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No more skirts for me

Aziraphale

Veteran

Oh dear. I just counted my running tally of bottoms. I've worn pants 88 times since October, and skirts 22 times. (Dresses = zero times). Clearly I do not need to buy any more skirts for a very long time!

Here's the thing, though: skirts are rad. I really like how I look in a skirt. But clearly I'm not wearing them, given my lifestyle. Anyone else have this difficulty?

I suspect I may wear skirts more in the spring/summer. I'll see what my tally says then.

Dressing

30 replies

Latest reply was from El Cee

Mo

(website)

Veteran

Sort of. Mine is more the dresses. I wear skirts more often, but own more dresses. Oops. No need to buy more, but I still want to! The lure continues. Argh.

Sona

Veteran

I am in the same boat. i cosnigned 20 skirts and still have about 15.
amount worn over last 3 months=0.
Yes you read that correctly-zero!
I am blaming it on the 'worst winter ever' .

Sharon

Veteran

I think you should wait and see. I was not wearing skirts at all a few months back, but then summer rolled around and boy, did they get some love then! So much cooler to wear a skirt on those really warm days.

carter

Veteran

I love skirts, but I hate tights. So NO skirts in the winter for me! They're not the most practical thing for my work, but I am going to try to wear more skirts and dresses this summer...such a cropped pants rut last summer!

Diana

Veteran

I rarely wear skirts in the winter. It's because I hate tights. There. I said it. They are fussy, staticky, constricting, and not warm enough. And they always seem to be simultaneously binding and sagging.

I wear my dresses more in the winter because I can wear them over pants or leggings, which are less objectionable than tights. Also dresses have no waistband (I don't have any with tight waists) so that ONE waistband from the tights is bearable.

But I do love skirts with bare legs!

Aziraphale

Veteran

Carter and Diana -- can I join the I Hate Tights club too?

I can tolerate sweater tights. They are soft and have a stretchy waistband. But I still seem to be reaching for my jeans more...

Greyscale

Veteran

Same here! I buy a lot of skirts second-hand but I almost never wear them. I think one reason I find more at consignment stores is that they're easier to fit (only a few important dimensions, unlike jeans with all the waist and hip and rise and leg and and and...)

I went through a skirt phase a few years ago, but I think I'm solidly out of it now. Can't decide if I should push myself to wear them more or give into the subconscious trend.

I do still really miss my favorite skirt that got lost in the move last year. Still hoping it'll turn up.

Ariadne

Veteran

I'm like Diana. No skirts in cooler weather, because I can't find tights that work for me (although I try every fall/winter). I'm down to one black VC tube skirt and 1 black pencil skirt, plus a grey pinstriped skirt I hang on to in case I ever need a short-notice interview/funeral/etc. piece. I also just had an old J. Crew denim pencil skirt altered a bit. We'll see if I wear it or not in the summer. Not sure if it's dated at this point.

I do wear ultra-casual sweatshirt dresses over leggings, with boots.

Thistle

Veteran

Yes. But I am not yet ready to say goodbye as I want to wear my skirts. It's just -4F right now. At 3:35 pm.

Janet

(website)

Veteran

Skirts are a problem for me too. I have worn a skirt exactly once since the fall. And I have beautiful skirts that I like, but this winter has been harsh and my life is very casual. I blame some of my cold-weather wardrobe neglect on the fact that I spent a whole month in jeans on a ranch in Texas, but still.

So nope, no more skirts for me for a long while. I wear then more in summer, but even then, it's a whole different type of skirt from my winter ones.

Aziraphale

Veteran

Thistle, most of North America is absurdly cold right now. I don't know how you do it. And your summers can be absurd too. My heartfelt sympathy!

deb

Veteran

I am down to 4 skirts and this number seems to be right. I purged the dresses early last year because I was not wearing them.

Beth Ann

Veteran

I still wear skirts --- particularly at the University. I tolerate tights better when I pair them with tall boots and I layer a pair of Jockey slip shorts over them --- for warmth and a little "slide" against the skirt.

That said, I wear them more in warmer months. See what spring brings! Perhaps you'll want to let your legs be free!

Susie

Veteran

I'm glad someone else likes clothing statistics
I do only track what I wear for work, Mon-Fri, so my numbers aren't totally inclusive of everything that I wear. Though I am much more likely to wear jeans than anything else on the weekends.

For the 4 months of Oct - Jan, I wore:

Pants 44 times (19 different pairs)
Jeans 23 times (6 pairs)
Skirts 4 times (2 skirts)
Dresses 4 times (3 dresses)

I only have 3 dresses to wear in the winter so that number looks about right! I have 1 or 2 more skirts that didn't get worn. One is probably better for summer and the other one I might purge.

Yet for all of the times that I wore pants, there are still about 10 pairs that didn't get worn once during those 4 months. Clearly I have more than I need.

Anonymous

I wish I could wear them more -- but they just don't work with my job very well. Today I was crawling around under desks and feeding cables everywhere and then moving big dusty trays around. One of my colleagues who is in admin always has the most original fun skirt combos and I am inspired by her all the time but I just can't seem to make it work.

Sarah A

Veteran

I am with you on having more skirts with less wear than many other items in my closet. At least i did convince myself to stop buying them in wool fabrications last year. I suspect it is the tights fussiness that does me in. Summer skirts only as a solution?

rabbit

Veteran

For some reason shorter winter fabric skirts with fleece lined leggings underneath and boots seem warmer than all the pants I own including jeans and corduroys, so I've worn a lot this winter. Tights bother me, but soft/stretchy sweater-ish or fleece lined leggings don't.

