Capsule Wardrobe by Math: Can You Actually Get Away with It?

Can you get away with it?

I've been fairly obsessed by capsule wardrobes lately. It started with Putting Me Together. Then I started thinking about how to pack lightly. Somewhere along a Pinterest board I came across it. A quick google search led me to this minimalist website.

There's two main arguments about why you should adopt a capsule wardrobe. One is the idea of the signature look. Most likely you already have one, but just don't know it yet--hence all of the clothes that you like, but never wear because it's not you or just doesn't fit your lifestyle. While it's fun to change it up, if you believe in personality, as in a pattern of traits stable through time, then it makes sense that one might have a fashion personality. We usually call it style. After all, isn't the main point of fashion to express our identity? If so, you might want to give a stable impression.

The second reason is minimalism. Minimalism does a lot of things. It makes your closet easier to navigate. It makes your bag easier to pack. It makes you spend less money, but it makes you buy higher quality items (supposedly you save on cost per wear). It forces you to wear those high quality items instead of saving them for a special occasion. It's good for the environment and all those kids in India sewing their hands bloody factory employees working in unsafe conditions in Bangladesh. It also makes you happier because you have restricted choice. Your boundaries make it easier to make decisions, for example, about what to wear.

The downsides of a capsule wardrobe are that you might run out of clothes or get bored with what you have, or people might start looking at you weird.

No, you can't wear the same thing every day. Not even if it looks awesome.

Also, looking at a lot of capsule wardrobes online, I found them to be unrealistic. For one thing, they didn't take into account exercise attire. For another thing, they seemed to be limited to cold weather.

Then it hit me: these capsules are only meant to last one season. Now I understood how any red-blooded woman could stand to only have 10-30 items of clothing. They really had 40-120.

Either this person doesn't have summer where she lives, or this capsule wardrobe is just for winter.

It seems like most capsule wardrobes are 10-30 items including shoes, but not including accessories and essentials such as socks and underwear. There are some nice examples of 9 pieces 14 ways and whatnot, but it's not really that impressive. It's simple permutational math, as my high school calculus teacher pointed out. Except, as my calculus teacher's wife pointed out, most women are picky about what shoes can go with what outfit, so the real trick is to make sure everything can go with everything else. Still, can you get away with wearing the same 30 things for three whole months?

Enter my nerdy spreadsheet:

Okay, so it's 32 items, but notice that it includes a category for exercise. I decided that I had 4 dimensions in my life. Depending on your lifestyle, you may have more or less. For each dimension, I had 8 items of clothing. While there are specific exercise items that I would not want to wear for any semi-formal public place (sweat pants probably are a no-go), it also gives me a chance to cheat (I'm never going to wear a dress while working out--but it's great to have four different types of dresses).

Scarves are an accessory, but I decided to include them because I want to cut down on my scarf collection since I always wear the same ones again and again anyway. It might even encourage me to use the ones I'm too afraid to wear for fear of ruining them. Also, scarves are great wardrobe expanders. 



Wendy's Lookbook

So would this get me through winter?

Disclaimer: I only really care about tops. I don't care if you wear a shirt with jeans one day and with slacks another--to me it's still the same outfit. But if you wear slacks with one shirt one day and then another shirt another day--to me that's a different outfit.

Assuming that your casual shirts, fancy shirts, and at least one of your exercise shirts can be worn to work, then you have 8 different outfits including your work dress. Let's see how many times we can repeat these tops without getting boring.

1. Plain
2. Work cardigan
3. Fancy cardigan
4. Thick belt
5. Thin belt
6. Work scarf
7. Fancy scarf
8. Casual scarf

More tips from Putting Me Together here.

That's 64 combinations right there. Also, though I don't consider wearing a top with a different pair of pants a new look, skirts are a different matter. So if you can wear all of the tops with a skirt, then multiple that times 2. So these 32 pieces will take you through winter and fall easily. Also, to be honest, I'll wear some of the tops from my Summer/Spring capsule as well. Technically I have 64 items, but it's for the year.

With this type of logic, you can do the 33 in 3 challenge in no time.

Whom are you dressing up for?

BFF had some sort of altercation with DB about why girls dress up and/or show off their bodies and whether or not they get bad attention from creeps. I'm not really sure how it went down, but at the very least, I have to be grateful for DB for presenting his unusual world view to me.

But it got me thinking. Why do women dress up? It has been my belief since high school that women dress up more for each other than for men. This view is not shared by men. They feel that women are dressing up for them, or for guys in general, some of whom are creeps who will give the women bad attention.

