style – Page 3 – the chelsea chronicles

initial fashion show

Last night, as you may have seen, Lee was able to grab a friend and head to Friendship Heights for a little dress trying on action. As I had other Friday evening plans that I did not want to dispose of, I had to skip the fashionable fun, though I was kept up to date by Lee’s stand-in consultant.

As I sent around previously, here is option number one:

This dress is a great color and cut on Lee, but I have had a few people text me to say they think it could be aging. Now I wasn’t there to see it in person, so I cannot say for sure whether or not this dress has that unintended and dreaded effect. But I do want to issue a general warning to women against making yourself look more matronly with the wrong dress.I know how hard it is to find the right balance between too young and too old, but the perfect dress is out there. I just may take kissing a lot of frogs to find it.

I am told by Lee’s trusty photographer that option number two, the above-pictured champagne-hued dress is gorgeous in person. Kassie Rempel DC shoe goddess and founder of the soon-to-be-launced Kassie’s Closet, weighed in that she liked this dress, and her opinion means the world. I like the color and the one-shouldered cut, but if Lee chooses this option, I want to see her put her hair up. Since she is traveling and won’t have access to her regular hair stylist, my next project might be to find a good “how to up do” tutorial for her.

And last but not least, there was a third option that I did not get a chance to post last night. The color may be a little heavy for summer but I like the cut and can envision the flow as she dances the night away.

There were others tried on that even I haven’t seen. There was color. But these were the favorites. If you have a favorite, please feel free to chime in. If you have an alternative, we will look at that too.

A military ball awaits.

men’s wear wednesday: the ties that bind

It has been some time since I’ve had the occasion to buy a man a tie. However, I do like to walk around the tie section of a high-end department store. I love how ties are organized according to their place on the color wheel. I love feeling the different textures and fabrics. I love imagining the possible suit-plus-shirt combinations a tie has to offer.

(Maybe all this tie buying love stems from the fact that I love helping a man take off his tie.)

A recent trip to Nordstrom in search of a birthday gift led me to my own little tie epiphany. Ties only come in three pattern options: solid, stripes or paisley. And within those pattern options, ties are either bold, safe (some might say boring) or ugly.

A tie is the man’s way to distinguish his outfit. It’s his shoes, jewelry, scarf and purse all in one. (Melt my heart if he has a corresponding sock.) The right tie gives a man his opportunity to present himself as more sophisticate, less prep school boy. It’s the one element that can pull together the professional man’s outfit. It’s a chance to be unique. Much like I don’t like to walk into an elevator and run into a woman with the exact same outfit on, I assume a man doesn’t like looking around a conference table and realizing he has on a variation of the same tie every other man in the room is wearing.

I personally like a man who can pull off a bold tie, but I recognize it isn’t in everyone’s comfort zone. If you are in the market for a tie and need some direction, my simple rules are: no skinny ties unless you are a dedicated hipster; no ties that require sunglasses to comfortably look at; and, I’m just going to say it, don’t bother with Vineyard Vines ties. They all look alike.

Oh and one more rule. Please, if you get a grease spot on your tie that won’t come out, you must retire it, no matter how much you paid for it or how much you love it.

men’s wear wednesday: just say no to dad jeans

I have two hot girlfriends who recently went on dates with guys who showed up in what I refer to as dad jeans. You know exactly what they look like. They’re a lighter wash. They’re high-waisted. They’re unflattering. They might as well have a tapered leg. Oh wait, sometimes they do.

I want to let men in on a secret: we like to check out your asses as much as you check out ours. I’m not saying that you have to go invest hundreds of dollars in designer jeans if that isn’t in your comfort zone or budget. I get it. You see jeans as being something you wear to kick around in, do yard work, coach little league. But I’d just like to make a few suggestions.

Stay away from colored denim. Unless you have a comfortable hipster swagger, skinny jeans are probably not for you. When you are going out on a date, try wearing jeans of a darker hue like this very budget friendly pair from the Gap. When you buy them, don’t get them baggy already because denim stretches. It stretches a lot. A trip to the Denim Bar, even if you don’t end up buying anything there, can be very enlightening. But I can almost promise you that if you do go to the Denim Bar, you will walk out with something in your bag.

If you don’t believe me, check out how amazing my friend’s husband looks from behind in his designer jeans. Imagine throwing a blazer on over this look for casual Friday at the office (or everyday at the office if you work in that type of environment). Envision yourself going out to a bar or dinner with your date in these. You will most assuredly turn some heads, and not just of the woman on your arm.

the Rita by Lillybee

I bought a white purse. Okay, it isn’t exactly nursing shoes white, but more accurately, a soft cream color that my kids just happen to call white. It has lovely dove-colored handles, the length of the drop on which is perfect for me and my on-the-go needs.

In three weeks, I may be wondering why I went with such an unforgiving color. It’s only a matter of time before it catches the nip of my ink pen, rubs up against something sticky, or just starts to accumulate a city hue from being carried to and fro in an urban environment.

But I’m going to diligently protect it from such evils because I love it.

