A Simple Shift

I often have style epiphanies but they tend to be fairly low key, subtle shifts when needed but last week I had a seismic shift one. Three things happened. The first was quite a fab one. I was just about to enter the Louis Vuitton offices for a press day. I'm an early bird as I trained under someone at a magazine who was strict about punctuality and speed. The trick was to plan the press day viewing like clockwork and finish by 1pm at latest. This meant a 10 to 15 minute allocation. So I wasn't surprised that my 10:20 arrival was beaten by the Elle team who were exiting for next appointment. And very swish they looked too. It was the black. Even on what was a sunny day the black looked uber stylish and chic. More Parisian and Milanese than London.  This small chance meeting moment stuck in my head. I have a wonderful visual filing system in my head. The looks, the light at that moment and the swishness of it all are logged.

The second incident was at a jewellery trunk show I was doing that same evening in a splendid location. I met lots of lovely people but I'm beginning to find a trait, people who are invited to a person's house for a jewellery party who don't buy. This makes no odds to me whatsoever as there are always sales but it does make a big difference to the person hosting the event. That person has made the effort to share their home, wine and food. If you come you should at least buy one item at the cheapest price if need be even as a gift for a forthcoming birthday or just in case. Anyway I had a guest, who didn't buy, telling me about every item of jewellery she was wearing, mainly Tiffany (fyi) and she just put me off a certain look and style. I won't bore you with her look and style but I sort of file it under the try hard yummy mummy Net-A-Porter/boutique look. In short contrived btu a contrived that says 'I'm wealthy and bored'.

So there I was pedalling my wares, trying to earn a crust because I'll always have to and I had some trout pout woman boring me with her slim wrist issues. Then I realised I had contributed to this ruddy look/lifestyle. All those years of shop edits, fashion styling and personal styling and I had contributed to this look, her aspirations and shopping habits. At that moment I knew something had to change for me and I realised as I mentally recalled the Elle team image I was going back to black.

At university to keep in credit and not spend money I had a uniform which was black. A brief flirtation with colour ended when running my clothes stall ended as I could no longer store my jumble sales finds in the entertainment offices cupboard. I sold up all my stock and I stuck to my black uniform. The only items which were colour was a purple velvet dress from High St Kensington market and a grey vintage dress from a vintage shop in the Netherlands. My accessories were plastic Spanish fiesta earrings in lots of different colours. I based my whole look on Audrey Hepburn's beatnik look in Funny Face and Nico from The Velvet Underground. I recalled this simple fact and thought actually I'm in that place again. My career is on hold indefinitely,I cannot go and work in a magazine or office due to circumstances of Mr MDS's work and my own making, a young child. We are not in a position whereby I don't need to earn and actually I like earning so simplifying my clothing habits is a simple solution and a great style shift.

I'm in the midst of selling off as much as I can. I'm keeping a few pieces of colour I truly love, garments I would never part with and the rest is going. I'm sticking to black,white and grey with navy as another option when it comes to clothes and that is it. It feels uplifting and frees me from so many trappings. Such a simple option and for me back to black is where it is at!

The Soft Pleat Dress £109 Isabella Oliver 365 Collection

Uniqlo Extra Light Crew Neck Half Sleeve Cardigan £19.99

Black Raw Edge Leather Sandals £27.99 New Look