Four Different Looks I Tried Before Finding *The One*
Plus, a little tease for a project I've been working on...
Hi everyone! Lately, most of my Substack time (read: my free time that’s still work, basically) has been dedicated to an audio project I’m really excited about. I’m hoping to release it next week here on my newsletter. So, this week’s newsletter is a little mixture of GRWM/Just Trying Things that I hope you’ll enjoy! I was about to say it took me less time than usual, but it didn’t…so I’m still working overtime. But! I’m so excited about the audio project I’m creating, I had to tease it here. Stay tuned!
I’ll be honest: it’s been a few days since I’ve left my apartment in a meaningful way. Meaning, anything besides the grocery store, or a walk, or a little hang in the park two minutes from my place. So, I haven’t built an ~outfit~ for a while, and therefore have not flexed my outfit-building muscles.
Tonight marks the convergence of two important things: the weather is actually somewhat nice and I have a work event. That means, at least to me, I can be more dynamic with my outfit. I can layer, I can maybe even wear socks, I can wear my hair down without it getting stuck to my sweaty neck.
It’s funny though—sometimes it feels like the more time I spend away from fun outfits, the less inspired I am. My closet, right now, is basically a black hole. It’s a mess, I need to go through my clothes and shoes, and I’m long overdue to figure out what’s missing from my wardrobe. I’m almost afraid to look at it. So, I’m going to avoid it and instead look up some outfits on Pinterest, Instagram, etc. and see what I come up with.
Look #1
After bopping around Pinterest for a while, this was the first image that felt inspiring. I have a cropped black tank and a denim jacket—I could do something with it. Maybe with a skirt, some tall socks, and tennis shoes? Let’s try it.
I actually think the bones of this outfit are really cool, but I need to revisit it on another day. I discovered that I’m crazy bloated while putting this on, so I have to re-evaluate what I’ll feel comfortable and confident in. (Which is why I didn’t even bother putting on shoes.) But, to sing this outfit’s praises for a bit: I’ve been really into the cross straps in front lately, and I like how it looks on. This is just a sports bra that usually crosses in the back, but I finagled the straps, and I’m excited to play with that more. I need a bigger jean jacket for layering—this one looks cool buttoned up as a top, but I don’t love it open. It doesn’t have the dynamics I’m looking for. Onto the next inspiration…
Look #2
Dress over T-shirt with some sort of jacket over it? I can do that.
I went off script for this one, because I don’t have many jackets that are light enough for an August day, even if the weather is better than usual (and I don’t own a blazer?? Time to reconsider my life). Plus, I wanted to see if this pattern mixing could work, since the colors are similar. I actually don’t hate it? But it doesn’t feel right either. On to the next…
Look #3
I’ve got a loose dress with a high neckline, and I can for sure do some tall socks. Jury’s out if I’ll do ballet flats because that feels too explicitly babydoll to me, and I get bored of outfits if they feed into one theme exclusively. Let’s see what happens…
I actually like the babydoll look more than I thought I would, even with the ballet flats. Maybe the socks make it more interesting? But I still wanted to try it with sneakers.
That’s fun, too—but I’m surprising myself by liking the ballet flats more. Overall, I just don’t feel 100% in this dress today, so I’m moving on.
Look #4
I went to @victoriaminerr on Instagram for fashion advice, and while this specific post doesn’t show what inspired me (most of her content is videos, so I had to find a still pic), I got inspired to wear something sporty with my ballet flats. So I tried this:
I think it’s fun, but ultimately I’m going to a work event so I need to calm down with the lack of length. I’ll come back to this one at some point though for a more casual event. Though I’m not loving the green of the shoes with the blue of the jacket. Sigh. Moving on.
Look #5
After all is said and done, there’s only so much Pinterest and Instagram can do. My searches got me thinking outside my usual box, but it was still up to me and my good ol’ wardrobe to create the magic. I looked at my stack of pants, my piled-up shoes, my haphazardly hung dresses, and noticed this dark green dress hidden at the back. It’s technically a fall/winter dress because it’s a little heavier/dark, but I grabbed it anyway and decided to incorporate a few of the details from my other outfits experiments.
And, ta-da! The winner for today. I added a bracelet, necklace, and ended up going with these boots after trying on a few different types of shoes. It was fun to make this dress more casual with the T-shirt underneath, because until now, I’ve used it for fancier affairs—dinners at dimly lit restaurants, work soirées. Now I see it as something totally different, which was an unexpected cherry on top to this whole saga.
The influencer I linked to earlier, @victoriaminerr, actually said recently that when experimenting with clothing, you have to be prepared to just…look like a clown sometimes. I think this newsletter is proof of that—I tried to post pictures during every stage of getting dressed, even when I looked silly, to remind myself and readers that’s just part of the process. It’s like writing: sometimes your first draft really bombs, and sometimes the story basically writes itself. But no matter what, you usually find something you can work with later, however that may look in the end.
Buckling down in my apartment once again,
Abi