Weekend in NYC Outfit Diary

I usually travel in a pretty consistent uniform (actually, much like I dress) and I  thought it would be fun to post my "outfit diary" from my weekend trip to New York from a couple weeks ago.

Years ago, I started making "outfit diaries" to help me pack for trips - laying out outfits and writing each item down.  Having a list of what I was traveling with helped me organize myself, keep my over-packing in check, and gave me a sense of what I should weep over if ever my luggage were lost or stolen (which has happened twice).  Over time, I became a convert to carry-on only travel, and my outfit diaries have become even more important to keep me packing sensibly.  If you have only room for one sweater, then it had better match everything pretty darn well.

Only now, instead of writing things down, I usually lay everything out and do a couple quick shots with my iPhone.  Here is what I took with me for my last weekend trip to New York City (advance apologies for the poor picture quality).


Day of Shopping/Light sight-seeing: Cardigan and shell, comfortable skirt, tote bag, flats.

Light grey St. John Sweater Set, Black Armani Skirt, VCA Necklace

Raisin 35 cm Birkin, Hermes Scarf Tohu Bohu, Chanel Ballerinas

Dinner out: Coat, LBD, clutch and slingbacks.

Gold Silk Burberry Trench, Black Silk Compagnie Francaise de l'Orient et de la Chine Dress,
VCA Necklace

Hermes Jige in Rouge H Box, Chanel Slingbacks, Hermes Scarf in Tohu Bohu

Sporty Sightseeing: Jeans, t-shirt, sweater, tote and flats.

Saint James Stripe T-shirt, COS Black Open Cardigan, Dark Wash Ralph Lauren Jeans

Repeat from previous day...

As you can see, I try to choose a main color - usually black or grey, and accent with a pop of color (bag and/or scarf).  There's lots of repeating happening, but as the shoes are tried and true for example, I know I won't miss having more to choose from.  The one scarf ties in all the various outfits, and I limit my jewelry to just one accent piece, in this case a necklace.  Lastly, I am able to get a third day's outfit by mixing and matching the black skirt and cardigan with the grey shell or wearing the black dress with the scarf as an obi-style belt.

These outfits worked a couple of weeks ago when it was still in the high 60s and 70s.  When I was in New York City this week, it was a little cooler so I wore a warmer sweater/coat and tights but essentially the same concept as the first outfit.

Do you do "outfit diaries" for your trips?  Are you a carry-on traveler or chronic over-packer?  Any tips to keep things manageable?

Admiring from Afar

Okay, I am doing my best not to buy anything outside my planned purchases list, however I just needed to share with you an item I have been lusting after for several months.

The Cambridge Satchel Classic

Source: http://www.cambridgesatchel.co.uk/shop/collections/the-classic

It makes me think of red apples, orange leaves, and plaid blankets.  Perfect for Fall!  And starting at 74 pounds, very affordable for a handmade-in-the-UK leather bag.  I am resisting temptation, but it doesn't mean I can't admire it from afar...

Apparently this is also the new "IT" bag (say, were we still doing "IT" bags any more?) but I don't care, I like it anyway. 

Now, on to trying my very best to be very good and not actually buy it.  

Less = More

Yesterday, I watched this short TED Talk by Graham Hill entitled "Less Stuff, More Happiness."  You might want to check it out.

It inspired me to go through the house one more time for one final purge.  (This is after about 5 or 6 major purges this year, and me thinking I was all 'purged out.')

The result?

Gone are two coats I know deep down I will never wear, a set of perfectly good wine glasses I never use, and these cute lunchbox bento sets I bought on my last trip to Japan, which went into the bin kicking and screaming for their sentimental value alone.  I wanted to love them, I really did, but my lunches are never complicated enough to fill all those little boxes.

Also gone is our DVD collection (all whopping dozen of them, three which were replaced in their digital version)-- this makes more sense if you know that in one of the earliest purges this year included our television set.

Also, I bid fond adieu to a 12 loaf mini-bundt pan - this one I'll miss, but only used once every 5 years, I decided it wasn't really earning its keep or transform itself into a multi-tasker.  And more books and clothes - where did they come from? - even though I'd just gone through less than a month ago and thought I was down to bare essentials.

Clearly, I've got more work to do as I come to grips with what "the essentials" really means... but for the moment I feel a little lighter and that's good enough for me!

