Why you shouldn’t be ashamed to shop at only one store…

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It wasn’t until I started writing my post about today’s outfit, and listing the items I wore, that I realized almost everything I was wearing was purchased from General Pants Co.!

Below: Shirt/Jacket: Neon Hart, Floral Culottes: Subtitled, Chiffon Vest: Don’t Ask Amanda (all from General Pants Co.) | Boots: Doc Martin

A while ago I was talking to a friend about where they shop for clothes. I was surprised to learn that she only shops at Forever New (and occasionally at Sportsgirl). When she goes shopping, she’ll walk past all the other stores, head straight to Forever New, and if there’s nothing she likes, she won’t go shopping again till they restock!

I thought this was a bit bizarre, as ‘shopping’, in my mind, means browsing in many different stores before making a purchase. This is definitely what I do, but I realized that I too, end up buying from the same stores every time anyway.

Almost half my current wardrobe is from General Pants Co. at the moment. All their separates are so infinitely wearable, and all the pieces look good paired together. This isn’t surprising as stores like General Pants Co., Glue and Parliament conscientiously buy labels that are of the same flavour. Unwittingly, my aesthetics are perfectly aligned with General Pants Co., which I can maybe sum up as ‘young’, ‘effortless’ and (a little) ‘unkempt’. Stores like Forever New, Zara, French Connection and maybe also Alanah Hill (though she is considered to be designer) are a bit different, as they are labels in themselves, but they don’t lose to compilation stores in terms of having diverse and comprehensive collections (i.e. they can dress from head to toe).

There is a general stigma out there about always shopping at the same place – being considered unadventurous or even anti-fashion, as in, can you claim to be a fashionista, if you aren’t aware of or have no interest in 99.99% of the labels in the industry? There is also the assumption that if you always shop at the same store your wardrobe will be too homogeneous.

I agree with all of these. But I think these days, with High Street labels being so extensively stocked and so frequently renewed, you could potentially build an exciting wardrobe from just one store – and no one could tell. And there are many indispensible advantages of doing this. As the store’s already done the work for you in building a cohesive collection, your wardrobe will inevitably also have a cohesive and distinguishable style. Also, as items from a single collection are made to be worn together, you can rest assured that everything you buy will go with the rest of your wardrobe.

My store of the moment changes from time to time. I was buying loyally from French Connection last year, and then, being unimpressed with their winter collection, I switched to General Pants Co. I think this has served me well. It’s only when I ventured outside of my usual hunting grounds that I had the problem of not being able to create a cohesive looking outfit. Maybe my coordination skills need a bit of work too.

Anyway, kudos to you if you have been interested enough to read this far.

On to the next topic.

Hair

I have mentioned before that I wanted to dye my hair light ash brown or ash grey, like AMO-chan’s current colour! Mean while, check out AMO’s Ameba blog post about how to get her hair style! I was saying in my previous post that I didn't want Amo to think that I was a copy cat to copy her hair colour, but then later she posted on my facebook that she thinks I should do it! She's so nice~

Today I went with the boys (my boyfriend and our housemate) to get their ‘communal’ hair cuts. They have both been moaning about needing to cut their hair for weeks. My boyfriend actually tried to convince me to do it for him! As a lawyer, I would frankly never put myself in that kind of high risk situation!

Anyway while waiting for them to finish their cuts, I was chatting to the salon’s ‘Master Colourist From Germany’ about whether I can get an ash grey/brown colour. Of course they told me I will have to bleach, and that due to my dark hair colour, it would be something like $250!

I just cannot believe how expensive hair is in this country!!

The ‘Master Colourist’ told me that bleaching myself is risky, especially because I haven’t done it before. But probably this is my own choice, since I have tightened my purse strings recently.

Mean while, I noticed that Eki from Ekiblog.com has recently died her hair a similar colour to what I want, and she did this all by herself. It looks quite amazing. She also made an amazing video explaining everything about bleaching and colouring.

She has very dark hair just like me, so this gives me hope that maybe I can do it too.

Life

Fondue at Max Brenner! This exercise always starts out very well, but everyone feels quite sick afterwards!

Did you know those old fashioned photo booths, normally for pass port photos, can print photos from your phone by blue tooth? That was fun for about 10 minutes!

Carving my first pumpkin! I always wanted to do this after seeing people do it on tv…we don’t really celebrate Halloween in Australia, nor do we grow orange coloured pumpkins.