Changing Your Clothes

Shopping, Sewing, Upcycling, Repairing: Make the most of your clothes!


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Closet Confessions: My Commitment Problem

How do you know when you’ve met The One?

Is it the pattern? The fabric? Or the perfect combination of the two? Exactly how do you decide what materials to match up with a particular design? And when you do decide, how can you be sure you can live with your choice?

Stretch cotton print fabric

Stretch cotton floral print, a months-long victim of my fabric commitment phobia.

Remember this fabric?

Yes, I first showed this to you way back in June, when I unexpectedly was offered a trip to Illinois, and was trying to plan a last-minute travel wardrobe. (To see all the posts in that series, click here.) To cut a long story very short, I ended up not making something for this trip with the print fabric, allegedly due to a combination of other priorities and lack of time.

Right.

Here and now, I confess to you, my sympathetic readers, the plain unvarnished truth: I didn’t want to commit this fabric to a specific project. Continue reading →


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Makeover Monday: Lining up!

You know how sometimes, even when something doesn’t need to be changed, you feel like changing it anyway? (I’m convinced this is the explanation for my lipgloss collection.) Well, I was in that kind of mood coming into today’s Makeover Monday; I only had to choose a suitable victim garment on which to experiment.

Enter the grey knit skirt.

I’ve had this skirt for at least 8 years, probably longer; I got it from Anthropologie, and it’s a triumph of featherweight 100% merino wool sweater-knit, with a pure silk lining, in my favorite shades of grey: charcoal and silver.

Grey knit skirt, before

Grey knit skirt, before. Nothing wrong with it, I love the style, I just suddenly want to change the lining, which, as you can see, peeks through the drop-stitch panels.

Continue reading →


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Liebster Award!

From my new blogging friend Michelle over at Preppy Boho comes a Liebster award nomination for Changing Your Clothes!

liebster-award

The Liebster Award recognizes upcoming blogs and tries to direct people to them. As it reads, the purpose is really to discover new blogs and help new bloggers on the way. Continue reading →


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Workweek Chic: A Pencil Skirt and a Leather Jacket

Fresh from Natasha at FreeUrCloset, here’s a wonderfully simple/sexy upgrade to a classic pencil skirt!

FreeUrCloset's avatarFreeUrCloset

Pencil Skirt Floral Bouse 2

Hello my fab fellow fashionistas! Here is a little office chic attire to get your work week started.

My black BCBG pencil skirt was my favorite go-to piece when I used to work a 9-to-5 job. Even now, when I attend business events and conferences, I rely on my good ‘ole black skirt and mix it up by wearing it with patterned blouses, blazers and leather jackets.

For my upcoming event, I decided to give my skirt a little do-it-yourself “sexy back”  by adding a visible gold zipper and a slit:

Pencil Skirt Zipper Diy

I paired my new and improved skirt with a floral top and a textured leather jacket in order to add some funkiness to the outfit (because, sometimes, you just need to bring the sexy to your work clothes ;)):

Skirt: BCBG (similar here)   Floral Top: Zara here   Leather Jacket: Vintage  Heels: BCBG

Workweek Chic Pencil Skirt Leather JacketWorkweek Chic Pencil Skirt Leather Jacket 2Pencil Skirt Floral BlousePencil Skirt 2Pencil Skirt Floral Blouse 3Pencil Skirt Floral Blouse 4Pencil Skirt 3

What sort of outfit makes your workweek “chic”?

NatSignature

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Goodwill Hunt, Part 2: The Loot

Okay, it’s not Thursday again already, but this is the promised follow-up on last week’s Thrift-Shop Thursday post, in which I explored a fabulous Goodwill boutique in the hipster-cool Hawthorne neighborhood of Portland. (Don’t you love the store displays?) Today, I’ll show you what I bought, and finish off my review of this hard-to-believe-it’s-a-thrift shop!

You know how it goes with thrift shopping… feast or famine, right? Some days the shopping cart runneth over, and on other days, you regretfully leave with nothing. This experience was a kind of hybrid of the two; I did find several wonderful things— for my daughter, who was with me on this shopping safari. One girl’s bust can be another girl’s bonanza.

First, this will give you a sense of the variety and quality I found throughout this Goodwill boutique:

Trying things on

Exploring what’s available. At left, Valerie is trying on an adorable vintage wool boucle jacked with mink collar (lined in silk, price: $24.99.). To the left of the mirror is a gorgeous BCBG silk blouse (also $24.99). And on the right, I won the traditional who-will-be-the-first-to-find-cashmere race when I spotted this J. Crew lilac cashmere pullover for $39.99!

