My Wardrobe, Myself

Today’s essay is basically a follow-up to my last one, about the issue of shopping the way we dress – or not. After realizing that I’ve often been a lot more selective with what I wear compared to what I purchase and/or keep, I decided to take a good, hard look at my recent purchases to see if I might avoid mistakes like the ones I wrote about last month.

Return windows are getting narrower at many retailers, but fortunately I was able to identify five items that I could still take or send back to the retailer for a refund. In this post, I’ll share those pieces and my reasons for returning them. They were all “close but no cigar,” which is frequently a defining characteristic of the wardrobe “benchwarmers” that hang in my closet and rarely get worn. Fully realizing how “picky” I am about what I wear will hopefully help me to minimize those benchwarmers even further and save me both money and guilt!

A Wardrobe “White Whale”

We’ll start with an item that’s been on my shopping priorities list for a long time:  cool-toned metallic, low-heeled ankle boots. I had purchased a pair that I thought would fit the bill back in 2022, but they turned out to be of low quality and didn’t hold up very well. I was probably too hasty in deciding to keep them, which can happen to many of us when we become weary at trying to fill a gap in our closets. After searching high and low for a specific item for months or even years, it’s common to lower our standards and perhaps “settle” for less than what we truly want.

After searching for a replacement for the disappointing metallic boots, I thought I found the right option last month:

These boots were perfect in almost every way, except in terms of the size and fit. I usually wear a size 9 or 9.5 in shoes, but the size 9 of these boots was too snug and the 9.5 was too roomy. My heels, which are on the narrow side, slipped when I walked around my house in size 9.5, but I thought that I could perhaps improve upon the fit by using inserts or padding. However, when I put such pads in the shoes (without affixing them just yet), I didn’t like the way they felt.

Since I was on the fence about the boots, I ordered another pair to try, that maybe weren’t quite as perfect (the heel was a bit too high, for one thing) but could potentially work. When those boots arrived and I tried them on, I immediately knew they weren’t right for me. So, I revisited the boots pictured above, which I hadn’t tried on since I’d written my last post. But once I got those boots on my feet again, I was clear about what I needed to do.

I knew the boots needed to be sent back because they just weren’t the right shape for my feet. If I kept them, I’d probably wear them from time to time, but they would never become a “wardrobe workhorse,” and I would continue to search for a better version. As it is now, I’ll still search for that ever-elusive “white whale,” but at least I won’t have a fairly pricey lesser option sitting in my closet.

Falling in Love with a Color and Pattern

Another pitfall that many of us can encounter when shopping is falling in love with a color and/or pattern. In the case of the top pictured below, it was both for me.

Burgundy is one of my staple colors, and I loved the gradient print of the top. I have several versions of this top already in my closet that have been worn many times. However, the brand has changed an important aspect of the top over the past year or so. The length is now about two inches shorter than it used to be. Because the top is made from very stretchy material, it can be pulled down to a longer length, but it still didn’t hit me in my preferred spot, which is basically “bisecting” my read end. The length in the picture is what I wanted, but because I’m tall, the hemline hit me quite a bit higher.

Like with the ankle boots I wrote about in the last section, I immediately knew what to do upon trying the top on again. Fortunately, I was still within the return window and was able to take the top back to the store. I’d still love to find a short-sleeved burgundy top, preferably in a subtle print, but I’m glad I didn’t settle for one that wasn’t quite right for me.

When the Color isn’t Quite Right

Two of the other returns that I made this past week had to do with colors that weren’t quite right. The navy sweater and olive joggers shown here were not the right shades of those hues for me.

As you can see, the sweater is a very dark navy that almost looks black. I love navy, but I prefer a shade that’s brighter and more vibrant. The sweater had a lot of other things going for it, in that I liked the notch neckline and the textured fabric. However, the color felt like too much of a compromise for me after I realized that I should be as picky about my shopping as I am when putting my outfits together. I understood that I would always feel uninspired by the darker navy, and I would probably also lament that I wouldn’t be able to wear it with black because the colors would be too close to each other. These realizations made it easy to decide to return the sweater to the store.

