There is still many months of cold weather to go before the first green shoots of spring, at least here in London where there is currently a smattering of snow on the ground. We may be becoming a little bored and jaded of wearing the same pieces every day. The solution as I think I have advocated before is to find a first quality alteration specialist and make him/her your new best friend.
Here are a few pieces I re-modelled this season. First a Nicole Farhi silk batwing sleeve dress. Not sure the batwing sleeves were a good idea in the first place. The dress certainly looks better and more current without them.
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| The Original - Not very flattering and out of date batwing sleeves |
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| The revised version - slimmed down and the sleeves re-modelled |
I read a very interesting article in the London Evening Standard by Lucy Tobin entitled How to live it up in the Austerity well worth a read if you want some good tips on how to live well in London without spending a fortune. I am sure the principles can be adopted for other cities. I loved her quote "Economic growth this year is looking about as likely as a vegetarian tiger".
She offers some good advice on how to get your hair cut at a top salon by being a "model" for a supervised student. Brand-name beauty products can be purchased from the following Feelunique or Strawberrynet.
There are also useful sites for budget travel and restaurants.
Other bloggers who seem to be on the same theme of adapting their clothes and shopping their wardrobes are:-
Not Dead Yet Style
Over50feeling40
Passaagedesperles A great post on how to adapt a fur coat
Style Crone
The simply luxurious life
The Vivienne files
Unefemme
I am sure there are many more if so let me know who you are. I would be interested to know and I am sure so would my readers.
Thank you for reading. I really love to hear from you and appreciate the time you take to leave comments.
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12 comments:
I haven't started yet, but your great results makes me want to try now! Amazing difference to the dress - really suits you now...J
Thank you so much for the mention! I really like the dress re-model...it looks great! I have become bolder about shortening a garment or refashioning a garment from a dress to a jacket for example. The dry cleaners is a good place to get some inexpensive sewing assistance. I so wish I had listened to my mother and learned to sew. Have a wonderful weekend!!
Great alteration work on those pieces!! The updated dress looks fabulous on you. And thank you for the mention!
Thank you for sharing some great ideas here.
I really like customising items that I already own - even some knits! will go take a look in my wardrobe!
You obviously have a good seamstress! I've ruin the fit of clothes before. But this is going to make me look at my wardrobe in a new light.
What a great idea! Before reading your post I had never thought of refashioning garments. Thanks!!
I love the fact that you addressed the elephant in the room when talking about fashion these days. Financial uncertainty is everywhere but we can continue to live with style and beauty with a bit of ingenuity. This weekend I am going through my closet and rather than discard, I am going to see what I can remodel. Great tip!
I am really glad I have inspired you to try the art of re modelling. If you buy well and good fabrics your clothes should last if you take care of them. Better for the planet and your purse.
Fabulous dress and works well all year round with the layering you're showing. You look fantastic in Navy (if my screen is telling the truth). And your hair looks great!
Wonderful idea! I have been thinking of shortening a dress to tunic length and pairing it with leggings. Or buying a dress designed to be quite short and also pairing it with skinny jeans or leggings. My answer to the winter doldrums is to add a colorful scarf, which I did this past week. I love scarves and couldn't wait to show it off. In the dreary month of January in upstate New York, a little color helps to remind me that spring can't be that far away.
Your post has got me asking myself why we feel we need to buy new clothes to achieve contentment with our wardrobes. Since childhood I have always been more fascinated by women who achieve elegance on modest means - members of my family and women I've encountered through life - rather than the superficial glamour of movie stars.
Your idea of revamping through alteration is great and I have bags of clothes which have been waiting to be done for years! Being a woman of modest means (with or without an economic recession!) I have two main strategies for beating winter blues on a budget that I've followed for some years now;
1. Regular hand and nail maintenance and a new nail varnish in a flattering colour - we use our hands all day so to have them well groomed and pretty to look at really lifts the spirits and feels elegant. Of course this also entails loads of handcream (or Vaseline) and cotton gloves at night (a la francaise). But I find if my hands look attractive I don't need new clothes - I feel well groomed and therefore complete.
2. Packing away summer clothes at beginning of winter and winter clothes at beginning of summer (Italian women actually take a day off work to do this on 15th April and 15th October) - in this way you rediscover your winter clothes when you unpack them which gives you a real feeling of wearing new clothes as well as rediscovering old friends. I also find it prolongs the life of clothes if they are properly stored in paper and French mothballs.
Catherine Thanks for your nice long comment. I definitely subscribe to your second piece of advice and aspire to the first but find it difficult as nail polish chips so easily on me (I seem to have very bendy nails)
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