Hello everyone! Going off of last week's post, I decided to do an article on developing a basic wardrobe to a more complete wardrobe. This article is intended to help someone who already has a defined style, but may not have all of the pieces they want for an everyday wardrobe. If you want advice on starting to build an alternative style wardrobe, check out my Building a Wardrobe series (part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4). Otherwise, you're in the right place!
So before we get into the steps, let's start with a definition of what a basic wardrobe is, mainly in reference to J-Fashion, but this can also be applied to other styles too. I consider a basic wardrobe to be one that you are able to make enough unique outfits for a week or mix and match the pieces you have to make a two week's worth of similarish outfits (like using the same tee and shoes with a different bottom and outer piece).
#1: Assess what you need
Once you have a basic wardrobe, you'll likely have a fairly good idea of what your style is, so you should be able to assess what your wardrobe is lacking or what it doesn't need. Take some time to go through your wardrobe and pick out pieces that you don't wear and decide if you don't wear them because you need new pieces to go with them or because you don't like them as much as you thought you did. Take some time to determine what you would need to wear the pieces you haven't been wearing and write them down. Once you've done this assessment, go through the pieces you do wear regularly and determine if the pieces you would need for your unworn or less worn pieces would work with what you already have. In addition to those, write down any other items you would like to add to your wardrobe such as weather specific items as well as anything you need to replace due to wear or fit issues.
#2: Prioritize
Once you've made a list of what you'd like to add to your wardrobe you can prioritize which pieces to buy first based on what works with the most pieces or what needs to be replaced. You can either rewrite your list in order of most needed/wanted or just write ranking numbers next to the items or something similar. A good way to decide on priority is to think what items you need sooner rather than later, like if it's getting cold out and you need a good coat and boots, you'd want to put those higher on your list than a light Summer blouse. Also, you can prioritize based on rarity of an item or how many items in your wardrobe it'll work with.
#3: Research and buy
Once you know what you want and what order you want it in, you can start to research which items specifically you want as well as start looking for auctions and sales with what you need. I highly recommend researching prices for specific items you want by looking through sold listings. For example, when I decided I wanted to buy Jewelry Jelly, I looked it up on Lolibrary to decide which style I'd prefer (JSK or OP) and make sure the measurements would fit me. After that, I pulled up sold listings for it on Lacemarket and compared the prices based on colorway, style, and what was included (matching headbow, socks, etc). From that I was able to get an average price to expect and was later able to buy the OP with matching headbow second-hand from Storenvy! Great places to look for used J-fashion are Lacemarket and its spinoffs (Kei market, etc, linked at the top of the page), Facebook groups (usually searching the style and sales works well for finding them), and eBay or Storenvy (just be careful and check their feedback). You can also check in local Lolita and J-fashion groups to see if there will be a swapmeet or if anyone is selling anything and willing to do a local trade/sale.
Do you guys have any plans for your wardrobes? Let me know in the comments below!
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