of time with them. Oh and she's independently wealthy too, so lived comfortably and looked fabulous through it all. My own secret, outlandish, impossible dream is to be an independently wealthy academic with a lot of free time on her hands, dressed in nice, expensive things, who also gets to do other cool things on the side, so basically Elizabeth McCord, and similarly fictional!

The costume designers dress her like someone who likes fashion and is open to some experimentation  on that front (as seen in the occasional more adventurous work outfit, or when she dresses up for galas and state dinners), but generally needs to suit up in business formal and thus sticks to more of a uniform (sharply tailored suits, generally with a subtle detail or two that suggests they're designer) most of the time. She mostly still manages to put a bit of her own spin on that uniform, in particular with many fabulous silk blouses with feminine details rather than more traditional cotton button-downs (rather like Stella Gibson in The Fall). She also re-wears many of the same blouses, and I noticed in the most recent season on Netflix that she has a few suits in multiple colors. As for her casual style, it's laid-back and emphasizes comfort, whether with her law school sweatshirt or the kind of cozy, slouchy knits in neutral colors that I like.

As for how to translate that style to real life? I think it may, honestly, just be too rich for my blood. The thing I'd want to bring into my closet most is those silky blouses with interesting tucks and draping, but after searching on a few occasions, I find it's a genre one is likely not going to find at my typical Ann Taylor or J.Crew on sale price. Out of the mall brands I typically shop from, Ann Taylor is the only one that typically offers something approximately similar, usually with a tie neck or sa ruffled or pleated neck. Except that I know from experience that I rarely wear polyester work blouses of this type anymore because they're not comfortable, I tend to get sweaty. Plus, I think the key part of Elizabeth McCord's look is that it looks really expensive and luxe, both in design and material. Just for fun, I window shopped for a few higher-end silk blouses that had the general look, and of course, they're all too fancy in price for me. For instance, there's a St. John tie-neck shell in white and a Milly tie-neck shell in blue-green. There's also a L'Agence pintucked white blouse with long sleeves and a Rag & Bone faux wrap blouse in pale blue.

In actual practice, this is not a category of item I'd be buying anytime soon, both because of the price point and because my sizing for blouses might change in the near future. Oh, and I do have a lot of other silk blouses that are similar to some of Elizabeth McCord's more standard silk blouses, but they are somewhat impractical for frequent wear, as they're very delicate, need to be hand-washed gently, and I've found it very difficult to get stains out of silk without causing weird darkened spots to appear on the fabric. Certain silks also don't retain their texture well after being hand-washed and air-dried. It's very likely that Elizabeth McCord goes to the dry-cleaner frequently! Both the Ann Taylor and more high end options I've linked are also in the below widget, along with some other pretty, high end options to look at.

Anyone else watch Madam Secretary? Are there any television or movie characters that you get personal style inspiration from? The last character I posted about like this was Amy Dunne from the Gone Girl movie (Rosamund Pike is gorgeous), so I clearly have, er, diverse and sometimes strange interests when it comes to personal style inspiration from the screen. 

Ideal Wardrobe Outcomes

via

Recently, quite a few of my favorite bloggers wrote about their approaches to building their wardrobe and, through that, some described what their ideal wardrobe looks like, what qualities it has and, possibly, what ideal quantity of clothes it would contain. These are themes that almost all of my favorite blogs talk about sometimes, actually, everyone who writes about clothing and shopping with some regularity, at least! 

More broadly, I also enjoy when people discuss the limits of minimalism for themselves and their lives, and either feeling like or being told "you spent too much" or "you consumed too much", whether to be a "proper" minimalist, or a "proper" frugal person. Those are definitely thoughts I relate to.

One of the recurrent themes to my writing here is anxiety about not being a good enough minimalist because (a) many things I buy (especially for work) are from mid-range mall brands with fast fashion production practices, and (b) I shop a lot, by both minimalist and frugal-person standards. One could very reasonably argue that I have plenty of money to make better consumption choices than I do, from an ethics perspective, but well, that may not be fully compatible with some of my personal finance-related values, which I'm increasingly finding might not easily allow for the big distant future designer splurges I used to dream of saving my way to earning, because those values put a ceiling on the price points I'm willing to consider in many shopping categories. Also, the biggest factors in all my spending decisions are my still gigantic and scary student loans ($2,500+ a month!), for at least the next four to five years or so, most likely, which can be expected to take me right up to when financial obligations to family, especially to the kids I hope to have, really "get real".

Then there's the anxiety about not fitting in to my particular segment of my profession, which sometimes feels dominated by people from wealthy backgrounds, because of those same more affordable mid-range mall brand clothes I stick to, even if I'm pretty sure I'm not actually being judged for that.