Taste

Back in Brussels, we lived right in the middle of the city.  In fact, our ground floor apartment was right next door to the neighborhood sandwich shop.  The shopkeeper was a charming man who often greeted me home from a business trip by hanging out the window and shouting hello.  He'd regularly invite me in for a coffee or a sandwich.  I am one of those people who can see "going out" for many kinds of food, but as a cook, sandwiches are one of those things I think I might just have the talent and resourcefulness to make on my own.  But every so often, I would agree to a sandwich because, well, it just seemed absolutely rude to always refuse.  Besides, he knew where I lived.

On my first occasion ordering my sandwich, he deftly slit the baguette lengthwise, held it aloft and declared more than inquired, "You like SPICE!?!"  As he looked at me expectantly, I could read from his face that the answer to this was almost assuredly supposed to be yes, so I nodded.  He slathered a green and red mixture of something, boy was I ever so curious, before proceeding to proudly layer on the ham and cheese.  (You cannot deny the joy of a man at his craft, even if it was a simple sandwich, I could tell he really loved what they did.  And I was sure it meant it would be one hell of a sandwich.)

Turns out the "spice," he bragged, was his signature - the je ne sais quoi which set his sandwiches apart from all those other plain, unspicy baguettes littering the city (and the much less crowded sandwich shop competing directly across the street).  It was something he was very proud of.

I suppose the spice could be interpreted as guilding the lily - I mean you start off with a French baguette, add ham, add cheese, really do you need more to get to perfection?  But spice was his thing, and it did make his sandwiches very unique.

In case you are curious, it turns out that "spice" is a mixture of chopped cilantro and pimento.  I realized this even before my first bite, as the scent of cilantro wafted towards my nose.  I am not a bloodhound, I just happen to be one of those rare creatures, who through a tragic turn of genetics, has the strong conviction that cilantro tastes like lemon dish-soap, obliterating all other flavors it is paired with.

I usually avoid cilantro with a passion, but I never had the heart to tell him to "hold the spice."  (I am not sure such a preposterous concept would even register with him, but I didn't want to find out.)  I would order my sandwiches, spice and all, and enjoy the spirit in which they were made.  Just because it wasn't my taste doesn't mean it couldn't be appreciated.

Okay so bear with me on this because this random musing will eventually come to a conclusion, promise... One of my favorite quotes is from Dorothy Parker, who said, "A little bad taste is like a dash of paprika."  It certainly is interesting, and sometimes that is more important than ordinary good taste.  Bad taste can be fun, and when done with passion, a pleasure.

That is why I cannot ascribe to the old fashion adage that one should take off one accessory before you leave the house.  Too boring and restrictive in my opinion!  I've been known to wear two scarves, a necklace and a broach all at once.  It makes me happy to wear so many of my favorite things at once, each one with a memory or a story of their own.  Yes, to some, I might have looked just like a Christmas tree that day, but my sandwich man would have recognized one spice aficionado for another.  Here's to a little bad taste now and again to keep things lively!

New York State of Mind

We've just come back from a long weekend in New York City, and it's basically taken me an entire day to recover.  I'm always so amazed by everything the city has to offer, but the flip side is it's really exhausting to try to take it all in!

We started our trip by visiting the new Ladurée which recently opened on the Upper East Side.  If you have not yet sunk your teeth into one of their fragrant pillowy clouds (also known as macarons), get thee to New York, or Paris, or London tout de suite...  

Actually New York seems to be a rather late addition to many international outposts (why or why?), but better late than never.  One taste of those macarons this weekend was all it took to bring me back Paris (I was, ashamed to admit it, a regular of the the Place de la Madeleine location), and of course intensify that nagging feeling that I must return to Paris asap.  But back to New York for now...  

After Ladurée, we did a little window shopping, stopping in at Hermes to drop off a wallet in need of repair (success) and look for a sauce ladle (no luck).  We popped into a bunch of other stores including one of my favorites, Bergdorf Goodman.  There, I tried to stuff my stubby little sausage fingers into lovely diamond rings at the Van Cleef and Arpels boutique downstairs, but with all their recent price increases I feel I've missed the boat on any more VCA.  Still, I must appreciate the sales lady's determination in trying to convince me that the ring around which my finger puffed was just "perfect!", noting Liz Taylor had very stubby fingers too but that never stopped her from wearing big jewels.  Well, I suppose Liz Taylor did a lot of things I'm probably not going to do, and while I cannot deny her eye for beautiful jewels, I'm afraid at least in that regard she cannot be my role model.