Saying women dress up for men is like saying men pump iron for women. Sure, that may be why a majority of women/men do so for a majority of the time. But it is certainly not the only reason they do so. So why do women dress up? There are 4 reasons.

1. Impress Men
 
I'm not going to deny this one. Women assuredly dress up for men. They want to look nice for them. Sometimes they want to look sexy. Sometimes they want men to drool over them, even if they have no intention of giving any of those men the time of day.*

*Society calls these women "teases," but I hate that word. Yes, sometimes women purposefully tease men. Sometimes they just change their minds. Either way, once a women says no or shows resistance, it is unethical to touch her. Remember that, please. No matter how a woman is dressed, DON'T ASSAULT HER!

My BF also points out that a lot of the clothes women wear tends to be designed by men, primarily gay men, so you can think of it as women being dictated to by men. Whether or not the percentage of women designers will increase is hard to say. Personally, my favorite designer is Nicole Miller. I discovered this by browsing designer dresses at Bluefly. Every time I liked a dress, there was an 80% chance it was by Nicole Miller. 

Resort dresses by Nicole Miller

You could also say that women dress a certain way to look professional for work, and that that's for men (or The Man, specifically). It's more of a society in general thing than specifically for men though.
 
I don't have that much more to say about this, except . . . women spend a lot of time getting ready to go out with men--the hair, the make-up, the clothes--they're famous for making men wait for them. Why? Men don't appreciate this 99% of the time. Maybe women are primping in hopes of that 1% magical walk down the stairs moment? What about all those times a girl gets a new haircut or wears a new dress and the guy . . . doesn't notice it? Can we be that oblivious? Are we dressing against this tide of indifference? Or are women dressing to:

2. Impress Other Women

Female rivalry has deep roots. Sometimes it's about men. Sometimes it's about the lead in a ballet (i.e. career). Sometimes it's about popularity. Sometimes, it's even about clothes. Whatever it's about, clothes become a woman's weapon. This is obvious when it comes to men, but what about for a career or popularity, which includes men and women?

Women are very critical about the way other women dress. This is not always nefariously motivated. Women spend a lot of time thinking about, looking at, talking about, and shopping for clothes. They assess not only their own outfits, but those of the women around them. When women get together, they may look at fashion magazines or Victoria Secret catalogs (or the online version, nowadays) to find women, hair, and make-up to emulate. Or maybe just to envy. Women learn how to dress not by passively buying what gay men tell them to wear, but by observing how other women dress. Some of these women might be models and celebrities, but a lot of them are the real women they see around them. After all, there's only so much money available for clothes.

For women, shopping is a team sport.

And what if a women dresses unusually poorly? If the women are catty, they will talk about her impending demise. If the women are nice, they will wonder what is up and maybe arrange a makeover. A makeover not only requires new hair and make-up, it will inevitably require new clothes, and shopping. That's another reason women dress up, to

3. Celebrate Their Clothes

Here's an anecdote from today. I got dressed, because I had to; I leaving my apartment. I rifled through the clothes on my beside table that I had worn only once and grabbed a pair of shorts. I had checked the weather, and it was going to be fairly warm. Also, I can only wear shorts on the weekend, because they are inappropriate for work. These shorts are pretty short. But! I did not buy them to attract guys.

Okay, I bought the shorts because of other girls. One day I was looking at some pictures of a summer event and I realized that my shorts were longer than those of all the other girls. I also realized that I had had those shorts since middle school (by this time I was in college). I decided I needed to get non-granny shorts.

Regardless of why I bought the shorts, the reason I am wearing them right now is because I like them, because they are comfortable, and because I hardly get a chance to wear them. One of my favorite sayings is that women don't buy dresses for events. They buy dresses and then find events to wear them to. I have twice as many dresses in my closet as I should have, considering how little I wear them, so a lot of times when going out to something even slightly special, I wonder if it would be overkill to put one of them on. I know I should get rid of some of them (and I will), but the thought of that is difficult because I like them all so much.

The neglected dress. Being enshrined in a closet isn't enough.

So that's another reason women dress up--because they feel like they're neglecting their nice clothes. Lastly and most importantly though, the reason women dress up and/or show off their body is for: 
 
4. Themselves

Duh. Any time a fashion show wants to talk about why fashion is important, they talk about how fashion affects one's self-esteem. Of course, one's self-esteem can't be completely resurrected by a good wardrobe--nor do I think the wardrobe should even play a large or foundational part. It might help though. After all, one could argue that a woman (or a man) who doesn't care about what she looks like has given up on herself. She has no respect for herself or the people around her. It's not a bad thing to take pride in one's appearance.

