Simplifying my life via my wardrobe

In My Humble Opinion
1

Must be fashion season! Lots of threads about getting all dressed up…ties…suits…

So let me just jump in.

I am looking for ways to simplify my life. I work in a bank and have to wear a suit and tie each day. It is time to buy some new suits.

I am thinking of buying four of the same black suit, and about 8 of the same high quality white shirts. Then each day I only have to go to the closet and grab a coat and a pair of pants, and I don’t have to worry about what is in the dry cleaner and what probably needs to go to the dry cleaner. Make sure all of my ties are good with a black (actually probably charcoal) suit, and I am ready to go!

So - is this weird? Are the people I work with going to think I wear the same suit every day? Will people notice?

My life is very hectic, and making my clothes more simple is just one way I am trying to simplify things. Bad idea? Good idea?

2

Don’t do that. Everyone will assume you never clean your clothes.

I’m about as fashion-challenged as they come. (Fashion-blind is morelike it).

I wear suit-quality dress slacks & a suit-appropriate shirt without tie every day. Here’s what I do:

Buy 6 pants; 3 in shades of black/gray/blue and 3 in shades of tan/brown. Buy 2 pairs of identical dress shoes; one black, one brown.

Buy 5-8 shirts that go with black/blue & 5-8 more that go with tan/brown. Depends on how often you like to do laundry. Make the color distinctions obvious. No off-whites that are sorta tan. For the blacks I have white, blue, gray, red. For the browns I have tan, brown, beige, yellow, purple.
I now have two complete sets of clothes, which I think of as brown & not-brown. Because I have two colors & the workweek has 5 days, it’s easy to get an alternating schedule going that mixes everything up but takes zero thinking. I wear pants a couple times between cleanings, but use a fresh shirt each day.

How’s it work?

Rule 1: Between brown & not-brown, what color do I wear today? Whatever color I didn’t wear yesterday. How can I remember what that was? Look at the top shirt in the dirty clothes pile. Whichever pants I pick, I use the next shirt which goes with that color & the right color shoes.

Rule 2: Is today Wed or Thu? If so, get the next fresh pants of the correct color (see above) and put the old pants in the dry cleaning pile. Otherwise, wear the pre-worn pants of the correct color.

Rule 3: After stuff gets cleaned, hang it up in FIFO order. Always put clean stuff on the left end of the rod & take the next clean item from the right end (or vice versa).
So each week I wear last-week’s pants on Mon & Tue, then fresh ones on Wed & Thu, re-using Wed’s on Fri. Alternating between not-brown & brown.

The result is in any workweek people see me wear 4 different pants, alternating colors every day. Pants get worn 2x or 3x each week. I only need to dry clean 2 pair a week & have 2 weeks to get then in & out of the cleaners. And with a bunch of shirts not divisible by 6, the shirts & pants mix themselves up with no thought. It just works.
Sounds kinda elaborate or OCD to describe, but after 20 years of wearing a uniform to work I needed a method which took no thought to execute. Once I came up with this pattern, life is easy. Just grab the item on top & put it on. Avoid dumb combos like black pants & a brown shirt or shoes. Even I can handle that.

The key to simplicity in operation is to avoid buying borderline-color clothes in the first place. Make sure everything is either obviously brown or obviously not-brown.

3

I think in general simplifying is a great idea.

I don’t know that I’d personally go with all suits of the same color, but that’s just me. I don’t think that necessarily makes it more complex - a black, charcoal and navy suit can all be worn with a white shirt. And I’m sure you can find ties that will coordinate with all or most of them. As long as you keep the suit pants and jacket together, you won’t run the risk of pulling out the blue pants and black jacket (hey, I’ve done that with shoes when I had two pair of the same style - I thought I was simplifying my life with that choice BTW).

Certain people MAY notice you’re always wearing the same color suit, but I don’t know that they’ll really care. Or that YOU should even care that they notice. Whatever, it’s clothes.

Clearly I am not a fashion plate, and I’m sure the next five posters will have wildly different opinions than I do. But I think you and I are generally on the same wavelength in terms of how much time & effort we care to spend on getting dressed every day.

