My outfits have been more intuitive this month than they’ve been in a long time, because I’ve been looking inward rather than outward for inspiration, outfit repeating like crazy and refusing any impulse to reinvent the wheel.
On a related note: my mind has been a quieter place, like a tourist town during the off-season, where I’ve been strolling desolate streets and peering into defunct storefronts, opening old doors and blowing the dust off of thoughts that used to interest me. You know when you go through bags of clothes you left in the basement and grab a couple of things you forgot you liked? I’ve similarly been revisiting past versions of myself, plucking a few of my favorite characteristics and bringing them with me into a new era. Though the resultant changes in my clothing choices are so subtle that they’re likely only visible to me, I can tell that my style is different than it was even a couple of months ago, yet somehow less different than it was a couple of years ago.
I can be a bit of a hermit, or I suppose the kinder term is introvert, and feel satisfied with listening to strangers from a distance for my incredibly one-sided social interactions, such as by reading books or listening to podcasts. Then I remember that the pieces of wisdom that ring most true do tend to be the ones said to us directly by someone who knows us personally — something that shifts your whole perspective, usually slowly then all at once. Or maybe those don’t resonate more than the ones we read in books, necessarily, but they are equally as impactful. Either way, I’m grateful to have heard some perspective-shifting sentiments recently. One of them did come through reading, in a newsletter by
, in which she said: “I don’t like styling things in complicated ways. I like wearing clothes as they are intended to be worn.”I was like that little cartoon of a head spinning round and round, steam bursting out of its ears. Instant epiphany! There’s nothing like the feeling of reading the perfect articulation of something you believe but haven’t yet realized.
Me too, Tiia! Me too. I try really hard to style clothes in elaborate ways, but do I actually like doing it? Enjoy the outfits? Find them fun to wear? Don’t get me wrong, there’s something almost existentially fulfilling about crafting a complicated outfit. It affirms getting dressed as an art form. It assuages any guilt accompanying the cost of an item by maximizing the amount it can be worn. But it’s so damn annoying, isn’t it? To constantly check if the weird tie you made isn’t falling apart. To needle pin after pin into the scarf so it falls just right. To hold yourself in such a way so that the unnecessary extra layer remains carelessly tossed? It’s so much easier to wear an item the straightforward way — and invest in straightforward items with distinctive details that are already sewn in and require little fiddling on our part.
I used to do that more often. I felt satisfied with simple outfits that didn’t contain too many moving parts. Maybe it was the rat race of sharing outfits online and wanting to add value by setting myself apart from others or maybe it was a curiosity for how creative I could get with styling, but I was feeling a lot of pressure to do something brand new with every outfit. I don’t feel that right now, and it’s a relief.
That’s not to say I’m giving up complicated styling techniques. They have their time and place and I like a challenge. But as my days are full of January things, snowy walks and typing on my laptop and watching movies on dark evenings, I’ll continue to relinquish sartorial ambition and enjoy my simple outfits, embellished with hard-working accessories, day after day after day.
Here’s what I’ve been wearing…
Thanks for reading xx
Francesca 🔔
totally made me rethink the manoogian hat - always feel that oversize bucket-y style is so hard to wear but it looks effortless and practical here. also your vintage fur jacket is incredible, what a find!!
I’m obsessed with your sweaters and that manoogian hat! Well done!