Continue reading →


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Thrift-Shop Thursday: Goodwill Hunt!

On previous Thrift-Shop Thursdays, I’ve occasionally mentioned a Salvation Army Boutique shop that’s close to where I live; remember the Christian Dior jacket I found there for my daughter? (It would have been for me if I was a few sizes smaller, but at least the jacket found a worthy wearer.) I love this shop; it’s quite small (compared to the usual warehouse-like thrift shops), but evidently someone is doing a major job of editing its contents, because much of what I see there is higher-end quality, including quite a few designer names.

I discovered recently that Goodwill is also opening up boutique versions of its trademark thrift shops; I learned this from my friends over at the Goodwill Hoarding blog, who were also kind enough to let me know where I can find the 2 Goodwill boutiques* in the Portland, Oregon area. There’s one downtown, and another in the Hawthorne district, which just happens to be one of my favorite parts of Portland: eclectic, lively, and high-energy. I’ve actually walked or driven past this boutique many times, but always had something else to do that prevented me from stopping in.

But not today! Today I’m heading over to Hawthorne, excited about what I might find there, and will continue this post after I get back. Wish me luck! Continue reading →


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Who Am I, Anyway? Part 4: ‘Do-ing It Differently

In my previous posts in this series (there’s a list of links at the end of this post if you want to catch up), I first confessed to being in a state of confusion about my identity, particularly as it’s expressed in my wardrobe.

Next, trying to bravely face myself, as it were, I created silhouettes of myself so I could begin visualizing how various styles actually look on me.

And in Part 3, I introduced you to my new style icon, Christina Hendricks, whose body type is quite similar to mine, and whom I admire for her willingness to dress the body she has, as opposed to hiding her curves.

Which brings me to this week’s major step forward in this process:

I got my hair done. Continue reading →


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We Interrupt This Blog-Cast…

… to introduce The Renegade Seamstress! Beth is an incredibly popular blogger focusing on refashioning clothes, and I love/follow/am inspired by her!

Here’s just one example of her work:

Before

One of TRS’s projects, before…

Continue reading →


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Who Am I, Anyway? Part 3: Style Icon Found!

Okay, I know, in Part 2, I promised a list of my likes (and, now that I think about it, dislikes) in clothes, but I just had to tell you about this right now:

Newsflash: I’ve found a style icon!

Remember in Part 1 of this series when I mentioned my quest for something, anything to give me a starting point for my newly-evolving style? Well, I’ve found it incredibly difficult, possibly because I was looking more at women whose style has been famous for decades, the same ones most of us think of immediately: Marilyn Monroe, Audrey Hepburn, Grace Kelly, etc. And while I love and admire all these and many more, and can find elements of their styles that might work for me, no one woman has felt like the right fit for me. This is good, actually, since it means I still have some sense of individuality going on; I don’t want to be a clone of anyone.

But it also adds to my confusion about who I am, style-wise. I mean, where do I start? Hence my search for someone who embodies not specifically the way I want to look, but more how I want to feel in my clothes.

This morning, I found her, not in our cinematic past, but very much a present-day star: Christina Hendricks!

Christina Hendricks

Christina Hendricks on my new Pinterest board. (Click on the picture to see the rest of this board.)

Continue reading →


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Who Am I, Anyway? (Part 2 of… many)

In my last post, the first of what promises to be an epic series, I confessed to a serious wardrobe identity crisis. This led to me biting the proverbial bullet by showing you pictures of what I really look like, body-shape-and-size-wise. (And thanks to all of you for your supportive and empathetic comments!) Today, I’ll show you what I was inspired to do with those photos to help this process along.

Already this process is leading me in unexpected directions. After finishing that last post, I suddenly felt much better! Could it be possible that simply facing up to what I had thought of as the truth about the way I look actually steered me straight? As I suspect many of us tend to do, I had fallen into the habit of focusing on what I perceived as the negative aspects of my body.

But after looking at those photos for a while, it occurred to me to think of it like this: What if that was a friend of mine, who had come to me for wardrobe advice? Would I be telling her that she’s too thick in the middle? Her shoulders are too narrow and her rib cage is too small for her bust? Of course not. I’d be telling her to focus on her assets, and dress to make the most of them.

So why am I not doing that for myself? Continue reading →