Sally's rules and Miss F's lessons learned..

The woman who founded the Great American Apparel Diet, Sally Bjornsen, which I referenced in my very first blog posting, is coming to the home stretch of her own year-long fashion fast. Yes, I said, YEAR-LONG! That is one strong woman! Now, Sally learned enough from her year-long experiment to establish eight essential shopping rules—steps, considerations, and minimum requirements that will help ward off wasteful spending.

Here are Sally's rules:


1. Don’t ever buy something because it’s on sale. Don’t buy it if you wouldn’t pay full price for it.
2. Don’t buy anything you don’t try on first.
3. Don’t buy anything that doesn’t fit you at that moment.
4. Don’t buy anything on impulse–it’s usually all wrong.
5. Don’t buy it unless you have two things in your closet that will pair nicely with it.
6. Don’t buy it if you aren’t comfortable in it right now.
7. Don’t buy it because it’s “in,” instead buy it because it’s magical!
8. Buy local if you can.

I don't have a list of 8 rules as my fashion fast is still in its infancy. Also, for those who know me, I'm not a fan of rules. I am interested in learning and have come up with some valuable lessons that I have learned thus far.

Here is the start of Miss F's lessons learned:


1- Only buy high quality clothing. If you do buy "disposable clothing" (as I like to call it), don't do it before you go on a 6 month fashion fast. You will quickly realize that low quality clothing (eg; from Target) stretches, fades, pills easily or just plain falls apart. It's high quality for me here on out!

2- Classic pieces should take up 75% of one's wardrobe. These are what I like to call anchor pieces. Solid, strong pieces that have staying power and stand the test of time through passing trends. You'll feel and look like a million bucks (think the late Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy). Below are some of my favorite CBK outfits......actually, this feels like a good place to pause and pay our respects to a classic fashion role-model.