Recenly, my new addiction is a website called Pintrest. I am mostly addicted to pouring over the pages and pages of fall ensambles and cute fall outfits. I wish I could afford high fashion, I swear I'd be the best dressed of them all! Sadly, I cannot afford high fashion. But that's where my other obsession comes in: thrifting & rummaging. My new purpose in all things clothing related revolves around the joining of my two addictions. Pintrest: meet thrifting! Thrifting: meet Pintrest.
I think the most important thing when trying to assemble an ensamble (how's that for a tongue twister?) is to realize that you're not going to find everything at a thrift store. If you truly want to achieve an all-together, high fashion look, you're going to have to sacrafice somewhere. For me, it's the boots (in fall, anyways). I just never find cute boots at thrift stores, and I really LOVE boots. So I purchased myself a couple pairs of boots, which I consider to be the anchors of many of my fall outfits. Now I didn't go overboard, I got two pairs of boots (one brown, one black) at Maurices for about $65 (total). I also have a great pair of boots that I bought one year during spring clearance. I think they were like $120.00 boots that I paid about $18 for. So I will probably try to hit the boot clearance again this upcoming spring. Boots: check.
This fall my new love is scarves. I am all about scarves. I have only 4 scarves though, and they are also hard to find at thrift stores (at least cute ones are). But I did stumble across some really cute ones at Walgreens (yes, Walgreens!) for only $5.99. I am also going to ask for scarves for my bday and Christmas, they can be inexpensive and you can ask everyone for them because the chances of you getting two of the same are near impossible! I also saw really great scarves at Charlotte Russe for $9.50. So, boots: check, scarves: check.
Now, you really just need to fill in the blanks. Skinny jeans, t-shirt, cardigan. Big sweater, tights/leggings, leg warmers. Dress, tights, feather earrings. The combinations are endless.
I have completely re-purposed the way I shop. Instead of shopping for "outfits" I shop for "peices" that can be used with things I already have. When I thrift, I make sure I have a purpose. One day I went and only looked at sweaters. The next time I only looked at shirts/tops. I use pintrest as a starting point because I am horrible at matching colors and patterns, so if I have a picture in my head of the end goal, it's so much easier to achieve that goal. Here's an example. Now, I am not claiming perfection - I'm just going for the overall concept. A lot of my fall ensambles are still incomplete, and probably will be for a while as I continue to search for the perfect "peices" to finish them.
High Fashion Inspiration:
Low Budget "Knock Off":
So back to what I was saying about just going with a concept. This was just using the basic color scheme. This outfit could really use a great scarf and I think then it would be finished.
The dress was from Goodwill: $3.99, the boots are from Maurices: $32.00, tights are from Kohl's: $6.99, belt is from Goodwill: $0.99, feather earrings from the Icing: $7.50 and the cardigan was a gift so price unknown.
Just for fun I looked up the prices from the picture above...Dress: $51, Cardigan: $140, Boots: $40, Earrings: $260 (WHAT?!%) and Scarf: $11 (something manageable!)
So while it's not identical, and the other one is in the end way cuter and much more desirable, my budget is better suited for the roughly $50 knock off than the $500 high fashion version. I will be in search of a scarf to accompany this, and perhaps a better cardigan,as I didnt like that mine doesn't button...I had to improvise with this silly belt. I'll keep you up-to-date.
Saving up and looking forward to Black Friday!
♥Angela
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