Investing in Timelessness
Making Wardrobe Choices with Forever in Mind
From top left across: Rei Kawakubo, Sarah Harris, Kate Moss, Chloe Sevigny, Ashley & Mary-Kate Olsen, Zoe Kravitz.
I’m not terribly interested in beauty.
What touches me is someone who understands herself.
Vivienne Westwood
The Art of Curation
Curating a stylised wardrobe and a solid style identity could be one of the most meaningful steps that you decide to take for your future self. With some guidance and practice, almost everyone is capable of creating a unique style blueprint that will last, for life.
Beyond the urgency of trends, wardrobe curation requires a calm and discerning process of edit, review and selection. Much like in interior design, curating your style involves weaving together garments and looks that resonate and connect with you on a personal level.
Careful editing and organisation of the pieces in your wardrobe will help to reveal the various facets of your personality, your life, ancestry and influences, which then translate into developing your own style identity. Ultimately, creating a cohesive and meaningful wardrobe that feels effortless, comfortable, and above all, like you.
From the beginning I thought about working with the body in movement, the space between the body and clothes. I wanted the clothes to move when people moved. The clothes are also for people to dance or laugh.
Issey Miyake
Know Thyself
As a style curator, much like an artist, you need to consider texture, colour and silhouette, viewing your body as an expressive form to adorn, almost seeing yourself with new eyes for the first time.
Moving through the emotions of what this brings up, will allow you to detach from the barriers that hold you back from - how you see yourself, versus how you want to be seen. There’s often a big difference between the two. Once we’re able to hear our inner critic as just that, a voice, sometimes helpful and sometimes not, we can start to create the magic.
It means choosing a viewpoint and sticking to it. Boiling it down to its essence. It’s about knowing yourself deeply and then being fearless enough to express it. My style ethos that runs throughout my work, is to guide clients to find the best version of themselves, that isn’t them versus their personality splitting or masking, but to find the most honest, truthful and authentic version of who they are.
Often delving into childhood, looking at old photos, artwork, interests, likes and dislikes can be a helpful starting point for this process. As we could easily express our inner truth, much more readily before the world stepped in to influence us in other directions. I also recommend when starting this curation process, to block out social media, and any visuals that you have not chosen to see. To become insular into your own thoughts and inspirations, and to use this as an opportunity to gain complete clarity over who you are and therefore, your life’s direction.
“If you create the composition in an attractive balanced way, the same way you prepare a meal, like if you know how much oregano is going to balance everything else out, it works and people will respond to it, people feel it and it’s kind of the same thing with clothes and references. If you kind of create the right mixture of references it’s going to be graceful, logical and poetic, and it will register.”
Rick Owens
The Edit
All good fashion editors know the power of a good edit - it’s about making the strongest choices and whittling down your selection to the absolute best options. The ones that just work, that fit the best, feel right and are comfortable, are flattering, true to who you are and that you don’t have to overthink when reaching for them.
One great exercise that you can do to start making an initial edit, is to put all of your current clothing on hangers with the hanger turned away from you. Any pieces in a month (adapt this seasonally) that are selected and worn, get turned the right way around to face you. After a month, you will have your edit. It’s often surprising to see what these pieces are and they’re usually selected because they work for you in the best way.
There are many other aspects to editing your wardrobe, such as defining your colour palettes, silhouettes, textures, patterns and brands or designers, but the above exercise is a really good way to start.
I want to put a soul in a garment. I don't want my clothes to be perfect, because human beings are not perfect.
Ann Demeulemeester
Investing
Thinking not just in the present, but with the next ten, fifteen, twenty years, to the rest of your life in mind when making any new purchases. Curation is consistently choosing quality over quantity, and cultivating a personalised wardrobe that transcends trends or outside influence. Allowing you to craft an interesting and personalised viewpoint, that is yours and yours alone.
By prioritising forever-minded choices in your style journey, you are investing in both your current and future self. Any future purchases should now be made with careful consideration, love and commitment to your individuality.
There’s a certain maturity in choosing to put down what no longer works for you and committing to the version of yourself, that is for life, not just for the moment. The payoff for making this choice though is tangible - You will be left with looks that you truthfully love, that make you feel radiant and alive. Getting dressed every day will also become effortless and you won’t get stuck on what to wear ever again.
Your style now becomes a statement of enduring individuality and a commitment to long-term sustainability, where each piece is a lasting investment in both style and conscience. Timeless style will endure throughout the years, transcending ‘of the moment’ trends that would otherwise drain your finances and ultimately end up unwanted and wasted.
“Most of the things that I get are things I have wanted for a long, long time. I am not an impulsive buyer and I don’t like clutter. I don’t like filling my world with impulsive things. It has to be a serious commitment.”
Rick Owens
In an ever-evolving landscape of fashion, wardrobe curation emerges as a powerful way of shaping individual style and defining the most well-dressed of wardrobes. Here are some of my favourite well-curated women on Instagram.
Athena Calderone
Instinctively styling her way across interiors, homewares, cuisine and fashion, Athena has a uniquely opulent, clean but bold style that is instantly recognisable as hers. With a consistently elegant viewpoint, cool colour palette, subtle detailing and sophisticated timeless pieces that fit seamlessly, it’s no wonder that so many people have become fascinated by her work, style and life.
You can buy her book, Live Beautiful, here.
Sarah Harris
As a prolific British Vogue Editor, Sarah has perfected the art of dressing well for over a decade. With ethereal silvery long grey hair, which she’s embraced for many years, her modern and classic way of dressing is distinctively hers. Nothing ever feels too overdone or precious. There’s the perfectly cut tailored suit, worn with trainers, a t-shirt with Chanel sliders and metallic jeans, even evening wear never feels over-done. It all looks so effortless, yet to achieve that level of personal style, takes a lot of tight editing. We can all learn from Sarah’s impeccable taste and curation.
Brenda Hashtag
www.instagram.com/brendahashtag
When I was first introduced to Brenda’s account earlier this year, I instantly appreciated her devotion and work ethic to the curation of her style. Bordering on obsessiveness, of the good kind, Brenda invests in forever pieces. Supporting a tight-knit list of designers that she believes in and invests in. Her unmatched curated wardrobe, only in black and white (see above), is a ruthless and genius edit. Brenda’s ethos promotes following a long-term strategy for buying vintage archive clothing and advises her followers on creating both longevity and legacy via their purchases.
Lydia Pang
Creative Director and Morning Agency co-founder Lydia Pang has a bold and uncompromising style identity, that has evolved over the years. She possesses a visibly steely and unflinching sense of self. communicating both a sense of playfulness, and toughness. Nearly always dressed in black, or very occasionally in a small amount of white. There’s a visible sense of intelligence in the looks that she puts together, combined with intuition and an ultra-modern viewpoint.
Stacey Duguid
www.instagram.com/staceyduguid
Those who remember Stacey from her award-winning column, Mademoiselle, Confessions of an ELLE Girl, know her as an enigmatic, hilarious and trend-setting fashion girl, now a fully-fledged woman. Her feminine boldness is risk-taking but accessible, favouring pieces that she’s grown to love and will wear many times, over following new trends. She’s documented her ongoing style process over on her Instagram, with a tight edit and honest wardrobe curations, often influenced by her closet space and day-to-day practicality. Stacey’s bewitching style and sense of humour continue to impress and delight us all.
You can buy Stacey’s book ‘In Pursuit of Happiness: Mating, Marriage, Motherhood, Money, Mayhem’ here.
“Start copying what you love. Copy copy copy copy.
At the end of the copy, you will find yourself.”
Yohji Yamamoto
Thank you :)