Wintry tones and cozy knits

How is everyone keeping with lockdown day… what is it now? 93? It’s been a while since my last outfit post… mainly because I’ve not been bothered much with putting together any interesting outfits but also because I’ve been working like a maniac and there has been little time to post. In the meanwhile, Winter has most definitely arrived here in South Africa, and if yesterday is anything to go by, it’s going to be a cold and miserable one… Most days are spent at my home office desk, sitting through various video meetings and progressively getting more frozen, so I’m mighty glad I never acted upon my idea to just leave all my warm knits in Europe…

I’ve been wearing a variation of today’s outfit most days in the last week, although I rarely put on shoes, it’s mainly slippers and Birkenstocks at the moment… And who can blame me, when there’s nowhere else to go but my home office? It’s usually a cashmere knit as a top, jeans (how skinny or loose depends on how tired I feel in the morning, as well as whether I had a little bit or a lot of bread the day before…), and slippers… So when I put together today’s outfit it seemed a little more photo worthy than normal, and here we are.

The top here is not a top by the way, it’s a cashmere mix dress by McQ, and I’ve had it for more than five years… Remember what you read about designer pieces being investment pieces etc.? All true. I wear this dress every single Winter: it’s super warm, with a tiered detail, and usually falls to just above my knees. Here I lifted up the bottom part, hooked it up with three little safety pins that hide in the folds, and there you have it, fun sweater look with a dropped waist detail.

I added some black skinnies with a lot of stretch (what would lockdown life been if someone hadn’t invented elastane, I wonder?) and that made my outfit. Then I remembered I hadn’t taken my Hermès Kelly 32 out for a little tour of the house in a bit, so I brought her out: funny how she still has a twilly on, usually I don’t bother with twillies around handles, except if it’s the height of Summer and I’m going for long day of meetings, they avoid any moisture from my hands to transfer onto the leather.

I added a cashmere and silk shawl: this one is another one that I got from the men’s side at H, some seasons I don’t like any of the designs they have on the women’s side, so I cross over… and I share it with Hubby Dearest. Not only does it have a gorgeous grey blue colourway, but the design has loads of stars and sketch-like drawings, which I love.

Ok. Before I go, I need to leave you with a word on these boots. Chanel has been making a version of these in the last couple of years, but each time I’ve tried the leather version it felt horribly stiff and gave me visions of painful afternoons ahead, and let me not tell you how much I hate the version with the patent tips… but this pair, in the softest possible suede, in a go with everything grey, was just perfect, and it was waiting for me at the Heathrow shop on one of my stop-overs, with the nice duty-free discount as well. I am obsessed with them. By the way, anyone else missing jet-shopping at the moment? I know I do…

With love, S.

Working from home… again

It’s getting colder here in Johannesburg… and I’m starting to sympathise with that colleague of mine who was confessing with glee that she was very happy to work all day in her PJs (see, I told you I’d slowly get there, I’m not quite there yet, but soon, I’m sure), especially as I just heard our office would remain closed for another four weeks at the least… That’s a lot of home-based work outfits for me to pull together.

I found this knitted dress during last week-end’s closet clear-out, it was hiding under some (many) jumpers… It’s from Mango, which pretends it delivers in South Africa: in reality it still ships your orders from Spain and you get wacked with a major duty invoice if you’re not careful, I learned the hard way…

I’ve been wearing trousers most days since lockdown so this is a nice change. In all honesty this feels very close to wearing PJs at work… After all the knit texture is super comfortable, very unlike the more structured shapes I often wear in the office, and this outfit took exactly five seconds to pull together. I am however wearing Spanx-like undies, for obvious reasons (try wearing knit fabrics over lacy lingerie and get back to me), does that redeem me?

I did make an effort with the accessories (pretty much like my colleague of the PJs: she puts a nice necklace on top of a sweatshirt and there you have it, dressed) with my favourite Hermès CSGM, a design called A Cheval Sur Mon Carré (it’s over ten years old, is at the top of many H fan’s grail list, and yet I scored in a sale!), a few fun pearl earrings from Samira 13, and my favourite Chanel slingbacks, which would need to be replaced at this point after three years of traipsing the streets of many cities the world over, if only Chanel would re-issue this very classic grey flannel combo instead of issuing some pretty garish colourways…

Watch this space, at this rate it’s very probably I’ll soon be wearing something very casual indeed to get me through my daily video call marathons, and when I do, I’ll be sure to document it.

With love, S.