4

How does this make things more simple? Egads man! :eek: :smiley:

How would you address the fact that I need to wear a coat?

5

If you buy a suit instead of slacks, the coat & pants match, as in are made from the exact same fabric. Even I can tell which suit coat matches which suit pants. I bet you can too.

I admit my drill is kinda elaborate to describe, but it really comes down to this …

Buy a bunch of stuff which all goes together & just pick items at random from that stuff each day. When something gets dirty, wash it.
I chose to make it a little more complex by having two sets of everything: brown & not brown. If that’s too hard, or you think brown is de classe, don’t bother with two colors.

6

If your suit is fairly simple and classic I don’t really think anyone will notice that it’s the same style every day. Unless a suit is extremely fashion forward (bold fabric or oddly pointy lapels ) what’s typically most noticable about a man’s dress is the shirt and tie. I never say “Olberman’s wearing a gray suit again” but I do frequently say “who let him on the air with that tie?”.

People won’t think you don’t clean your clothes unless your suit is rumpled, and has cat hair or mustard on it.

I would recommend against getting only white shirts, though. Assuming you work a five day week, maybe 5 white shirts and three other colors with splendid ties. Or if you’re really set on all white shirts don’t get a stack of the same white shirt. Throw in a couple of white on white stripes or windowpane checks .

My last 2¢… don’t get into a pattern of “this is my Monday tie”.

7

Do not buy 4 of the same suit. But it does make sense to find quality items and buy several of each in different colors.

Actually, I think LSLGuy’s scheme sounds quite simple. But I can see how you thought otherwise.

But you can make a simple scheme from his plan quite easily!

First of all, skip the brown/not-brown thing. Go all not-brown for the duration.

Buy 4-5 suits. Black, charcoal, charcoal pinstripe, navy, and maybe navy pinstripe.

Buy two pair of dress shoes. Both black. Two different styles. (You could get away with one pair, but it’s better not to wear the same pair every day.) Get a stack of identical black dress socks so you don’t have to match your socks.

Buy shirts. Get a bunch of white. Get a few classic colors that go with both black/charcoal and navy.

Get some ties. You should be able to find some that will go with any of your suits and any of your shirts. Get some good sales help to accomplish this. (IF you find a tie you love that won’t go with everything, you will have to remember what it does go with, so keep this to a minimum. But everything else is so simple at this point that it won’t be onerous. Keep the ties that you have to think about on a separate hanger.)

Voila. Now you can just grab a suit, a shirt, shoes, and a tie from the “goes with everything” hanger and you’re done.

Without looking like a freak who wears the exact same clothes every day.

If you want to jazz it up a little, you can get some striped shirts, too. Just remember not to wear the striped shirt with a striped suit.*

*Yes, you can wear them together in a lot of cases, but in the interest of keeping it really simple, I’m just saying not to do it.

8

People will totally think you own one suit and you never bathe. Just get several suits and go through them daily. Own seven, whatever. “It’s Thursday, so it must be navy!”

9

Tip: The suit jacket should be just long enough to come to the tips of your thumbs when your arms are relaxed at your sides.

Be sure it fits through the shoulders. There is nothing that looks dumber than great big shoulders hanging off a small guy.

10

Certain people WILL notice you’re always wearing the same color suit, they are called WOMEN, and they will make disparaging comments about you to other women. I heard this very conversation last week about another woman at work. “Blah, blah, blah always wears that jacket and those pants, blah, blah ,blah…” While they were having the conversation it dawned on me that I couldn’t tell you the colour shirt or tie that either of the guys I work with was wearing that day.

11

For the record, I am a woman.

I’m sure you meant “some women” but I’m just clarifying in case you thought I was a dude.

12

The plan Green Bean developed from LSL Guy’s more complex scheme is brilliant. Make sure everything matches and it is dead easy. Don’t be the freaky dude who always wears a black suit.

13

Also, I don’t know how it is in other parts of the country, but even in conservative places like my dad used to run, “only black people wear plain black suits”. This does seem, from my observation, to be true. (Women of all races seem to wear black suits, though.)