I love that it looks just as good with black as it does with my brightly colored dresses and skirts for spring and summer. I love that it works with jeans. I love that it isn’t matchy matchy with my spring and summer shoes, but it also doesn’t clash with them. And most of all, I love that it’s from the Lillybee inaugural Italian handbag line, designed by local shoe goddess Kassie Rempel. That means my purchase not only supports a dear friend, but a woman-owned, DC-based small business.

On the first day I broke it out, I was mainly confined to my desk, but the three times I stepped away from the office, I received compliments on Rita. She makes a fine addition to the Lillybee family, and with any luck, maybe I can talk Kassie into offering it in eggplant for the fall.

bad outfit days

Just like every woman has a bad hair day now and then, usually coinciding with an event for which she’s extra focused on needing it to look good, like for a date, we also have bad outfit days.

Bad outfit days usually reveal themselves within minutes of their wearer being far enough away from home that it’s too late to rectify matters. Sometimes bad outfit days don’t make themselves apparent until after the outfit has seen several days of wear (not consecutively, of course). And under the worst case scenario, the bad outfit isn’t uncovered until many years later as the wearer combs through photographic evidence of days past. In the last case, these bad outfits aren’t just a representations of a long-gone trend or victims of the passage of time. You know deep inside they were as horrible then as they are now.

I had such an outfit that plagued too many days of my life two summers ago. I was experimenting with the mixing of patterns. You know, stripes with florals, florals with dots, dots with stripes. (J. Crew used to make it look effortless, though I’d describe their current combinations as erring on the side of the ridiculous.) Anyway, I had this olive green and ivory striped long-sleeved shirt. And I thought it would be super cute to wear with it a short-sleeved floral cardigan with predominant tones of olive, orange, pink and purple. I threw a multi-strand pearl necklace over the whole thing, paired it with jeans and waited for compliments that did not come.

Me: DC isn’t ready for this coolness.

I seriously thought my ensemble was awesome, so I wore the combination again. And again. And again. Then one day, I looked in the mirror and realized, “this is just awful.” (Or rather, that’s the sanitized version of what I said to myself.)

The point I’m trying to make is that bad outfit days happen to everyone. Maybe they happen to those who experiment and envelop push more than they happen to others. Or maybe because (for me personally) the pressure is high to always have on a great outfit, I’m more sensitive to the bad ones when they occur. Whatever the case, I typically advise to go with what your gut says when you stand in front of the mirror and ask yourself, “does this work?”

You just have to recognize that sometimes your gut is going to be wrong.

must have monday: nude pumps

I know this seems like an overstatement of the obvious to anyone who owns a pair (or in my case, multiple pairs) of nude pumps and/or wedges, but I get asked all the time, “what color shoes should I wear with this?”

The answer to that question can always be nude.

I wear nude (or its sister shades of blush, clay, and beige) with any and everything. Are you one of those people who tries to match the navy blue of your suit/dress/skirt to a navy pump? It’s impossible, so give up and get a nude pump or wedge to wear with your navy ensembles (save your navy shoes to wear with green). Do you wear black shoes with red? Unless you are color-blocking or mod, please stop. A nude shoe looks so much more sophisticated with a red dress. I even wear nude with black so as to elongate the leg and not look too funeral-y. They even work with jeans (but no floating hems, please).

Luckily for us, nude shoes have saturated the market, so you really can find one at any price point and in a variety of subtly different hues.

My current favorites are the Mai suede wedge in tan from SimplySoles, but I also have my eye on the Platswoon in adobe. Piperlime has pages worth of results if you plug the right coordinates into their search engine, including the Flax in light natural. When in the dressing room ready to model options for the guest of a wedding style dilemma, the cunning women at Neiman Marcus let me try on dresses with a gorgeous pair of nude patent leather Prada pumps that I have spent way too much time daydreaming about the last 48 hours.

This particular shoe might not fall into the “must have” category but they are squarely on the “will lust after” list.

more things I won’t wear

Fashion blogger Alison gave me a teensy bit of a hard time for won’t wears that describe what 78% of the universe of fashion bloggers would have on their lists. (I suppose we’d diverge when it comes to boyfriend blazers and strapless dresses.) Thus I decided I should push the envelop a little (something else Alison is trying to get me to do more of) and add some won’t wears that are either on trend or prevalent on our fair streets.

1. Colored Jeans. In the spirit of full disclosure, a year and a half ago, after three months of wearing all black in order to camouflage my back brace, I grew obsessed with owning a pair of J. Brand cherry red skinny jeans. Then I bought a pair. I looked like a hooker in them. If I’d been on twitter at the time, any #twitterfashionshow comments would have concurred with my assessment. I quickly got over the trend, apparently just in time for it to explode to include every color under the rainbow.

2. Boho Anything. There can be an understated elegance to bohemian styling when done right, but it’s totally hit or miss and it’s totally not me. I’m not exactly the carefree type and would feel in costume wearing a peasant blouse, floaty cotton skirt, or anything described as hippie chic, an expression I consider an oxymoron. After all, aren’t these the same people who made UGGs commonplace?