What would my own ideal wardrobe look like? 

First things first, I definitely don't have an ideal total number of items in mind. I got into minimalism blogs back when capsule wardrobes just started gaining traction (Un-Fancy was still a fairly new blog back then, for instance), and most of my biggest influences were bloggers who had done most of their fashion and shopping-related posts quite some time ago, and who were winding down their interest in fashion and shopping, or even their blogs entirely (think Assembled Hazardly and La Nife en L'air) by the time I started reading. So capsule wardrobes were never really something they discussed, and I wasn't primed to look in that direction as the idea got more popular.

I find the capsule wardrobe idea appealing as a theoretical matter, how clean and uncluttered a closet would be if it contained only a small, discrete number of well-loved pieces, every one of them comfortable and that one is thrilled to wear. I also agree there probably exists an optimal, "perfect" number somewhere, at which one doesn't "need" anything more (and that it's a surprisingly small number, relative to what advertisements say or imply). I'd feel a genuine sense of "everything as it should be" accomplishment if I could find that number, but realistically, I just didn't think it was practical for my needs or my habits. I feel like capsule wardrobes generally have their biggest shortcomings for people with a lot of different wardrobe "needs", whether that's from a job with a restrictive dress code, extreme weather patterns (who really ever derives KonMari-esque joy from a puffy down coat and snow boots? not me, at least, but they're definitely necessary in some parts of the country), or for sports, things like that.

For me, the primary sticking point that ensures a numerical limit-based approach would never work for me is my business casual, sometimes business-formal office dress code. I like to joke that it's "casual business casual" because, in most NYC biglaw offices, there's room for women who enjoy fashion to try and wear some trendy things that aren't traditionally seen as conservative enough for work, but make no mistake, there are also tons of unspoken rules and expectations still. Lots of people out there are secretly mean and judgmental about these things, there exist judges at prominent federal courts who think black skirt suits are the only appropriate courtroom attire for women, court staff definitely are snarking about inappropriate shoe or other attire once they're in private, etc. etc.

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I don't enjoy conservative business formal attire at all, neither the heels nor the suits, but understand that it's absolutely necessary for court and interviews, so that's several pieces of my work wardrobe I dislike, but that need to be in there. I also don't particularly enjoy most business casual either, but it's necessary and gets the job done.

I've sometimes commented, over at JENKR's, who also discusses this theme, that it can be really wonderful to find something that's good for both work and weekend, to start making that work wardrobe feel more "me" and create some overlap between it and my "for fun" wardrobe, but that's an extremely rare thing (seen most vividly in the J.Crew Open Sweater Blazer and the J.Crew Factory version). (That's an idea I think fellow law-person A at Posts Factum also touches on.) Because so much of my total wardrobe is necessarily taken up by all these work clothes I just don't enjoy, the idea of trying to refine the numbers (either of my whole wardrobe, or even just the work portion) just doesn't appeal, even if it is probably possible to create a streamlined "work capsule" and a separate very small "weekend capsule" for each of the seasons.

Having so much of my week taken up by dressing for work probably leaves me free to come up with a remarkably slimmed down and super minimalist-seeming tiny wardrobe for casual wear, actually. If I did laundry for my light-colored clothing often enough, I'd be perfectly happy with just the above set of clothing, two tops (both from Uniqlo ages ago, they've only stocked more traditional-looking breton-striped tops since) and a single standard pair of dark skinny jeans (mine are from Gap now), for all my spring and fall weekends. For summer, two or three short-sleeved or sleeveless summer dresses in some combination of linen, cotton, silk, or rayon (currently the older design of the Grana v-neck silk slip dress, an Old Navy tie-neck rayon shift dress, and a Madewell silk-cotton blend dress I bought secondhand) and a pair of FitFlops is all I really need and actually wear. Because temperatures have been all over the place sometimes, that long Uniqlo linen-blend open cardigan I bought mainly for work has also been seeing tons of weekend wear (it looks great over dresses).

Please follow the link below for some additional thoughts about ideal outcomes for new purchases!

The "It Bags" of Yesteryear

Three celebrities with their Miu Miu Coffers, a pre-2010 "it bag" that has not held its value. I adored this bag when I was in college. 