Leaving rather bare-fingered, we found lunch at the Plaza Food Hall.  It reminded me of Harrod's Food Hall, but smaller and more relaxed.  And the added convenience of being shown to an empty seat and brought your food via a waiter made it a much more pleasant experience than Harrod's, where it's more like survival of the fittest to get a seat.  


Anyway, I have no photos to show of the meal, because I was well into my smoked Kobe Pastrami pile of delight before I remembered.  I highly recommend the whole place - also much less frenzied than Eataly and there really is something for everyone (sushi, dumplings, carvery, cheese, etc.).  After, we headed upstairs to the Plaza Champagne Bar where we drank champagne and quietly liberated the occasional macaron out of the Laudree bag (shhhh!).  Yes, we live on the edge.

The Champagne Bar at the Plaza has these beautiful velvet green chairs that are perfect for spending an hour or more in cozy decadence...

Plaza Lobby flowers were all in a purple hued theme, my favorite color.

After this, my plan was to head to the Santa Maria Novella store to stock up on candles and do some more shopping around SoHo.  Santa Maria Novella was out of my favorite candles (the "Relax" which smells like lavender and sunshine), and the main shopping streets were so crowded I could barely wedge my way inside of Muji, or out of it again.  Not fun.


Fun was coming back to our comfy hotel room at the Ritz Battery Park, kicking off our shoes, and peeping at a lady through a telescope...

Before you worry, here is the lady in question:

As seen through this telescope, which the hotel kindly places in each room for better viewing:

A better shot of the room, which was comfortable, modern and clean:

After dressing for dinner, we headed to Wolfgang's in Tribeca for amazing ribeyes.  Highly recommend!!!

The day after we rose early to visit the Statue of Liberty up close.  We'd booked about four months in advance to get tickets to access the Crown.  It's a very small space up at the top, so they only let a limited number of people go up per day, which explains the wait-time a bit.  After going through security several times, you are stripped of your bag, coat, everything but a camera, and you climb 27 floors up to the very top.  Yeah, 27.

While it starts out like a normal staircase, it quickly changes to a spirally, narrow metal chamber of horror as you reach the top.  Okay, maybe not chamber of horror for most, but as someone with a fear of heights and enclosed spaces, I probably should have done a bit more research before signing up for this one.  Still, I made it to the top, a sweaty shaky mess, in about 8 minutes flat - it's amazing how motivating "get me the heck out of here" is when it comes to climbing stairs - and the view was pretty awesome.  Just don't talk to me about how I got down...

The neck of the statue is the narrowest and darkest, but at least by then you know you have nearly made it.

From the top you can look down on the raised arm.

And also read what it says on the tablet she holds.

A better view from the ground.

On the Ferry to Ellis Island.

From there, you can take the Ferry to Ellis Island, and tour the Main Hall and some very interesting exhibits.  You don't have to have had a family member come through here not to appreciate the risk, hope and effort that drove people here.  Of course the introductory video made me cry.

Main Building, Immigration Museum

Great Hall - beautiful tiled ceiling!

Back in Battery Park, a bronze statue called "The Immigrants"

As the child of immigrants myself (they came in the 70s, long after Ellis Island stopped operations), I can understand why the desire for the American Dream is still strong for so many all over the world, even today.  And it's definitely made me want to learn more about this part of our history.  So next of my reading list is Not Fit for Our Society: Immigration and Nativism in America by Peter Schrag:

Now I'm off to pack for my next trip, and this will come with me, but more on that one later!

Fall is in the Air! (and around my neck)

My only Fall indulgence so far... a new scarf.

See, I went to the Hermes Sample Sale in NYC a couple weeks ago, and I told myself the ONLY think I really could justify was if I found some of their "older" cashmere.  It seems to me that the older stuff was thicker somehow than some of the newer designs, and anyway, it was worth having a look-see.

I arrived a couple days into the sale, so to my surprise, there were actually no scarves left really except a couple tassled fringey poncho numbers and some bedraggled looking items I'd seen at the last sale.  Oh, well, it was a long shot.

I was rifling through their shoe section when I saw this lady with a beautiful paisley stole.  I thought to myself, "I really love paisley and that is such a beautiful one, I wonder where she got it?  I am surprised they let her in with a scarf anyway, aren't you supposed to take them off?? I wish Hermes made paisley prints more... perhaps I'll check out Etro."  (Yes, I really do have such long conversations in my head, I was an only child...)

