closet ponderings

[anotheranon]

Fashion for Nerds is a bad influence. I mean that in the best of all possible ways ;) For someone like me who gets stuck in periodic sartorial ruts it's a real inspiration - her confidence with color and texture are a marvel to behold. She makes me want to wear skirts. She makes me want to wear [shock horror] colored socks.

These temptations combined with recent closet scouring have yielded the following cautious conclusions:

• I have enough black dress pants (yes. I have ENOUGH of them!). Also enough black t-shirts and black boots. At least they are all different from each other, and I've not fallen into buying the same/similar items. Not often, at least.
  
  
• Future black items have to have some element of texture or contrast so as not to be boring/look worn out too quickly.
  
  
• This involves getting away from my beloved 1990s minimalism [twitch] [flinch].
  
  
• Anyone know how to make cufflinks? I have a couple of French cuffed shirts and I don't need anything dressy, just something more interesting than the plain plastic linked buttons it came with.
  
  
• I broke down and got these 'cos I found them on sale and I really want to rock the Kate Hepburn look this fall.
  
  
• I daydream about making something like this or this to wear as a vest/layering piece. Maybe in bottle green velvet or red tartan.
  
  
• I have a bunch of jewelry I never wear. Gonna see to that. Will attempt not to look like overdone '80's nightmare.
  

Comments

[wcg.livejournal.com]

I don't know how to make cufflinks, but I have several pair that I'd be willing to let you sort through and choose some you like. I can take pictures of them and post them somewhere, and then mail you the ones you want. They're nice cufflinks that I just don't ever wear these days.

[anotheranon.livejournal.com]

Thanks for your offer!

I would be interested. Please let me know where/when photos are posted and we can work out some sort of exchange if I find some I like.

[wcg.livejournal.com]

So, after investigating the possibilities of this, it seems my wife and daughters would be distressed if I were to give away things they've given me over the years. So they shall stay in my jewelry box. The good part of this exercise was actually finding all the cufflink sets, and identifying the broken/missing/etc... ones.

Ah well...

[anotheranon.livejournal.com]

Thank you for thinking of me though!

[tommdroid.livejournal.com]

Being a total n00b when it comes to fashion and clothing this was a most instructive post. Thanks. :-)

[sealwhiskers.livejournal.com]

I have a ton of jewelry that I love but never wear, so I hear you on that. I need to plan some jewelry into my week schedule or I'll just forget about it...

[jlsjlsjls.livejournal.com]

Easiest way to make cufflinks: break out the fancy buttons/beads and join 'em with wire

Ah those shoes ... I've always loved that style and have never found a pair that fit ... ***sigh***

"She makes me want to wear [shock horror] colored socks. ***giggling 'cause you made me instantly think of this ...***

There was more talk about Father's socks and shirts than anything else. Most of this talk was by Father, who didn't like things to disappear for long periods, and who wanted them brought promptly back and put in his bureau drawer where they belonged. This was particularly true of his favorite socks. Not the plain white ones which he wore in the evening, because they were all alike, but the colored socks that were supplied to him by an English haberdasher in Paris.
These colored socks were the one outlet of something in Father which ran contrary to that religion of propriety to which he adhered. In that day of somber hues for men's suits and quiet tones for men's neckties, most socks were as dark and severe as the rest of one's garments; but Father's, hidden from the public eye by his trousers and his high buttoned shoes, had a really astonishing range of color and fancy. They were mostly in excellent taste, but in a distinctly French way, and Wilhelmine used to tease him about them. She called them his "secret joys."

From "Life With Father", by Clarence Day. I've always loved the thought of that properly dark'n'drab-garbed 19th-century stockbroker with his secret wild socks. ;-)

[anotheranon.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the cufflink...link ;) I may try this out!

And that story about the wild socks over somber exterior...:D

Re: socks - I have for many years been of the mind that white socks go with sneakers; black socks with everything else. Maybe gray socks with gray pants/red shoes (of which I have a few pair).

But I have all these black shoes...

If I change this it would be rather a shocking development for me!

[jlsjlsjls.livejournal.com]

I've always thought a flash of colourful sock in an otherwise black-from-head-to-toe ensemble looks rather sharp, m'self. But if you're not used to that kind of craziness you might want to start slowly ... perhaps with a pair of perfectly-matched-to-the-footwear red socks with that gray pants/red shoes combination?

you said red tartan...

[stanci.livejournal.com]

If you would do something with it, I have a piece of Skene tartan (wool, red and green, with the red more prominent than green) that's about a 30" x 72" fabric? The only thing I've figured that it would work for is a pleated skirt, but am not entirely sure I'd wear something Christmas colored enough to make it.

Re: you said red tartan...

[anotheranon.livejournal.com]

Thanks!

If you're really not going to use it, I'd be willing to give it a go. Do you want to do an exchange? Contact me off-LJ.