The first unattainably expensive designer bag I coveted, back in college and not long after The Devil Wears Prada movie ignited my interest in fashion, was the Miu Miu Coffer. I didn't have much reason for it, certainly didn't have a sense of my "personal style", nor did I yet have a good understanding of my handbag preferences (I now favor large, unfussy totes). I just knew that it was beautiful, and that the whole combination: ruched leather, braided handle, and oddly placed front pockets, just seemed perfect, even if it all looks rather fussy to me now. I looked eagerly at celebrity street style photos of it, was familiar with all of the few that popped up online. Every time I saw it in real life, I stared at it wistfully from a distance.

Had I saved my work-study and summer earnings for it, I'd have been disappointed in my investment. Certain designer bags maintain their resale value well, as we all know, but Miu Miu isn't one of those brands. If I still wanted it, there are several to be had on The Real Real* (affiliate link) for $300 or less, though generally not in good condition, as it's ancient and long-discontinued. It originally retailed for over $1400, so that's a loss in value of more than 60% in the last decade, more if one considers consignment fees. 

I suppose there's not much point to looking back on it, except to emphasize that my teenage self was sometimes silly, didn't have great or particularly consistent taste, and would definitely have wasted tons of money if she had it. I admire people who, at a similarly young age, had a far more thought-out and defined sense of their own style, or aesthetics they were interested in, say Twelve: of Our, who I sang the praises of when I last reflected on my own early experiences with fashion, desire, and aspirational consuming. 

It's also interesting to see how some "it bags" stand the test of time, and some don't. To me, there doesn't seem to be much rhyme or reason to it. Way back when I started this blog, I looked forward to the day, years after I graduated law school, when I could finally indulge in a big designer splurge after having truly earned it. Except even then, I actually wasn't sure of what the bag would be, because I wanted something timeless. It had been a long time since I had been as attracted to any bag as much as that Miu Miu Coffer. So I was ambivalent even then, and that ambivalence only increased after I graduated, as the few "maybe" bags I picked generally weren't cool anymore, even just one year on. 

These days, that hypothetical "distant future splurge" keeps getting pushed back because my career has involved a few voluntary pay cuts, and I've only recently started paying my student loans in earnest. I'm actually pretty sure it won't happen, which isn't sad because, as you've seen, I indulge frequently in shopping and want for nothing. It's simply that my preferences have changed. Furthermore, looking forward, my plans to aggressively finish off my student loans (I could hit "net worth zero" a year from now, and it'll take at least another year and a half after) might not mesh well with goals like buying property, wedding planning, or getting ready to start a family, much less the, er, (still hypothetical) possibility of all of those things coinciding in a fairly short time. All of which is a long way of saying that, now that I've finally settled in to a job with no short-term expiration date, I'm a bit overwhelmed by how long it takes to make financial progress, and how slow the numbers tick in the right direction, especially now that the long-awaited market correction is upon us. 

Have you ever fallen completely in love with a designer item that was unattainably expensive? What was it? Would you still want to buy or wear those items now, if you had been able to buy it? Have those items retained their resale value? 

*Note that many people have raised concerns about The Real Real lacking quality control when it comes to verifying the authenticity of their products. I probably wouldn't worry as much about a really old and relatively low-value handbag that I'd only be interested in as a collector's item (which I'm not actually interested in, but hypothetically speaking). Handbag counterfeiters were extremely sophisticated, even back then, though, so buyer beware.

2016 Shopping Budget Roundup

Happy new year! I hope that everyone has had a wonderful holiday season and that 2017 is getting to a good start. Today's post is a reflection on last year's fashion and beauty spending and my plans for this year's budget. I'll also give a shout-out to some of my "best buys" last year, pictured above. Unlike last year, I don't have any "worst buys" to point out, which I'd like to think means that I'm a more careful shopper than before.

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Clothing and Accessories Budget

In 2015, I spent $2729 out of the $250/month or $3000/year budget. This year, I spent $1545.99 of the $170/month or $2040/year budget I set for "on-budget" purchases. Certain purchases, such as socks or underthings, have always been "off-budget." I also made some planned big-ticket off-budget purchases in the form of two suits (J.Crew Factory wool blend, discussed here) and a pair of work shoes (Cole Haan Catalina wedges in black patent, be sure to size down a half-size!), which cost around $400 total. Putting that together with my on-budget shopping for the year gets me a total of roughly $1945.99, which means that 2016 was a better year for my wallet than 2015. 

For 2017, I'm setting a $150/month or $1800/year budget for clothes, shoes, and accessories. As has been my usual practice, the monthly limit is flexible: Any excess rolls over to subsequent months and any deficits can be made up in later months, but the limit for the year is firm. Items like socks, pajamas, and tights continue to be off-budget, unless I decide to indulge in something unusually expensive, like Wolford tights. Throughout the year, if I get cash from Ebates, Splender, or from reselling items, I won't add it back to my budget. 

