Minimalism

Over thanksgiving break, I went black friday shopping with a friend at a mall nearby school. I went in shopping with a list in mind, mostly composed of winter essentials with what me being from LA. One of those essentials was a long winter coat. We went to Forever 21 to look for an inexpensive, yet thick coat and I found two: a navy trench/parka type and a minimalist grey/black coat. My friend really liked the minimalist style of the grey/black coat and with his encouragement, I bought that one. Since then, I've been intrigued by the idea of minimalism. A few weeks later, one of my favorite YouTube fashion vloggers uploaded a video about minimalist outfits (minimalist lookbook) and it made me wonder, 'what makes these clothes minimalist?'

I googled minimalist style blogs and found two in particular that have captivated my full attention. The first blogger describes a capsule wardrobe method that I haven't heard of before but I'd love to start trying it right away. Basically, you choose a certain amount of pieces to wear for a select period of time (37 piece during 3 months for her) and it forces you to be creative with things that you really LOVE rather than be half-satisfied with articles of clothing you may or may not be loving. The second blogger has printables and calendars to help organize a minimalist lifestyle which I'm finding incredibly useful. This way, you can actually start looking forward to the clothes you'll be wearing and the outfits you'll be putting together.

The goal of minimalism is to free you up from extra baggage to allow more freedom for things that are more important. So instead of spazzing about closet space, cleaning up, and etc, I can wear an outfit I really love and instead, invest more energy into blogging, knitting, baking, all those side activities I've always wanted to try out! Maybe I'll finally be able to tackle on simplifying my life and emphasizing the essentials, starting with clothes. Also, this would help immensely with my champagne taste with a beer budget.

Links

Capsule Wardrobe: Un-Fancy by Caroline

A minimalist lifestyle: Into-Mind by Anuschka

A digital scrapbook: Style&Minimalism by Vikki

For men: Intro to men's minimal style

Forming the outfits

Blogs for men: SimplerMan by Mark

Minimal-Ism by William Chu

Tips for minimalism: GQ style tips

General, everyday tips