Trying to keep a focused color palette has been a help toward wardrobe satisfaction and versatility—focusing on
cooler colors, gray, some black (less for tops, more for bottoms, footwear, and
sometimes a black topper is just so versatile), berry tones, fuchsia and some
orchids when I can find them. Moved away from brown, though I actually love
cool browns, including brown with purple, and black with some browns, but I had ended
up running 2 dark neutrals that often competed, required separate accessories.
Got rid bright reds, olive and taupes that were hard to mix with other pieces.

I’m still in the weeds about color type, as I don’t fit the very
dark, strong Winter colors but may be Soft Winter or Dark Summer or
something—medium dark colors, not very deep ones, and not very bright or hot colors,
but not dusty. Sigh. I think I may run cool to neutral, and can wear a few
warmer colors, or maybe it’s just those universal colors or “cooler” versions
of warmer colors. I’m very okay with buying and wearing whatever looks good and
will try colors on for that purpose—I don’t carry a color chart around with me.

Anyhoo, I have ended up with myriad gray tops which work but
often are JFE, not really “alive” colors, just because a lot of time my best
colors are not available in work-wear items. I do strive for tops in burgundies
and berry tones but still don’t find as many “real colors” as I’d like.

So the point is that outfit-happiness is highly related to
wearing “face colors” that are flattering and brightening. I would like to wear more good, rich colors
more often because they are better for that than most neutrals.

Which brings me back to, I came back around to trying some olive
and some taupe, and “cooler” rust tones, because I found some items in good
styles, typically a nice knitwear, and tonal quality that looked “healthy,” but
I don’t want to go overboard and get
into a confused color palette again.

The hard part about going farther afield with colors is
having a complete “3-piece” outfit with
topper, because I can usually get any color top to go with black pants, say,
but adding a blazer or jacket becomes more problematic—e.g., trying not to
depend on black jackets; gray jackets don’t mix with the taupe or olive. In
fact, having really great 3-piece outfits is harder than I thought, as I found
out when I needed polished, professional outfits for some meetings, after not focusing
on toppers for awhile, because not only colors but proportions are very
critical (jacket fit and length for skirts vs pants and for the styles) and
fabrications, too.

In trying to find a happy medium, I think the solution is in
restraint and in capsule-thinking. For example, keep up a capsule of several well-coordinated,
complete outfits in my grays/black/berry tones because those are easiest to
find, mix, and update in typical
business or polished business casual (tropical wool or other good quality
fabric pants and skirts, better knits or
silky blouses, good jackets, modern but neutral footwear). Then, run some small capsules in some
alternate colors, especially when sans topper (such as chunky
sweater/pants-skirt outfits, trendy knit sweaters, that can stand alone and are not being
depended upon for formal business meetings, etc,. This is where I might get my
taupe-y fix or wear olive for summer and fall. Also summer toppers for me can
include some off-white, which is JFE, and then the topper is JFE while the
richer color is in the top.

The second feature that I
think helps is if the color goes with different “seasonal neutrals”. For example, I got an olive linen sweater
that goes with white , tan and black pants and so can give different seasonal vibes; a taupe linen knit
top that goes with several flowered and
patterned skirts but also with solid classic items. This makes the “odd color”
versatile in its own way.

How about you—what are your stories of color-restraint or
color-starvation and how have you balanced it? Any good tips or discoveries?