As in 2016, I will also allow myself a few work wardrobe-related "off-budget" purchases. I have a solid-sized wardrobe of serviceable (though generally imperfect) dresses for work, but I'd like to branch out a bit and try to find one or two dresses that I think are worth tailoring to get a best possible fit. I may try to get something secondhand from The RealReal, though I also have some temptation to try out M.M.Lafleur and Of Mercer (thanks to their effective branding targeted right at my demographic, though I have no actual sense of whether their items are worth retail price). As I'm quite happy with the A-Line Dress from Brass, their Pencil Dress is also on a possible future shopping list, but I'd likely consider that one of my on-budget purchases.

Personal Style and Minimalism(?) 

I often go back and analyze my monthly budget posts. I'd like to think that there's a noticeable and, ultimately, good contrast between my shopping habits from when I started to now. I buy less, both as a matter of total items and total spending, as the year-end numbers show. I know myself and my own style better, and I make fewer "regret" purchases as a result.

As part of this process, I'm going on a "shopping fast" for at least this month. Admittedly, this is no great burden, as I don't need anything for the ongoing winter season. I feel that it will assist me in continuing to get a better understanding of both my personal style and this minimalism-ish that I've been practicing while writing this blog.

When one compares the general color and nature of the purchases from my earliest "monthly budget" posts to the most recent ones, one can also see some evolution in my personal style, which is echoed in my personal style inspiration pinterest board. I get less excited about prints these days (I still like them, but am much pickier about which ones will suit) and favor more neutrals and more subdued colors. Pants play a larger role in my work wardrobe than they used to. I've really embraced my fondness for slouchy sweaters. My tastes in jewelry have taken a turn for the dainty.

My actual personal style evolution isn't quite this stark, but I did start this blog at the tail end of my "statement necklace" phase and do regularly wear slip-on sneakers, skinny pants, and a slouchy sweater now. Left photo is originally from Sarah Vickers's blog and the right was randomly found from Pinterest.

Over time, I've accepted that I am, at the heart of things, a fairly low-key and low-maintenance person. Among other things, there's no more need to experiment with blush or eyeshadow or eye makeup beyond a touch of eyeliner and a little bit of brow pencil, as I don't enjoy it. A lot of more "statement" or "interesting" wardrobe pieces just don't get mileage in my wardrobe. That big distant future splurge is less and less likely to be a designer handbag because I'm unlikely to really fall in love with one that's just so "me" and unfussy that I know it's both a good value and the right way to spend such a sizable amount of money. (That last thing is a largely a theoretical or academic question, as it's looking more and more likely that I'd postpone any such future splurge until long past 2018, due to a preference for really attacking my student loans first.)

Beauty and Skincare Budget

In 2015, I didn't faithfully record every single beauty purchase, but I've been recording everything accurately this year. I spent $388.97 in 2016, mostly on skincare. I'm satisfied with where this number is, given that I'm still using about as many products as when I last did a post detailing my entire skincare routine, though the exact items involved have changed. So I'll continue with my general approach of not setting a budget for beauty and skincare, though I'll still record these purchases in my monthly shopping posts, as I like keeping track and sharing some of the products I enjoy. 

Keep reading for my thoughts on my best purchases of 2016!

Pretty Things: Handmade Jewelry from Porcelain and Stone

all photos via Porcelain and Stone Etsy shop

I've been thinking of making a jewelry purchase for myself for almost a year now, on and off, and I've finally decided what I would like. I was originally thinking of a dainty ring, something more on the fine jewelry end of the spectrum, though the price on that was always going to be a little high to fit comfortably in my month to month shopping budget. Also, I haven't worn rings since a brief period before law school when I was obsessed with bright cocktail rings, before I decided that they weren't practical for me. Long story short, I think a necklace is the way to go. In the past year, I've transitioned rather decisively to being no-frills with my accessorizing: Just a teeny-tiny necklace, barely visible over the neckline of most of my clothes, and a subdued watch most days. It's a big change for someone who used to get heavy use out of a rather sizable collection of brightly colored statement necklaces, and it sometimes feels too somber. I'd like to dip back in to wearing more substantial jewelry, and I think a necklace from Boston-based company Porcelain and Stone is the way to go, most likely the bar necklace below. (I might be ordering mine from Moorea Seal.)

I first heard of Porcelain and Stone through my undergraduate school's alum Facebook group, from someone who had purchased one of he necklaces. I went to college on the East Coast, so the tie to the Boston area has a bit of a geographical connection to us alums. Kimberly Huestis, the artist behind the business who also hand-makes each piece, specializes in ceramic or porcelain jewelry, often with really beautiful marble or natural stone-looking colors and textures. (She also makes more colorful pieces than the ones pictured, and you can see the process on her Instagram.)

