An 8 day October trip takes me to Dutchess County in the stunning Hudson Valley of New York State — home to the Franklin Delano Roosevelt home and Presidential Library, hiking, wineries, the Vanderbilt Mansion, and many other wonderful places to visit and things to do. It’s time for me to toss things in a suitcase and get going!
I need casual clothes for this trip. I’ll be visiting historic homes, doing a little hiking, exploring wineries, eating at the Culinary Institute of America, and stopping in at the Orvis Sandanona Shooting Grounds — to check out their clay shooting and fly fishing. From there I head to a parent weekend at my daughter’s college (think football game and other laid back activities).
You know what easy packing would be?
Being able to take anything you darned well want without having to think about whether it fits in the blasted suitcase! And then having someone else carry those flipping heavy bags!
But you know, that’s not the world I live in . . . and to make my dressing life easier on the road, the best solution I’ve found are capsule wardrobes. And this, this takes some planning.
What is a Capsule Wardrobe?
As many of you already know, a capsule wardrobe is:
- Two sets of neutral colored clothing (2 Cores of Four — typically 2 tops and 2 bottoms in each core color).
- One (or two) additional set(s) of clothes that complement the 2 Cores of Four. This means tops or cardigans/bottoms/dresses that contain either: A) both neutral colors (think print, plaid, stripe) or B) contrasting colors that coordinate well with both of the basic neutrals (These additional sets of clothing are often referred to as the Expansion Four and the Mileage Four).
- Capsule wardrobing in your home clothing collection means you have a closet full of pieces that work well together (don’t we all want this!).
- Capsule wardrobes for travel means you are always well-dressed — AND it still fits into a rationally sized suitcase.
In a classic 4 x 4 capsule wardrobe for your home closet, you would have 4 sets of clothes with 4 pieces in each, so a 16 piece wardrobe collection.
In a travel capsule, the number of pieces you can pack reduces the size of the wardrobe. Depending on your suitcase size, you will be limited to a total of 8 to 12 pieces total, a couple of scarves, and a jacket you take on the plane. Obviously, the time of year also has a big impact on the number of clothing pieces you can pack. Sweaters take up a lot more room than shorts and t-shirts!
This time I am taking a standard suitcase (25″ Travel Pro) — HURRAY!! — instead of trying to fit everything in a single roll-aboard (which is 22″ for U.S. domestic flights).
Why? Well, while I’m not really packing more pieces, the clothes are bulkier for a chilly fall trip. Besides, I can handle the bigger suitcase on this trip. Last time out was my press trip to the Adirondacks, we were told to limit our suitcase size since there were 6 of us in a standard mini van ?.
This time, I’ve chosen grey and dark blue as my two neutrals. You’ll notice that one of my grey core pieces is a cardigan, and I went with a pair of army green cargo pants in the Bridge Four — a color that complements both grey and blue.
I have three possible outerwear options: a heavy charcoal grey cardigan, a brown suede moto jacket, and an Athleta Clouburst rain jacket.
Travel Capsule Wardrobe in Grey and Dark Blue
Packing list
| 8 Days in a 25″ suitcase — SO easy after my 10 day trip in a carryon! | |
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Toiletries
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Makeup
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The good news is that the packing list above will leave you with a goodly amount of space in your suitcase. For, you know, shopping 🙂 .
The fun part of capsule wardrobes, as far as I’m concerned, is realizing how many different outfits you can get out of your set of clothes.
Here are three different sets of ideas for outfits based on the wardrobe.
Capsule Wardrobing — How Do You Start?
Whenever I put a capsule wardrobe together, I start in my closet. What do I have that I like for this trip? What are the two core colors that I ALREADY have that seem to work best for the time of year and level of dress required (casual, business, dressy). And then I fill in where I need to — like most women, I typically do my biggest shopping in the fall and late spring, and I do keep capsule wardrobing in mind when I do it.
While clothes pictured in this article come from Nordstrom, Trunk Club (Nordstrom), Stitch Fixe, Chico’s, DSW, Athleta, and Rebecca Minkhoff — here’s the thing. Internet shopping makes capsule wardrobing easier than it’s ever been. Wherever it is that YOU like to shop, you can get online and browse clothing by color.
Whether you open multiple browser windows to look at pieces of clothing from different companies, or you copy and paste images into a Word doc. — you really can limit yourself to considering clothing in color sets. It helps me from getting distracted. Honestly, it’s how I started writing about capsule wardrobes — I regularly made Word documents with my planned purchases. When one of my friends saw it, I suddenly had a capsule wardrobing lesson command performance.
