I have heard from many people who are trying to start building their professional style but don't really have the money to buy an entire new wardrobe. I picked things that many people probably already have in their closets (black pumps, white shirt, black shirt, colorful cardigans, black skirt, etc) so you might not have to buy as much as you think. I actually had to build a new wardrobe about four years ago. I finally put my nose to the grindstone and lost the weight that I had been hanging on to since my son was born. I lost 20 pounds and two clothes sizes. I was finally back to my pre-pregnancy weight but I had NOTHING to wear. That's when I first started working with the "capsule" idea. I spent more money on the business professional staples and then starting adding pieces. I worked with one general color scheme and got items that would all mix and match. I found that a colorful scarf adds endless possibilities to your wardrobe options, as does jewelry. (I'm not addressing jewelry today, but I will in a future post.)
Here are 25 pieces you could start with (substitute your own favorite colors; if you don't like animal print then choose some other neutral print):
You will see that I picked mostly neutral bottoms but added one bright colored skirt and one animal print skirt. Of course I had to include white pants which are my favorite summer staple. I picked mostly solid colored tops and two neutral prints. I would have liked to have found one printed our colorful top but I couldn't find one I was crazy about on Polyvore. That would be the one thing I would change. But I did add one colorful scarf and one neutral (animal print) scarf. I think when you are just starting off it's not a bad idea to have many solid color options but looking at in now I think prints would be a needed addition. I wanted to show you that you really only need two pairs of shoes and one neutral bag to work with all these options. I'm a little afraid lightening might strike me right now because I have a closet full of shoes and bags and still can't get enough of them but this just proves that you could get by with two pairs of shoes while you are building the wardrobe. I would suggest you invest money in shoes because the better made shoes really are more comfortable and you have to wear them everyday.
So, here are the outfits I came up with:
That's how you can start to build a professional wardrobe. My next post will be about shopping for business professional basics and seasonal accessories.
Would building a mixable wardrobe work for you?