Anyway, I've mentioned that I struggle with fully taking the leap into shopping more ethically for clothing, which I think requires relying on shopping secondhand. Figuring out a way of balancing my budget-consciousness with the minimalist ethics that I really want to embody is tough. It all feels even more complicated because work leaves so little extra time and energy for shopping from anywhere other than my usual mall retailers online. With this one purchase, I'm glad that the decision is simple: I'm supporting a small business, one that also happens to be woman-owned, and I'm buying something handmade in the US. The pieces I thought about are also more comfortably within my month to month budget than the other possible jewelry purchases I thought about these past few months, which is another big plus. I wanted to treat myself to something that felt a little indulgent, partially to sort-of celebrate a recent industry-wide raise even if I'll only benefit for a few weeks on this end, while still operating within the constraints of my monthly budget.

Whichever necklace I end up buying, it'll pop up in July's shopping budget. Kimberly's work really is beautiful and unique, and I highly recommend checking out her shop, whether on Etsy or her website, and her Instagram is lovely too. 

The Big Distant Future Splurge, Revisited

About a year ago, I wrote about a hypothetical "big distant future splurge" for when I got a bit more well-established financially. It wasn't something I would have indulged in anytime in the next half-decade, but it was nice to daydream. That "shopping fund" I mentioned has not, by the way, grown much beyond the $250 it contained back then: My emergency fund savings and (slightly) accelerated student loan payments take first priority and I've also traveled quite a bit. My "shopping fund" is also the source for my "off-budget" workwear purchases, including the Cole Haan Catalina wedges I recently bought (Nordstrom Rack has the best price online, but in a very limited size range).

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Since last year, my understanding of my personal style "needs" versus "wants" has evolved, and I've found that I'm satisfied with the handbag collection I have. It covers all the bases when it comes to my needs, and even what I want to wear. I could even resell a few with no real effect, like that Annabel Ingall Jojo (discontinued, similar) and Rebecca Minkoff MAB satchel (discontinued, similar). The latter was my biggest regret purchase ever, as I mentioned on Save Spend Splurge. I realize now that my main criteria when it comes to whether I'll actually wear a handbag is that it must be, above all, easy to carry. My favorite bags, whether for work, travel, or just walking around, are my large Longchamp totes. They're roomy, light, waterproof, easy to dig around in, and sit comfortably on the shoulder: They're the definition of "easy" and entirely unfussy. 

Most of the bags I considered for my hypothetical future splurge would not, as far as I can tell, fit my "easy to carry" criteria. Even if bags like the Givenchy Antigona or the Saint Laurent Duffle I was dreaming of are not that fussy in look or design, I'd potentially find them a bit annoying to use just because they're less easy to carry than what I already own. Out of the designer bag designs I'm familiar with, the Mulberry Bayswater probably best resembles the type of large tote bag I prefer. This is all a very abstract discussion, of course, as I probably can't bring myself to spend anywhere near that much on a bag anytime soon, not when I already have a perfectly functional collection. 

That's not to say that I've completely stopped daydreaming of hypothetical big purchases. Although I was initially unsure of how useful a trench coat would be in NYC's climate, I've gotten tons of wear from the Everlane Classic Trench (my review here) I bought last year. It makes me contemplate whether one of Burberry's classic trench coats could be a better "big distant future splurge" to set my eyes on, in terms of versatility and cost-per-wear ratio. It's not something I'd act on anytime in the next calendar year, probably not for eighteen months or more, but it's something that I think I could justify a fair bit sooner than I could have done with a similarly priced handbag (which would have happened in four or five years or more), as a coat arguably has more utility. A higher-end trench coat would have certain advantages over the Everlane one: a full lining, for one, a buckle detail at the wrist, and I'd also plan on putting money into tailoring to get a closer to perfect fit.

Considering a replacement for my currently well-functioning Everlane trench as early as twenty or so months after purchase is, admittedly, not fully consistent with the tenets of minimalism that I'd like to embody. However, my general line of thinking here also (maybe?) shows that I've come a long way in terms of understanding what I'll actually wear and use and also being able to identify when I have all I need in a certain category, i.e. handbags. Also, there's a greater than 50% chance that I'd elect not to make the purchase at all, due to both budgetary and other concerns. It's just a daydream, for now.

Is there any particular item you're yearning for? Have you ever had the opportunity to finally purchase something you wanted for a long time that was a major splurge? If so, how did it feel?