For the love of used clothes

I'm a huge advocate for secondhand fashion. The last time I checked, 70% of my clothing collection was acquired used, and since I discovered online thrift stores (Swap.com and, just recently, ThredUP – links are referral links!), it's gone up to 78!

Today's outfit is a celebration of all things pre-loved, and what better way to represent that than with a dress covered in hearts? I got the dress at Swap.com, and found that not only was it pre-loved; it was also pre-refashioned! It apparently used to have sleeves, and I can tell that they were removed by the fraying fabric around the armholes. I'll have to do something about that, but at least I know there's one DIYer out there who's just as lazy as I am!

While the used dress and used sweater (hand-me-down from a friend) are a pretty good celebration in themselves, the real party in this outfit is the shoes.

Let's take a stroll down memory lane in them!

When I was in high school, shoes like this were at the height of fashion. I can still see me now, attending a function in our gym/auditorium with all the other girls in my class, rocking a long floral straight skirt and a cardigan-cami set (other iconic styles of the late 90's) and a pair of sandals much like these—skinny, asymmetrical straps, square toe, and, well, mine definitely had a much more aesthetically pleasing block heel, but I guess this flared look was fashionable too!

For a long time after the 90's ended, I was forced to eschew square toes because they were very clearly outdated. But what goes around comes around, and the square-toe shoe is back! After having had about 20 years to get over them, I am fully on board with their return and have gone all-in on finding vintage  sandals from the 90's to round out my collection. I've gotten three so far (and I should probably stop now!), but these off-white ones are probably my best find at only $3.49. So yeah, you can pay a couple hundred dollars for a cool, up-to-the-minute pair of vintage-looking sandals from your designer of choice, or you can head to your local thrift store right now and probably snag something decent for a couple bucks!

If that's not a reason to buy used clothes, I don't know what is!

ThredUP gave me this nifty "used" pin when I made my first order,
so naturally I had to take a photo with it for this ode to secondhand goods!

Fun with colors

"Fun with colors" is practically my personal motto, rather than a single outfit theme, but it's taking on special meaning as my latest hair color heads into its third week of existence. I probably shouldn't speak of my plans, since plans change, but this is the last unnatural color I intend on doing for a while, and my feelings about it are bittersweet.

On the one hand, I've made it through every color of the rainbow by now, and it's time to move on to something different. But on the other hand, I've been getting a lot of compliments on this color scheme in particular, and it will be hard to let go of that popular feeling I get when I'm the most noticeable person in almost any room.

Today was no exception, as someone stopped me in the hallway at work to comment on how she loved my outfit and how it matched my hair. It did, indeed. Not intentionally of course, but since it happened, I figured I'd better blog it—you know, before this hair color is gone forever and such a coincidence can never happen again.

Athleisure at the office

For last week's Friday Funday, I decided to take a turn toward the sporty side of things with a pair of jogger pants. But not just any jogger pants, naturally—these are unquestionably Unfashionista jogger pants. Why so unquestionably? Let me count the ways!

1. They feature a houndstooth design (albeit a very blurry, avant garde houndstooth!)—my personal favorite pattern!
2. They have all three of my favorite cool colors: purple, blue, and green.
3. The pattern and colors together make quite a statement—my favorite thing to make!
4. The cut and style is so 5 years ago (I actually thought these pants were funky enough to have never been trendy, but then I ran across a picture in which Taylor Swift literally outshone my pitiful pants with a much blingier matched set...back in 2015.

Unsurprisingly, the Unfashionista is late to the multicolor houndstooth joggers party, but she's just glad she made it at all! I'm really pleased to have found these pants (for $3.20 at Swap.com - hit my referral link if you want to shop!), for lots of reasons, one of them being that I've been wanting pants with a tuxedo stripe forever, and although I had planned to make my own, these ones saved me a lot of time and effort!

They also have turned out to be a great pant for work—loose and comfortable, but still with a certain sense of chicness and sophistication brought on by the tuxedo stripe and silky fabric.

They go equally well with sneakers and heels, so I wore them with heels for a slightly more professional vibe, and paired them with some subtly studded rhinestone earrings and top. While I've worn some sporty stuff to work before, I'm pretty sure this pair of pants is my favorite piece of office-athleisure yet!