Make Your Own Lucky

My Lucky abandonment is complete. I am now faced with post-traumatic store syndrome, brought on by the homogenization and boringification of my favorite retail outlet. I attend twelve step meetings and have an official, turquoise-adorned, flowy-sleeved sponsor. But between the meetings and texts to my sponsor, I find myself trawling sites and stores in search of that same feeling that Lucky used to bring me.

My latest find is this $25 blouse. I liked the adorned smockiness and the gauzy feel. For all that, though, it is a weak substitute. It is the methodone of boho blouses.

Rain, Rain, Stay All Day

You know what would be so freaking awesome? If it would just rain some more. Truly, it just has not rained enough this spring. For sure my feet have perma-sog, but that is a small price to pay for the joy that is chilly, wet overcast days, weeks on end. I honestly hope that we never see a sunny warm day ever again, and I commemorate this desire with a $21 floral blouse covered in flowers, all in varying shades of glorious gray.

Le No? Le Yes!

The dealmaker: This top is $20. It has some of that recently popular bat wing sleeve, but it's cinched with an empire waist, so you don't look shapeless or like you might take flight.


The dealbreaker: It's called the Leno blouse. There is something so repulsive about Jay Leno and his scary chin, that simply because an item shares his name, I would seriously run from it, screaming, arms flailing. Perhaps you will not have as visceral a reaction, although I will never understand why not.

All in the Family

Amanda has this blouse, my sister has this blouse, and I will soon have this blouse. So, given its popularity, it seemed logical to share the blouse with you, the public at large. In Amanda's case, the blouse came her way as the spoils of photo shoot. (I want a job where you get pretty blouses for free. I get things like books on disruptive innovation or conflict resolution tool kits.) My sister, a fishmonger (not really, but it's a profession that doesn't get enough press and is fun to say), had to purchase it for herself and, as it turns out, for me as a birthday present.

Look at the cute gimmick, I mean detail, on the sleeves:

I think this top looks absolutely adorable paired with the walking shorts in the first picture, but I know that if I wore those to my office, it would not be the win-win-win situation - more like a "go home and change, young lady" situation. Disruption has its time and its place, apparently.

More Pleasant Peasant

Over the last two summers I have bought several peasant-y blouses... and thrown them out. If you are looking to add volume to your torso, they are definitely the way to go. But if you, like me, live in terror of people describing you as "a big girl," the flowy peasant blouse is not for you. But I think this is an awesome compromise - peasant-y style, with an actual waist! And it would look equally at home with a loose, breezy skirt or tailored work trousers. Peace and harmony for $22.80.

Orange You Glad It Isn't Peach?

When I started work and went through four searingly hot months of training in Tampa (Tampa! In the summer! Suits required!), the company arranged to have a woman come speak to us over dinner about how to dress professionally. Also, how to use a fork and knife (really - my company hired from top tier schools, and then felt a need to pygmalion us). This woman told all the women that we needed to invest in a peach colored suit. I will never really get to the bottom of that suggestion. Was it a power play? Did she hope to stop by the office later that summer and chuckle to herself when she spotted any of us in peach suits, knowing that none of us, who each had to pass an HR test to secure this job and must therefore be sane, would have arrived with a peach suit in our garment bag, and must therefore have purchased it at her malevolent suggestion? I wouldn't put it past her.


So, to make it clear, I believe a peach suit is a bad idea. If it were a dog named Idea, I would hit it in the snout with a rolled up WWD or Anthropologie catalog and say, "Bad Idea!! Bad, bad Idea!" But I do love me some burnt orange. Look at this gorgeous, flattering tank in that great combination of silk with lycra - and only $16, with free shipping!

The Hobbyist

It's hard to believe how many hobbies I find time for. In addition to laundering clothes, scrubbing toilets and correcting people's grammar, I also return things. Whereas some folks entertain themselves with shopping, only a select few can fashion an entire pastime out of returning. Sure, you may buy things and later change your mind and return them, but how many of you return things you intend to keep? Less cryptically, I buy something I expect to go on sale, then buy it again on sale, and return the original at full price. And, in the case of this shirt, I performed a third iteration, buying the shirt on its second reduction and returning the first two shirts. As you can imagine, this hobby demands excellent receipt filing skills and the ability to do a cost/benefit analysis on the spot, each time your notice your item on further reduction (is it really worth my time for $4.99? for $7.99?"). I am fairly certain, though, that I read somewhere that these sorts of calculations keep your mind strong and ward off dementia.

Anyway, this shirt is so cute, and it is now $15 (depending on the color), from $45. Great under a suit, and you can whip off your jacket for the boiling commute. And you have me to thank for having to buy it only once - for those of you that don't see the joy in the hobby that is returning.

The Subway Blouse

Not to be confused with the "wheelbarrow" dress, the subway blouse is perfect for commuting in the hot weather suddenly upon us. You know how you head out to work and it's a bright, sunny morning and you're happy to be alive, if not happy to be going to work, and then you head down those two flights of gum-encrusted, AM New York-littered stairs into the train station and stand dripping, on a subway platform that is inexplicably a full 27 degrees hotter than the street? This is the shirt for that commute, and it's $20. Sure, it looks dressy, but it's hardly there at all. And of course, you would pair it with something a little less Country Joe and the Fish. OK, I don't really know who Country Joe and the Fish are, but believe you me, this is their shirt. Try for a somewhat more sophisticated solid cami, possibly a nice absorbant cotton

Somewhere out there is the "office blouse," the blouse you can wear in the hot, hot, hot subway (so hot that if it were coffee, my mother would drink it) and still be comfortable in the icicle-encrusted office.