Latest trends: Stylist Live Catwalk

Stop press! Hold the front page! I've just returned from a flying visit to the UK to help my brother celebrate his 65th birthday. While I was in London I managed to visit Stylist Live, in order to discover the latest trends to share with my readers. The trends were: intergalactic, velvet goldmine, sportswear, the navy coat and spice world and all outfits are available on the high street plus on-line.

You may feel that over 60 women shouldn't be bothered about looking trendy - and I certainly don't recommend wearing the latest trends head to toe - however a nod to fashion can liven up your basics and (dare I say it?) stop you looking boring.

The catwalk show presented the trends in reverse order, so the first photos show Trend 5: Spice World. I wondered if the clothes were going to be outfits from the Spice Girls (Victoria Beckham?) however they turned out to be spicy colours. This is a great opportunity for those of us who have warmer colouring to go shopping.

 

 

Trend 4: The Navy Coat is good for those over 60s who are finding black a bit too harsh for their complexions. I'm the first one to put my hand up and admit to this! In some of the photos below you can see the navy coats being worn with accessories in warm colours, as navy looks good on people with warm colouring as well as cool colouring.

 

 

Trend 3: Sportswear is one that will appeal to those of us who like wearing casual, comfortable clothes. You probably wouldn't wear these outfits to the office or for going out to dinner, unless it was somewhere very casual, and it might not appeal to everyone. I'm tempted by the Adidas trousers, though knowing my luck they probably won't have them in petite sizes.

 

 

Trend 2: Velvet Goldmine is perfect timing with Christmas only a couple of months away! Why o why did I throw out that green velvet jacket? I'm trying to console myself with the thought that it was probably the wrong shade of green..... Wait! I do have a pair of burgundy velvet trousers, so I can still look trendy at any Christmas parties that I attend. You don't have to buy a velvet trouser suit to look on trend, as there are velvet bags in the shops that add a trendy touch to your outfits without spending too much.

 

Trend 1: Intergalactic isn't one that I'm likely to follow, as it's a bit too shiny for me. I don't need my wrinkles highlighting, thank you very much! I'd be surprised if many women of a certain age will be buying into this trend, though shiny bags and shoes are a good way to add a touch of silver to your outfits.

 

 

     

What about you? Do any of these trends appeal to you? Are you likely to be purchasing any of these outfits? As I've said before, even if you're not particularly interested in looking fashionable and prefer to just look stylish, it is useful to know what the latest trends are, as it provides clues to what you'll find in the shops. If a colour that suits you is trendy, then look for classic styles in that colour so that your clothes don't look outdated the following season. Don't spend a lot of money on something that may look out of date in a year's time.

My autumn capsule wardrobe

Autumn colours

I do love the idea of a capsule wardrobe and have blogged on numerous occasions about the advantages of creating one. I've talked about the 10 item wardrobe, which is great for holidays but - if I'm being totally honest! - a bit limiting for me otherwise. I've also followed Project 333 for just over four years and find that a lot easier to stick to, as you are allowed 33 items to cover 3 months, though I have to admit that I do bend the rules slightly.

I bought an e-book recently: The French Minimalist Capsule Wardrobe, which falls in between the above two capsules as it suggests a total of 26, consisting of 22 items of clothing and 4 pairs of shoes, to cover you for 3 months.  The French Minimalist Capsule is built around neutrals of black, white, ivory, grey, denim and camel. In my case black and white are too harsh and cool for my colouring, which is on the warm side. My neutrals therefore are brown, camel, beige, olive and navy.

Being a rule breaker, plus having to work with my current wardrobe items, I have included a few other colours in the selection below, however they will still blend with my neutrals and hopefully be equally versatile . I have also allowed myself 24 items of clothing for this autumn capsule. In the e-book, the capsule consists of 9 tops, 6 bottoms (including skirts), 5 outer layers, 2 dresses and 4 pairs of shoes. I have chosen 12 everyday tops, plus 1 dressy top (as there aren't any dresses in my capsule), 5 bottoms (but no skirts) and 6 outer layers, which includes a trench-coat.  I'm hoping that I won't need the trench-coat for a while here in Spain, but it proved invaluable on my recent trip to London for my son's wedding! 

