Week Six of Why So Many Clothes: Coming Up Daisies
I like it
That black vest peeking out from under Monday’s plum Warehouse (90% off) dress is one of the most sentimentally valuable things in the wardrobe. It was a bold buy for eighteen-year-old me, when living in Bangkok. It has a red wiggle across the waist and tummy, and a brown and red cubist design on the back. I can’t wear it on its own now, because it has white marks, bobbles, tears, faded patches. It’s almost offensive. I can’t get rid of it. It’s long past its days as a really trendy item in Bangkok fashion, when I bought it in a swanky department store from ‘Fly2K’ after months of saving up the bottle. Back then, a colleague in my office, a Thai woman of about 28 (about two years younger than I am now), used to wear the most intriguing and diverse outfits to work. She was beautiful, with big eyes, face-framing black hair, a slim but curvy figure which she thought was fat. She leaps to mind in a sheer, rusty and golden, printed tunic, belted with a silver threaded plait, and tight, charcoal flares, somehow officey and out of this world all at once. When I asked her where she got all her clothes from, she laughed and said not to worry, by the time I was her age, I’d have as many choices in my wardrobe – just to keep collecting if I wanted to have that variety. Sometimes I’ve caught a glimpse of her in the mirror, and smiled.
So, to the Warehouse dress. I didn’t specifically like it when I bought it, but it reminded me vaguely of the shapes Ossie Clarke made. I go in and out of phases of liking it or wondering why I have it in the first place. Today, I like it. The colour, comfort and relative work-worthiness. So many clothes because sometimes I need to wait until I like them again?
I like it not
Oh dear, I’m fickle. I didn’t like Tuesday’s green skirt when I put it on. I wanted to, but didn’t. This was its first wear. I thought I’d cheer it up with the rusty tights and the black corsage on the puff-sleeved tee shirt. My mum’s staying and she says I look really good. My boss compliments the skirt. I start to like it. A colleague says he thinks the skirt is great but a real winner with the tights. Oh, dear. Keep.
I like it
I had an email (thank you!) asking how it felt to be thinking about my clothes every day, while writing this blog, and whether it made me tired. The Wolf and I are talking about this experiment, on Tuesday evening, and I realise that, at this stage, I feel differently than I’d anticipated: six weeks in, not having duplicated an item of clothing, as I go through the labyrinth of wearing all my clothes. Not oppressed, as feared, by my clothes nor by a stealthy, creeping awareness that some insidious notion of femininity and style and status ruled my life without me knowing it. Phew. What I’m learning is that there are very few things in Not Keep because I love my clothes and clothes.
I’m increasingly finding confidence and self-expression through this experiment. This has a lot to do with the Wolf’s camera eye and my mum’s generosity and friends’ and readers’ support. I’ve also realised that I haven’t spent a lot of money on this magnarvellous wardrobe.
Is this too soon? There are still drawers that don’t shut to wear through, that mysterious pile on top of the cupboard, a few bags, clothes on hangers and a pile of handwashing to do. There are still a lot of shoes. Still those luminous green shorts. Still so many questions.
Clothes as a magnifying glass
Wednesday’s outfit begins with one little pin. It’s a crow playing a saxophone, made by a childhood friend, for Dingwalls in Camden. The crow’s wearing a red mac and he’s black and white with a bit of brown. So – red halterback, black and white pirate top (Dingwalls is by the water, Camden Lock – now a very different place to when the Crow pin was made), chocolate leather jacket, black, high-waisted drainpipes, vintage Italian brogues from the 1960s, black lace socks. The whole outfit is a magnified version of the pin, and its tone: through this, a magnified expression of feeling for the memory and the living, present person, who designed the pin back in the 1980s.
I like it not
Hmm. Thursday’s clothes are comfy, bright and playful but I’m not really playing. I feel silly. Always wanted to like the spotty, grey dress but one giggle from my mum and I have to admit – it doesn’t work for me. I don’t like it, just liked the idea of dressing as a spotty librarian, the image in my head when I blew 50p on it in a Commercial Street Charity Shop. On Friday, a lady on my route to work is in a similar get together. I narcissistically flatter myself that someone was inspired during our daily train ride but really, I think it just works for her. As for me – Not Keep. The pink tights and lace hoodie stay though! Just maybe not together.
I like life!
Friday is a day for celebrating and showing change. The black, slinky cocktail dress was from the sales in the clothes shop I worked in during my BA. Now I’ve earned it: I absolutely need it to wear for an informal prize-giving, for a poetry competition. It’s raining and I’m working outside of home all day so I need layers. I started with a pink tee shirt but that went back in the drawer and on with Mum Style – the loose, retro shirt with fruit and flowers. I’ve been looking for a reason and the bravery to wear this. A rainy world needs a dose of my mum’s bright hand-me-downs to lift moods up. Shoe-wise, the black wellies (my mum looked at them and said, ‘Not Keep?’, but I love them) are alternated with cute Lulu Guinness platforms (Irish Charity Shop). The pink mac feels very right. All Keep.
More magnified moods
Saturday: why can’t I just stay in the garden with my mum in the sunshine all day? She’s heading home and I have to go out to work before she leaves. Hmmph. This calls for my favourite tee shirt, bright red Jigsaw one, over ten years old and still keeping its colour. It looks a bit stubborn against the Whistles top (hand me down from ZH), matching my childish, inner strop. Not Keeping the skirt as it makes me feel flooby and wet – although I spent a couple of years eyeing these up in shops before getting my sticky paws on it. It sits so high, it looks like my tummy’s been bandaged with corduroy.
I like it, I like it not
Very excited about seeing wonderful KR for roast Sunday lunch, want to match excitement with clothes. The kilt carries the mental image of women I idolised when eleven or twelve, in the time mini-kilts and red and black combos were popular. I really didn’t want to admit this skirt, bought on impulse in an Upper Street charity shop without trying it on, just didn’t fit right. The reason I didn’t want to admit it is that the Wolf grumbled about the skirt and leather skirts in general, when I bought it, and that made me want to like it even more. However, all day today I feel like I’m mid-parachute, showing my bottom as I descend on the embarrassed post box, winking petrol station, fired-up oven. I don’t like the studs on the pockets, either. Not Keep. If I were to end the week on a stubborn note: I know what I like, can be convinced to like clothes with a few compliments… but not to dislike them!
By Sara Nesbitt Gibbons