I am lost in a paisley reverie when lo and behold, I stumble across a scarf just like hers!  The scarf she was holding was indeed an Hermes one, one at that very sale, lurking about in a pile I'd missed by the ties.  I wish I could say it was the universe reading my mind, but it's only a scarf after all, so let's not be that serious.

Of course I bought the scarf, and I am extra pleased because it was part of my original plan, and something I loved even before I thought it was for sale.  There is nothing worse than feeling like maybe you bought something in part because you trekked all the way to the store, or it was on sale, or it seemed "good enough."  I have fallen prey to all those traps before, but not this time.  I even walked away from a few very good pairs of shoes for the same reason.  *sniff* Sometimes doing the right thing is hard, but the scarf is a good reward...


And here she is!

The colors are Autumn itself!

I love the rosettes in mustard yellow, maroon and brown...

Hiatus, Interrupted

Ok, after a series of family visits followed by sickness (unrelated) which have kept me focused on other things, I am back today to hopefully what is considered regularly posting.  Sincere apologies for the long and unplanned hiatus!

A Fall chill has descended upon this little corner of the world, and I couldn't be more thrilled as this is really my favorite time of year.  I am definitely a cold-weather dresser, and gladly welcome fall so I can get back into my boots and tights and scarves again.  

When it comes to Fall/Winter wardrobe planning, I am in a little bit of a muddle this year though.

First off, I have all the clothes I need.  

Huh?

Say, what?  

If my mother were reading this, first she'd wonder if I'd been snatched by an alien.  And second, she'd drop dead.  Really, I mean it.  We are born shoppers, it's like denying the family legacy.

Truth is, I never really thought I would get to a place where I could admit such heresy, but here we are.  I have more than enough clothes, good quality things that I love and feel happy to wear, for all sorts of occasions.  

In fact, I don't even get a chance to wear all the clothes I love enough -- all my pretty little jackets and knit skirts which are my cold weather staples see a lot less action now that I am not a corporate drudge.  (Little known secret: one of the few things I loved about my work was the chance to dress up.)  Now I am in jeans and sweaters most of the time, because it would be weird to putter around the kitchen in blazers.  And I have plenty of jeans and sweaters too, so that's out.  Shoot.  

Okay, reason two I am in a fall shopping doldrums: I used to be motivated by making sure I got in on whatever the hot new color or style was.  Now, not so much.  I am hep to their marketing schemes.  I mean, doesn't it seem like we keep hearing the same Fall color story, year after year?  This year's color: berry.  Wait, two seasons ago, wasn't it plum?  Every Fall, we get some variation on this theme: aubergine! khaki! charcoal! and the proverbial animal print!  Recently I even heard black was back.  Sheesh.  I have my wardrobe colors, and I'm sticking to them - they're neutrals, classics, and suit my coloring and the accessories I've built up around them.  So I am no longer tempted by just that particular shade of this season's burgundy.  

Which is a bummer actually, because I still love clothes and I do appreciate the thrill of shopping.  I was explaining all of this to my spouse, who said it sounded all very anti-consumerist, but it's not.  Just because I don't NEED anything doesn't mean I don't WANT anything... there's the rub. 

I have two things on my WANT list this year, and they are both unfortunately so splurge-y that they are mutually exclusive.  

The first is an olive green 30cm Birkin from Hermes in the Ghillie design.  It's supposed to be new for A/W 2011, and it's like a Birkin married a pair of Church's shoes and had a darling baby.  My name is first on the list for one at my local store, but that doesn't actually mean much as I haven't even seen a photo of it and have no assurance of when it will come in.  I've basically put it out of my mind and will be terribly surprised if I manage to hold it in my hot little hands before the new year.  

So the other WANT is this Alexander McQueen sweater coat:  

Buy at Alexander McQueen

It goes without saying that the other implied WANT here is an additional 6 inches in height and less 6 inches in girth to rock this jacket as it should be rocked.  Some things are probably best admired from afar.

So that's what's has been putting a crimp in my Fall shopping habit.  In the spirit of total confession though, I am not a shopping saint.  I have bought one small thing this Fall - didn't need it but I couldn't resist - and I'll debut it and tell you all about it tomorrow!