Suz

(website)

Veteran

Can I sign up for this club, too?

I feel like hanging my head in shame. I added (yet another ) skirt to my fall wardrobe this year, after all. I don't even wear the other three I own! What was I thinking?

Well, I was thinking maybe I just needed a skirt in a colour other than black or denim. But I was wrong.

I love skirts. I really do. And I don't even mind tights all that much. (Hose are another matter). But in the kind of winter we've been having, tights and skirts are just a no-go. Plus, I work at home and my pencils skirts don't really cooperate with my sit-to-stand chair -- or with the couch when I curl up there to do some YLF time.

But I've figured it all out. I wear skirts like a girly girl ALL SUMMER. Basically, what Sharon said. Skirts are great for when I don't need tights, I can wear a stretchy kind, when I'd otherwise wear shorts, etc. Skirts are not so great for the Canadian winter.

Angie

(website)

Fashion Stylist

Too cold to wear skirts and dresses. Will wear them again when the weather warms up.

Anonymous

I've had such a love/hate relationship with skirts the last few years. First of all, I never wear them in the winter if I don't have to. In the summer, I had gravitated to them in lieu of cropped pants once I learned how leg-shortening short pants are on me. Skirts are much easier to fit for me than dresses so I thought I was all set right? Wrong. There is a serious dowdy factor for me in a skirt, and when I start adding toppers it all goes horribly corporate or just wrong. So I've culled all but my favorite denim skirt (which never looks corporate, because of the denim) and this year my goal is to try to transition over to summer dresses. If I can find any that work for me. If not, I am SO screwed.

Helena

Veteran

With the exception of one or two casual summer ones, I generally hate skirts - they are great in theory but for some reason they just never work for me. So you are not alone!

lyn*

(website)

Veteran

I stick to a certain number of skirts but mostly I am pretty lazy and will turn to a dress if I am in a hurry.

I think you can put a halt on the # of skirts if you want, and hopefully get more wear out of the ones you have!

I'd imagine that the Polar Vortex didn't make it easier to wear skirts since October!

Aziraphale

Veteran

Lyn, the polar vortex is working out OK for us in Vancouver. It's been unseasonably warm and dry here. Except this week. It's hovering a little below freezing here, which is cold cold cold for this wimpy temperate rainforest inhabitant! (I think the general rule is, if eastern Canada and the eastern/midwestern States are having poopy weather, it's nice in the Pacific Northwest...and vice versa).

Sounds like I've got lots of company in my difficulty with skirts. Many of you are like me in that you're more likely to wear them if tights are not involved. There's also a convenience factor. Lots of days, pants are just more practical that a pencil skirt (plus, who wears a pencil skirt to art school?).

Gigi

Veteran

I haven't been doing too bad with my skirts, but the only skirts I wear in cold weather are maxis, and I layer leggings and long underwear beneath them. So they are really quite comfy, and even warm. But I wouldn't dream of reaching for a pencil skirt, even with my wool tights. Do you like longer skirts? Do you think you'd wear skirts in the winter if they were longer?

Aziraphale

Veteran

Gigi -- no, I can't wear long skirts. One, I'm very petite, so they are wildly unflattering on me, and two, I feel really constrained in them. I don't know why this is so, because pencil skirts are quite restrictive too and I feel fine in them. (At least, if I'm not doing anything too aerobic that day). I think it's that I don't like having fabric flapping around my calves. I bought a canvas one once that I liked so much I convinced myself it would work. I never wore it. It looked goofy on me, and I felt hobbled. That skirt probably would have looked good on a taller woman.

I do have number of "midi" skirts that aren't really. The hem is below my knee, so I don't consider them knee-length, but they are not calf-length. That's a tricky length for a tiny woman.

rachylou

Veteran

What Angie said! It doesn't count, counting from October... hehe.

Gigi

Veteran

OK! Your midis do sound like a tricky length. I have one midi that hits below the calf but a bit above the ankle. I have found that it looks best if I wear knee-high boots with it, because that gives a better vertical line, if that helps.

Here's to warmer weather so you can hopefully get back to your skirts!

E

Veteran

How interesting! I wear my skirts a lot more in cool & cold weather. I never wear them in the summers here, because when it's 100+/38+, nothing on earth will get me to wear a fitted waist band. And I only wear skirts at my natural waist, with a top tucked in. It took me a summer to realise this, that I should focus more on dresses than skirts for very hot weather. I probably wear skirts & trousers with equal frequency right now, in our 'winter'.

I must run warm, because I can wear a wool skirt w tights & knee high boots (w wool socks under) and feel perfectly comfortable in quite cold conditions. If it's very cold, adding silk long johns under the tights works a trick. Maybe because I wear full skirts, so that's a lot of wool wrapped around me for insulation? Luckily I love tights too; I only have one pair right now that isn't comfortable (sadly, it's my grey pair). When I move up north I plan to save up for a pair or two of wool tights (or the wool to knit them with!).

April

Veteran

All of my skirts are pencils, which was great for my job but now that I spend most of my day cooking and running errands, less practical. I still love skirts but have pared down the collection accordingly. (And forget it in the winter -- way too cold. I'm postponing any further decisions about which ones to get rid of until the weather warms up enough to make me rational about it.)

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