The situation with the joggers was quite similar. I don’t wear olive all that often, but I like the way it looks paired with black and black-and-white prints. I own that style of joggers in both black and navy and hoped that the olive ones would be a nice addition to my at-home wardrobe capsule. However, when the joggers arrived, I noticed that they were more of a heathered olive rather than a rich and vibrant olive shade. Because they were very comfortable and I got them during a rewards members’ sale, I considered keeping them. But as with the dark navy sweater, I came to understand that I would always wish the color were different, which would probably result in my wearing the joggers considerably less often. Back to the store the joggers went, with lots of relief and zero regrets.

A Flattering Neckline and a Soft Fabric Isn’t Everything

The final item that I’m covering today is a soft and cozy sweatshirt with a surplice-style neckline. That’s one of my preferred necklines, as I like to highlight the top half of my body and accentuate my slim torso. The neckline on the sweatshirt stayed in place nicely, and I loved the feel of the soft fleece inside the top.

The sweatshirt looked great from the front, but I wasn’t as confident about the back view. When I bought the top, I wasn’t sure that I’d keep it, but I decided to try it on with various pants to see how I felt it looked in my at-home mirror vs. the potential “skinny mirror” in the store.

I didn’t do my at-home try-ons until after reading Sally in St. Paul’s helpful comment about the disparity she’s noticed between how I dress and the way I shop (which was the subject of my last post). But when I tried on the top with several pairs of jeans and black pants, I ultimately decided that the thick sweatshirt hem was a dealbreaker for me. Not only was the top a bit too short just like the burgundy one highlighted in a previous section, I felt that the thick band at the bottom drew the eye to my least favorite area of my body. I remembered why I don’t wear traditional sweatshirts or hoodies with the thick bottom band and instead prefer to stick with more subtle hemlines on my tops.

Although I loved most aspects of the black surplice top, I realized that I shouldn’t overlook a detail that I found problematic. Doing so has led to countless shopping mistakes and wardrobe benchwarmers over the years. Sometimes I’d still wear the items in question, but I’d either do so begrudgingly and out of guilt or I’d have certain “contingencies” in place for wearing them. In the case of the surplice top, I’d probably always wear a cardigan or jacket over it to cover up the thick band in the back. But I already have other tops with that type of contingency, and I certainly don’t want more like that.

Conclusion

I’m grateful that I was able to save myself from five shopping mistakes that were likely destined to become wardrobe benchwarmers or closet castoffs in short order. The bottom line is that while other women may be far less picky about what they wear and don’t obsess or agonize over what might be considered “minor details,” I am not that type of person. I care deeply about getting garment colors, hemlines, and fits right, and I don’t like when they’re a bit “off.” I also want my heels to fit firmly in my shoes and not slip when I walk.

Self-awareness is extremely important to how we shop and the way we dress. We need to know what we like and don’t like, and we shouldn’t settle on what are important details to us. I’ve learned that when I try to wear what fashion professionals or style bloggers say is “in” or what my friends think I must buy, I often end up making shopping mistakes. If I trust my own instincts and don’t try to talk myself into liking something or buying it because it’s a “good deal,” I fare much better with my sartorial purchases.

Years ago, I read that if something isn’t a “hell, yes,” then it should be a no. I believe this maxim can be attributed to Derek Sivers, who wasn’t writing about shopping at the time. However, his wise advice definitely applies to our wardrobes, as well as for any other decisions we might be making in our lives. If I look back upon my worst purchases of 2023 (or previous years), none of them were even close to a “hell, yes.” They were usually more along the lines of, “It’s a great deal,” “I love the color,” “The fabric feels soft,” or something like that. While it may not be possible for the clothes that we buy to be absolutely perfect in every way, we should at least feel great in them and be excited to wear them sometime in the near future.

One commenter on my last essay mentioned a post from Bridgette Raes, which I’ll link to here in closing. Back in 2016, Bridgette wrote about “Five Secrets of a Well-Dressed Woman,” the first of which is being a ruthless editor. This editing should begin when we shop, as it’s much easier to let go of something before it’s ours than when it’s hanging up in our closets. I think back upon the many closet audits that I’ve done over the years that would have been far less agonizing had I just been more discriminating in what I purchased. I’ve improved a lot over the years, but I still have a lot of room to grow in increasing my shopping success percentage. The returns I did this past week were another step in the right direction, so as Gretchen Rubin says, onward and upward!