Today we are continuing with the fall/winter capsule wardrobe introduced a previous post but with a bit of a time travel aspect to it.
I wore the olive and black floral dress in this capsule twice in the late summer season and thought those outfits would be good to include in my capsule outfit series and to include in the accessory capsule. I know many places continue to experience warm weather for a while yet so these transition season outfits will probably continue to be relevant (even here).
Because I was creating a capsule for fall/winter, I didn't include this short-sleeved long cardigan even though I wear it routinely with this dress. If I'd created this capsule even a couple weeks before, I would have added it. So let's just agree to consider the lighter cardigan as either a holdover from a spring/summer capsule or as a bonus item.
Since I'm all about the print mixing, I enjoyed adding these polka dot flats to the outfit, and I liked how the gold studs repeated the metallic color from the palm pendant.
This dress is one of the somewhat rare print garments in my closet that hasn't inspired a paper bead bracelet set. That's because I have several sets with black and olive in them created to coordinate with other print pieces, such as these two sets I made for this colorful black/olive/orange/maroon floral skirt.
My daily bracelet stack is based on the paper bead bracelet set (on the right in the above) I made in a black, beige, orange, olive, and silver colorway. This is a neutral-dominated stack but with small amounts of orange/rust to create a lovely color palette for fall (though I will happily wear this set in any season). I supplemented those three paper bead bracelets with (top to bottom) several other DIY bracelets: olive serpentine stone bead/silver spacer bead, black/silver bicone paper bead, clear crackle/black bicone bead, and black glass with gold/silver spacer bead.
The top bracelet with the elephant charm was made using this safari digital photography painting from an alumni magazine. I loved the rich autumnal color palette and beautiful blends of color. I didn't even notice that there was binary code (a series of 0s and 1s) superimposed all across it until I rolled up the beads and saw that there were some small numbers on them here and there.
The second bracelet in the set with the dimpled silver bead in the center came from a full page drawing about Captain Cook in an alumni magazine. After cutting the strips, I used black marker on the edges to cover the white paper core and to add some contrast to the beads. The beads are very neutral overall but with some nice hints of yellow, light green, orange, and rust among the stripes.
The bottom bracelet is the most colorful one, starting life as this full-page image in a Lands End catalog. I was really struck by the combination of the bright aqua and coral from the puffers with the earthy background color...I don't know what to call this warm, muted green-orange color but it reminds me of Czech glass beads in a yellow travertine colorway. For this bracelet, I cut strips from the end with the woman in the bright coral jacket and the brilliant orange fire, and I added some black to them by covering some of the off-palette areas (like the teal coffee mug) with black marker. This page made some strange but fascinating beads that worked well with the other two in finishing off this bracelet set.
I wore the same dress + cardigan combo again a couple weeks later because yes, in the real world, we repeat outfits or parts of outfits. This is definitely one of the Pleasing Pairings in my closet that does extremely well in the transition seasons because, like the colorful floral top that inspired this capsule, the pieces are short-sleeved but a little heavy/warm for high summer weather. They are perfect for early fall, however. This time I wore them with the nude wedges by Cole Haan and a bulky olive bead/ribbon necklace from Fire Mountain Gems.
My daily bracelet stack started with the second of the sets inspired by that same floral skirt but in a darker black, maroon, and olive colorway. To this I added my two DIY black glass bead bracelets, an olive/black bead bracelet from Christopher & Banks, and a DIY green/olive/silver bicone paper bead bracelet. It's funny, it wasn't until much later in the day that I'd noticed that on the top bracelet I had taken the back part of the bracelet I usually wear against the underside of my wrist and positioned it on the top like a focal element. The black and gold spacers are really just there to make the bracelet the right size for my wrist, but they don't look bad up front and center.
Starting from the top, the paper bead bracelet with the black and gold beads came from this very fall-like image in a (rare!) Christopher & Banks catalog. I added olive marker to the sides of the strips to bolster that color in the beads, then added black marker to cover the white paper core. Between the olive and black, the beads were very dark and low contrast, which is what I'd been aiming for in this set.
The center bracelet with the maroon glass pearls was created from this stunning seed bead creation in a Fire Mountain Gems catalog. This is an instance in which paper beads really can't do justice to the magnificent detail of the original paper, but I liked how the beads turned out: rich brown with hints of fiery orange and red and specks of yellow and white.
Finally, the bottom bracelet with the green glass pearls was made from a drawing in The Economist magazine. It was a small-ish image but so perfect for my set's desired color palette. The strips had some areas of white in them, but as I wanted a darker look to these bracelets, I added black to cover those areas (not shown). I like how the green spacer beads look with the mostly maroon and black paper beads.
I made a pair of delicate "3 beads on a stick" style stack earrings from my bead soup to coordinate with this paper bead bracelet set. I found three pairs of small beads in black, warm green, and maroon to stack up with antique pewter tone disk spacer beads and findings. I chose antique pewter because it's a dark metal color with low contrast to the beads and it feels very neutral (and can be worn with either silver or gold).
With four outfits lending accessories to this capsule, here's what we have. With the dominance of black, red, and olive in the outfits thus far, it's not surprising that these colors are best represented in the accessory capsule. However, I have a suspicion that some other colors will be joining the mix soon...
Do you like to wear dresses in the transition seasons? Are you more of a stand-alone dress wearer or do you prefer to layer over them? Do you have any favorite dress + topper combinations in your closet? What is your favorite style of dress?
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I wear dresses year round, just changing out what goes under or over them. Well, I also have dresses that are definitely cold weather vs. warm weather. I am really enjoying wearing dresses over dresses because most of my dresses are long (I'm too lazy to hem them). My favorite kind of dress is one that fits!
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