Dressing For Your Mood
Signature Taste, vol 08
This is the weekly paid issue of (In)Decent Taste containing an in-depth lesson to cultivating an exquisite wardrobe while saving you time, money and answering the age old question of “what should I wear today”.
In my late adolescence, I enjoyed a sense of independence within the confines of the American mall. As small towns began to crumble under the growing influence of big box retailers and urban sprawl, the mall was a place for young people to gather, socialize and learn the art of consumption.
It always felt like a field trip to enter a mall, confident in the knowledge that what I purchased here would create a frisson of excitement amongst my peers. It was there, sitting on a bench where the wings connecting each anchor department store converged, that I discovered a store spanning prime mall real estate that forever entranced me: Units.
For the uninitiated, Units was a store that held countless cubicles filled with individually packaged garments promising a never-ending combination of outfits. Each jersey garment could fill multiple roles: a belt! a scarf! a headband! Oh the possibilities! Women could shape shift from high-powered executive to Norma Kamali-esque mom running errands to chic cocktail escort. It’s safe to say Marcie Dahlgren-Frost was their target audience.
Women weren’t the only ones enjoying the cosmic potential of a modular wardrobe. Men could break free from the handcuffs of their stuffy corporate togs and adopt the uniform of a religious cult.
Mesmerized, I gathered the courage to step in and request a brochure outlining a small slice of wardrobe potential. I flipped through this brochure for years, looking at women in exaggerated poses of exuberance, trying to analyze which Units would create the ultimate pre-teen persona. While the value proposition of Units was unimpeachable, the cost of entry was a bit too steep for my teeny budget. Alas, I would never realize my full Units potential and laid to rest my dream of being the most successful divorcee real estate agent in my middle school.
The draw of having infinite choice in my wardrobe always followed me, though. The drive for newness every day, expressing a different facet of yourself to your peers is a feeling that has led many of us to stuff our wardrobes full of things that never get worn.
Fashion writer and artist, Jenny Walton, has a preternatural talent for creating endless looks with her encyclopedic knowledge of designers’ past seasons, mixing vintage with new, using old stockings as headbands and whatever else strikes her fancy. Fashion is also her bread and butter where her day can be spent mixing and matching, playing with different combinations and taking them on test runs in hyper-stylish Milan. It’s unrealistic for most of us to stuff all of that creativity into our already packed mornings. Having a wardrobe as expansive in choice as hers may seem exciting at first but can leave us paralyzed by indecision.