Thursday, January 23, 2014

Getting fussy about casual

My office is so casual (how casual is it?)

It is so casual that my boss, who walks past my desk and talks face to face with me approximately a million times a day, took about three days to notice when I did this to my (previously platinum) hair.

This is my favorite way to deal with overgrown roots -  July 2013
The work atmosphere laid back and my coworkers are kind of a hair dye, body art, geek-tee loving bunch. This is great for radical self expression, but not so great for caring much about looking "nice", especially when I have a bad habit of rolling out of bed with half an hour to get to a workplace that is twenty minutes away.

Still, I have been making an effort to choose my clothes ahead of time and throw a bit of effort into my makeup rather than just slapping on some moisturizer and jumping into something that approximates the right size. Even on my ultra casual days I think I've made a noticeable improvement over my previous wardrobe failures and I've gotten a full face of lightly contoured "low makeup" makeup down to five minutes.

Now if only I could figure out a way to instantaneously blow dry my hair. Sadly leaving it natural is NOT an option. I have ultra fine wavy hair with tenacious cowlicks and a talent for bed head, especially now that I'm growing into a slightly longer pixie.



I even accessorized a Batman shirt! 

I am trying to work out ways to change things up without dropping a bunch of cash on new clothing because  it is a pretty repetitive formula; dark wash bootcut jeans + hip length tee + high hip length sweater, + flat or low heeled boot. I do occasionally change it up a bit with a longer V-neck sweater and a scarf per the bottom left. Today for example I'm wearing a black version of that sweater with an orchid pashmina scarf in my usual BT Standard knot.

I love wearing heels and dresses and have gotten some heavyweight tights to make skirts a bit more winter friendly, but the repeated polar vortices we've been experiencing in the Northeast are putting the kibosh on that. Braving the cold is one thing, braving sub-zero temps and knee high snow is another. I also picked up a fist full of skinny faux-leather belts in various neutrals on deep discount from Necessary Clothing the other day. I'm still working out how I prefer to do belting but for less than three dollars apiece I figured I couldn't go too wrong.

It also doesn't help that I'm suffering a touch of post holiday "functional wardrobe shrinkage", but I've been hitting the treadmill in earnest again so that should open up my options with some of the more form fitting items in my closet.

I do feel like I'm getting somewhere. Odds are if you bump into me on a work day or out doing errands I'm going to look rather a lot like one of these pictures, and I think I'm pretty okay with that.

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