    

The items shown above are definitely autumnal and reflect the colours in the photo at the top. With twelve tops and five bottoms to mix and match there is plenty of variety in my wardrobe, plus there are four cardigans to ring the changes. Accessories also have an important role to play in making my outfits more interesting.

The blue jacket below doesn't really fall into the warm category, however I've worn it over my orange top and it also goes well with brown and camel, especially with the right coloured accessories. It adds a touch of colour to my wardrobe, which is why it will be part of my capsule. Finally, my dark navy jeans and breton top are both classics and as such deserve a place in any French inspired capsule wardrobe.

My French Minimalist wardrobe consists of 24 items, without including shoes and accessories. If I want to extend it to an Autumn 33, as part of Project 333, that gives me another nine items that I can add in. Keep it quiet, but I am going to London next week, so I may very well make a few purchases there to complete my autumn capsule wardrobe!

PS Update: I've just read that brown is one of autumn's It colours - so for once I'm going to be on trend!

Do you like chocolate?

I've been inspired by a recent post on the Looking Stylish website: How to wear chocolate brown - colour combinations for you to try.  First of all I ate a piece of dark chocolate (it's supposed to be good for you!) and then I looked into my wardrobe to see how many chocolate items of clothing I have. Here's what I found to begin with.

There are several different shades here, just as chocolate varies from white chocolate to milk chocolate and dark chocolate. Too much chocolate though can be bad for you, so I decided to have some fruit.  Do you like oranges and peaches?

Or how about lemons and limes?

What about some vegetables - pumpkins, avocados or tomatoes? Enough of this nonsense!

The point I'm making here is that when you start with a neutral colour, you will have a wide range of accent colours that you can wear with it.  Remember though that if it's a warm neutral, you should choose warm accents. I chose these accent colours to go with my brown basics, but they will also look good with my other neutral of camel.

If your colouring is cooler than mine, you may have black, navy or grey as your neutral colour and your accent colours will obviously be cooler. However you could choose chocolate too. In her blog post, Maria of Looking Stylish shows combinations using cooler colours such as blue and pink. 

So, back to my original question: do you like chocolate?

Holiday outfits

I checked the weather forecast before packing for my birthday holiday. We were going to Calpe for a couple of days as John's daughter and her family had booked a villa there, after which we headed to Jerez and Cádiz in southern Spain via Madrid. It wasn't going to be a beach holiday, even though we knew the weather was going to be hot, as we're more interested in walking and sight-seeing when we go on holiday. I packed one tankini as we were staying in a Spa hotel in Jerez, plus there was a roof-top hot tub in the hotel we had booked for the last night of our holiday. Apart from that, my clothes were mainly tops and bottoms that would be comfortable for sight.seeing with a couple of dresses for wearing when dining out in the evenings.

These are the clothes that I packed for this holiday: we were travelling by train so we weren't restricted by airline weight limits, though I didn't want to take too many clothes as I still had to lift my case on and off the trains!

I thought it might be interesting to post photos of some of the outfits that I wore on our holiday. Please take note of the hat in many of the photos - I'm not really a hat person but I knew we would be doing a lot of walking and at times we might have to walk in the sun rather than in the shade.

 

 

 

I had packed a couple of cardigans. We watch the weather on Spanish TV and had seen that it was very windy in Cádiz so I thought I might need to wear them when we went out in the evening. It was still very warm at night though and the winds had died down so I didn't need them, however they are light and don't take up much room, so next time I would still include at least one cardigan.

