This summer, I happen to be doing a fair bit of traveling, and to different climates. This week I’m in the tropics, and in a few weeks, I’ll be in the rainy Pacific Northwest. With my general distaste for paying airline baggage fees, that means I have to pack seriously smart. I also want to look good doing a variety of things, from kayaking and hiking all the way to dinners and meetings in academic settings. With that in mind, I want to share with you one of the things that guides how I practice style and pack: a capsule wardrobe.
A capsule wardrobe is one that follows one or two colors and tries to build on core pieces to make the most out of each one. In this piece, I want to go over the benefits of designing your wardrobe around a small color range.
Capsule Wardrobes are Stylish
A capsule wardrobe can be a deeply stylish choice, if for no other reason than it’s a wardrobe that you’ve carefully planned out. I doubt that you’d get up in the morning, pick any random set of shirts, shoes, and pants and just head out for the day. Without any forethought, you have the risk of looking seriously goofy in the process. Instead, you’d take the time to try to coordinate an outfit that makes sense for the day’s activities, and makes you think that you look good doing it.
With a capsule wardrobe, you buy only things that look good together. Thus, by the time you have it put together, you ought to be able to pick any one shirt, pair of pants or shorts, and shoes, and they will, at the very least, make sense together. In fact, that’s one way to test the versatility of a capsule wardrobe: if you can mix and match the pieces and random and still find it visually appealing, you’ve done a good job.