I’ve been reflecting a lot on the outfit posts on my blog
lately. Someone recently told me that on
Guru Gossip once I was criticised for too often just wearing ‘jeans and a
t-shirt’, and that my outfit posts weren’t ‘inspirational’. I’ve thought about that a lot, and you may
have noticed that I’ve not been doing as many outfit posts lately as I wanted
to get my groove back before I jumped straight back into photographing what
I’ve been wearing. And I guess that’s at
the heart of it – my outfit posts are always just… what I’ve been wearing. I’ve never claimed to be a fashion
inspiration – I’m not a fashion student, I’m not good at ‘styling’ things; I
don’t have time to lay out my clothes in the morning and take ‘flat-lays’ and
switch them up until I’ve found the perfect combination (full kudos if you do,
I love getting fashion inspiration this way – I just pinch other people’s ideas
instead!). I do wear jeans a lot – I try
and mix up what I wear them with, and I have more shoes and coats than you
could shake a big stick at, but jeans are definitely my ‘go-to’, my comfort
zone.
So when Next invited me to take part in their ‘Take 12’
challenge – I did try and rummage around to find a faux-leather pleated midi
skirt that I knew would look awesome with this beautiful tie-neck blouset, and I
thought a lot about sleeveless coats and boots and all kinds of other things I
could dig out that might create an outfit that showed I’d really thought about
how to ‘style’ the item whilst nailing some key AW15 trends. And then I thought, stuff it – I’m going to
wear the shirt as part of an outfit that *I* would wear to dinner – with some
heels I’m wearing loads at the moment, a leather jacket that also popped up in
a recent outfit post, and some faux leather mix leggings that didn’t arrive in
a package from ASOS last week, but more likely last year. Because to me, fashion is about things you
can wear, and feel good in, and not feel like you’re playing dress-up (which I
would have, if I’d pulled out that skirt that frankly still has the tags on it
because it wasn’t very ‘me’ to begin with).
I’m sorry if that’s not inspirational – but this is me.
Shirt: Next, £28*
Jacket:
Great
Plains, £95*
Faux
leather leggings: ASOS {old}
Shoes:
M&S {No longer on website}
ANYWAY
– so I love the idea of the Take 12 challenge – and I hope I’ve done it
justice! Next put together this campaign
because you can now order right up until midnight for next day delivery, so to
celebrate that you can shop right up until the clock strikes 12, they invited
12 bloggers to style up a key
piece from their A/W range. This
shirt is perfect for my workwear wardrobe, and for throwing on with jeans
(there’s those jeans again – sorry GG!) at the weekend.
What are
the favourite items you can’t help but drag out of the drawer again and again?
Are you a fan of inspirational outfit posts or do you prefer the more
day-to-day, casual outfits?