I have two Longchamp Le Pliage bags, which are ideal for travelling. I carry one of them and the other one folds up neatly, taking up very little space in my case. The bilberry one goes well with my brighter outfits, while the red one provides the splash of colour that I love with my neutral outfits.

The shoes I took were all chosen for comfort: a pair of Decathlon ballerina pumps and some lightweight trainers for days when we were going to be walking for several hours, plus a pair of gold sandals that are smart enough for going out in the evening, but still comfortable. I also had a pair of flip flops for when we visited the spa and the roof-top hot tub.

We were away for 10 days, however I haven't any photos of the outfits I wore for travelling or for going out at night. I must try to remedy that on our next holiday - you can tell that I'm not a professional blogger!

From Travel Wardrobe to Whatever's Clean

In my previous post, I showed you what the brilliant Janice from The Vivienne Files included in her travel six-pack and I then showed my own version. The actual number of items of clothing was nine, with six pieces packed plus a travel outfit.  

If you follow the above link, you can see how Janice then expanded this to create a Whatever's Clean wardrobe of just 13 pieces. The idea is that everything should mix with everything else in your capsule, so you don't end having to wear a couple of clean pieces that clash horribly. (I've experienced this myself when on holiday, partly due to the number of colourful pieces I had packed!) In reality most of us will have more than 13 items of clothing in our wardrobe, but creating your own Whatever's Clean capsule is still a useful exercise and definitely comes in handy when travelling. 

You can see the 13 pieces Janice that included in her version of Whatever's Clean in the following pictures. To start with there are three "toppers", then six tops including a couple of patterned pieces, and finally four bottoms including one skirt.  In her blog post she explains the thought process behind expanding her travel wardrobe.

I followed a similar thought process myself. I added a camel cardigan to make three toppers, then chose two more tops, making six tops in total. Finally, I added a pair of cropped white trousers and my Whatever's Clean was complete.

Like Janice's version, my capsule can be combined to create numerous different outfits. Obviously some combinations will look better than others, but it's still a versatile wardrobe. If, like me, you enjoy wearing lots of different colours, you might find this a useful exercise to see how versatile your own wardrobe is and perhaps to identify any gaps. If you're taking part in Project 333 (where you select a total of 33 items of clothing to wear for the next 3 months) you could create a second Whatever's Clean capsule using a different colour scheme - and you would still have seven items to spare!

My colourful "six-pack" travel wardrobe

I've been a fan of The Vivienne Files for a long time, and Janice has been the inspiration behind many of the posts on my blog. I was very excited by her latest series of posts, using beige, bright blue and orange, as I have similar colours in my own wardrobe. As I have a holiday coming up at the end of the month, I thought I would see how much of her six-pack travel capsule I could use to create my own travel wardrobe.  Below you can see Janice's version and the link to her post is above.

There are actually nine items of clothing shown, however three pieces will be worn when travelling while the other six will be packed into the travel bag. If I was flying hand luggage only, this would work well for a week's holiday or even two weeks if I did some hand washing. I'm travelling by train though, and we'll be away for ten days, so my travel capsule will contain a few extra items.

I have shown nine items of clothing in the above pictures, giving me a travel outfit and six-pack like Janice's, however I am lucky enough not to be limited by hand luggage restrictions on size and weight for this trip, so I will add the following items.

My final selection consists of a white short-sleeved lace top, an orange tank top, a green and yellow dress (which I admit doesn't fit in with my colour scheme!) and a loose navy top.  I will be checking the weather forecast just before I actually pack my case. If it's going to be hot in southern Spain, I will probably leave the blue jacket behind and just take the orange cardigan. My accessories will be chosen to fit in with this capsule: I have a couple of blue scarves, a beige bag and shoes, plus coral and gold earrings.

I will be celebrating my birthday while we're away, so I may very well treat myself to something new in orange or blue to fit in with this colour scheme! In my next post I will be talking about expanding this capsule to create a "whatever's clean" wardrobe so I can identify any potential gaps.