Sometimes a women will compliment another woman on her appearance. The first women might say something along the lines of, "I was feeling yucky today." The other women will nod in understanding. Sometimes dressing up can make you feel better about yourself, even if no one admires you but yourself.

 

 

Why are Weddings such a Big Deal?

Pinterest has a whole section devoted to weddings. Women not even engaged yet (sometimes not even with a partner!) pin their dream weddings. Why so much investment in this ideal? Why is it so pervasive and so overblown?

I have two theories: singularity and identity.

By singularity I mean that for most women, this is the biggest party they will ever throw in their lives, and for many women this is the first party they will throw. For some it will be the only one. At least it seems this way. Both tradition and the wedding market encourage this. Traditionally, getting married is a major milestone. This was when you not only committed yourself to a person for eternity, but also became an adult and moved out of your parents' house and started having sex.

The singularity of the event means that women will pour in a lot of effort to make sure that this day is the perfect day. They will muse about the menu, cogitate about flowers, and agonize over the dress, because there's only one chance that they can get this right--and it will be photographed and filmed for future posterity and facebook.

I found that it takes a lot of pressure off to not think about the wedding as the only party I will ever plan. If something doesn't make the cut or is too prohibitively expensive, I can file it away for some future party, such as an anniversary, my bridal shower, or a friend's wedding (at the risk of becoming a bridemaidzilla). Bacon-wrapped canapes don't fit the theme? I can make them for a dinner party. Peonies too expensive? Hint to husband that they would make a nice anniversary gift. Tulle canopy held aloft by balloons not appropriate for an indoor wedding? Save it for a friend's bridal shower (or birthday).

It's very liberating. Instead of agonizing over whether or not I'm making the best choice, I can put it down to deliberating about the right choice, and comfort myself with the idea that I can still experience all those other photo-worthy displays some other time in my life (if I still care).

What about identity? After all, a wedding is now less of a community event and more of an expression of the bridal couple (or at least the bride). It could express how they have money, or it could express that the couple enjoy the irony of wearing expensive outfits and drinking fancy signature cocktails out of mason jars in a barn. Seeing that this is a large gathering of realtime people, the couple probably want to represent themselves well. It's an expression of what they value, calculated by what they choose to spend their money on.

Offbeat bride celebrates this. The introduction to the book talks about how it was important for the wedding to convey how the bridal couple were, instead of going through the motions of wearing a veil and walking down an aisle to appease family and community. One Perfect Day warns that this is not only a marketing tactic, but a harbinger of a breakdown of community. An Atlantic article warns that just because your wedding isn't unique, doesn't mean you aren't getting married.

My take aligns more with offbeat bride. Even though a wedding is in some ways more about the people invited than the bridal couple, if the community didn't accept the couple for who they were, I don't think they would go. Also, a lot of the hipster ideas regarding rented barns and mason jars are, in fact, ways of saving money, though the wedding industry has proprietized those practices. As for the Atlantic article--isn't that the point? To express oneself while still participating in something that, even 50 years from now, you can point to in your outdated video to your grandchildren and still have them recognize it as a wedding?

Anyway, I wanted a lot of things for my wedding, not out of practicality, but because I had an idea of it in my head or because I thought it went with a theme I liked. I spent a lot of money on flowers because I wanted a bouquet (as did my bridesmaids). I didn't want all-Asian catering, even though it would have been cheaper. I am going to get married in an Asian-American Museum, not only because it's relatively cheap and the right size and I'm afraid of getting married outside because of the weather, but because I thought it was appropriate for my identity. That's why I stuck with those choices even when costs and hidden charges got racked up.

Vera Wang's 2013 red bridal collection. To aim at the Chinese market?

I also considered wearing a red dress (one part practicality, one part tradition, two parts because it matches the venue). My friend asked me, why not get married at city hall if I'm not going to wear a white dress? Why have any of it? Why invite people from both sides of the Pacific to this thing where we pay for them to eat fancy food and unlimited wine and beer, in the process coordinating headache-inducing schematics including timelines, spreadsheets, websites, and $200 worth of flowers, for the love of all that is good and holy? (My fiance wonders this whenever I try to coordinate with him.)

Well, because I still wanted a wedding, even if it's not completely traditional. To say that a different colored dress would invalidate that was pretty insulting.

It will be (I swear) the most expensive party I will ever throw in my life. It will have the largest number of guests (that I personally invite and know of). It is the only time I will ever rent out a venue or hire a caterer. It is (hopefully) the only time I will ever get married.

It is also a chance to express myself, my culture, and my love for my husband-to-be.