3. Maxi Dresses. I want to have the extra six inches of height that I think necessary to carry off a maxi dress, but since I don’t, I’m saving this style for the Alisons, Nancys and Liesls of the world.

4. Peplum. Who needs wider hips or the illusion of wider hips? Not this woman who has birthed two children. I don’t want peplum on a dress. I don’t want it on a jacket. I want the opposite of peplum please. (I guess that’s called shape wear.)

5. Leggings. Alison might put this item in the category of yesterday’s obvious selections, but I see enough people wearing them that I think they deserve a place on my list. I wish I could wear leggings with riding boots and a tunic and feel effortlessly cool. But the one time I tried a pair of leggings, I felt like I was wearing running tights. I have a comfort issue personally, but leggings in general are very tricky. Not everyone can/should wear them, even those of us who work out regularly. If in doubt, don’t.

There we go. Again, very personal and based on my age, personality and body type. For the most part, I’m not judging if any of these items fall on your must haves list.

Well, maybe judging just a little.

Operation Chelsea: Dress Reject #1

On Monday, I ordered a David Meister black fitted dress with interesting ruffled detail down the front and a jeweled neckline that looked so pretty on-line. This wildcard dress, not pinned on my Pinterest board, was going to serve as a backup to the navy lace sheath.

Well, it arrived today and it has been declined. The jeweled neckline is, as our intern Marlene described it, prom-y. Frankly, the jeweled neckline looked cheap and the whole thing was just bad. I didn’t even show the bride before sealing it back into the box to go back to its home at Saks Fifth Avenue.

I promised a twitter fashion show, but I don’t want to dignify the dress by trying it on. However, I am happy share this photo of the offending neckline.

Fingers are crossed that the navy lace works out better (and that it isn’t 85 degrees on the day of the wedding).

green is my new orange

Pantone decided that tangerine tango is the color of 2012. I have one response to that: I found it first.

Who sported a neon orange cross-body bag all last summer? That would be me.

Who owns two orange (okay, I’m going to call tangerine tango by its given name) silk blouses, an orange cashmere sweater, orange (coral) espadrilles, orange suede wedges (a new addition, granted), an orange DVF from a few years ago, two orange scarves, and various orange t-shirts?

You know it.

While there is some personal satisfaction in knowing you are ahead of trend, it’s also annoying when the one color you are most drawn to is apparent everywhere. I will still buy it because it is my color. For example, I just have to have the orange version of my favorite dress, known affectionately as the zipper dress, but if it’s navy sister is any indication, it’s a classic piece that will outlive fashion whimsy. Otherwise, when available, from now on, green in my new orange.

Still fresh in shades for spring (this is not your St. Patrick’s Day kelly or the early 90s forest) and honestly something that will pair well with my existing sweaters and shoes, green is still eye-catching. And it’s so versatile, working with many of its friends on the color spectrum.

But if Pantone’s 2013 color of the year is cilantro or grassy knoll or tulip leaf, I’m going to be green with pissed-off-ness.

And will promptly move on to purple.

stop pinning and start writing

I never thought it would happen, but in the last 48 hours I have turned into a Pinterest monster. Finally.

Admittedly, I have come late to every social media craze. I resisted Facebook initially, but then I realized I could write really amusing updates. A blog? I barely ever read any before I started my own last year. I figured out Polyvore so that my blog readers would have something visual to connect to some of my posts, but I was going to draw the line at Twitter. Then one bored day, I bit the bullet. The Twittersphere is still somewhat of a mystery to me, but the friends I have made from this universe compel me to stick with it (plus it has great cyber-stalking capabilities).

I don’t remember when I was first invited to join Pinterest, but I do remember it was my friend Janna who said “you will love this.” However, like all interweb-related crazes, I took one look and was scared. Too complicated. Too time consuming. And what’s the point?

Then on Thursday night, as I was making my internet window shopping rounds searching for a dress for Kaitlan’s wedding, I started thinking, wouldn’t it be great to have a clearinghouse where I could keep track of all the looks and clothes and shoes I desire. Three hours later, I had finally given the scores of Pinterest followers I already had amassed something to actually look at. Friends were re-pinning my pins, liking my pins, commenting on my pins… all fuel for my Pinter-ego.

Friday morning, instead of making pancakes for my kids or heading straight out the door for the strep culture that would register positive when I finally went to the minute clinic later in the day, I pinned more. I organized my pins. I put thought into what categories I would like to pin. Pinterest is going to be the home of a humongous Chelsea wish list with economy-improving capabilities. After all, it’s fantasy. I don’t know how often I will pin recipes, inspirational quotes or arts and crafts, but if you want to know what dresses I covet or what lipstick I like to wear, look no further.

After 24 hours of being a Pinterest-aholic, I lamented to a real blogger, DC Celine (one of the dear friends I thank Twitter for) that Pinterest was going to be the death of my neglected blog. She had the brilliant idea of writing about Pinterest to break the writer’s block that has plagued me. She encouraged me to read her post on pinning and crib her idea.

I am proud to say that my writing took a different direction, but I’m happy for her inspiration. If I could pin her as a friend, I would.

But then that would be Facebook.