The Secret to Better Outfits Isn't Spending More

Have you ever put on an outfit and felt like something just wasn't quite right?

Sometimes, the problem isn't the outfit. It's the condition or quality of the clothes you're wearing.

Maybe your black dress pants are starting to fade. The heels on your everyday boots are worn down. The straps on your work bag are beginning to fray. Your favourite sweater has started to pill.

Individually, these things might seem small. But even one worn-out piece can make an otherwise great outfit feel less put-together.

And this is where it gets frustrating: you might actually spend a lot of money on your wardrobe.

So why isn't that money showing up in the outfits you wear every day?

Because you could be spending it in the wrong places.

You might spend $200 on a dress for a wedding. $100 on a bathing suit for a vacation. $50 on cowboy boots for a bachelorette. But you only wear these pieces for a few hours or a few times before they end up in the back of your closet.

Meanwhile, the pieces you wear all the time don't get the same attention.

You've spent a lot of money on your wardrobe, but the clothes you're actually wearing every day don't reflect it.

You're spending your money in the wrong places

Imagine instead that you borrowed a dress for that wedding, rented one or bought one second-hand for $30.

Now you have that $200 to put toward a beautiful cashmere sweater you can wear to work all winter and keep for years.

Or maybe you wore a bathing suit you already owned on vacation and used that $100 to repair your everyday work bag or replace the black pants you've been wearing three times a week for the past two years.

Those decisions would probably have a much bigger impact on how your wardrobe looks day to day.

Of course, this doesn't mean you should never spend money on a dress for a wedding or a bathing suit for a vacation. If you find a classic black or navy dress that you'll wear to weddings and events for years, that's completely different. If you genuinely need a new bathing suit that you'll wear all summer, that's different too.

The point is to spend according to how you actually use your wardrobe.

The problem is that most of us shop reactively

Wedding coming up? I need a dress.

Vacation? I need a bathing suit.

Themed event? I need a costume.

We shop for whatever is directly in front of us instead of stepping back and asking: What clothes does my actual life require?

That's one of the reasons I teach outfits instead of just individual pieces.

When you know that you need, for example, 10 work outfits, 6 put-together casual outfits and 4 dressier outfits for dinners and events, you can see exactly where your wardrobe needs the most attention.

You know which pieces you wear consistently.

You know which pieces are worth investing in.

You know what needs to be repaired or replaced.

And when a one-off event comes up, you can recognize it for what it is. You don't automatically need to spend a few hundred dollars on something you might never wear again.

Your go-to outfits are the foundation of your wardrobe

This is also why managing a wardrobe can feel so overwhelming.

When you're constantly shopping and own 100+ pieces, it's hard to know what deserves your money or attention. It's hard to notice what needs replacing. And it's hard to tell whether buying something new will actually improve your wardrobe.

But when you have your go-to outfits figured out, everything becomes much clearer.

You can focus your time and money on the clothes you actually need for your day-to-day life.

And instead of having a closet full of expensive purchases that don't necessarily translate into great outfits, you have a smaller group of well-planned outfits that look good, feel good and get worn again and again.

You don't necessarily need a bigger wardrobe budget. You need to allocate the money you're already spending to the pieces that have the biggest impact on the outfits you actually wear.

Not sure what those outfits should be for your life? That's exactly what The 20 Outfit Wardrobe System helps you figure out.

It will walk you through how to identify the outfits you need, figure out which pieces work best together, style them, and see what’s missing, so you know exactly what’s worth investing in.