Just the basics - an outline

[ls1dreams]

Hi all,

I'm building up a new wardrobe from scratch, and am trying to come up with a very basic outline of the casual clothes I should own.

Overall, I'd like all of the clothing to:
1. Be classic - it should not be trendy or become outdated in a few years
2. Be affordable - let's pretend that the buyer is someone right out of college and has a limited budget to work with
3. Be versatile - should be able to easily mix and match to make new outfits.

I made a similar thread to this one in the normal men's fashion thread, but I think that's a lot easier. For casual wear I'm often very lost.

Here's what I've come up with so far. Please help me out!


Shirts: ( try to keep under $50 )
- 2 white button down
- 1 light blue button down
- 1 lilac/purple button down
- 1 light pink button down
- 1 navy polo
- 1 other color polo (?)

Sweaters: ( under $50 )
- 1 navy v-neck sweater
- 1 charcoal v-neck sweater
- 1 light gray crew-neck sweater

Jeans: ( under $100, under $50 preferrable )
- 2 very dark straight leg jeans

Shoes: ( under $200 please )
- 1 dark brown plain-toe
- 1 loafer, brown
- 1 boot ??? (recommend something versatile here... chelsea or chukka boots seem to be the most popular). Dark brown? Suade?
- sneakers (badly need suggestions here - just want something conservative but flexible)

Blazer: ( under $150 please )
- 1 navy blazer
- 1 dark grey/charcoal blazer


Anything else I'm missing?

Specific questions:

- For shirts, I own a majority of these as dress shirts. Can I repurpose them for casual wear? The biggest problem seems to be that if I leave them untucked, I really can't use them.

I'm struggling a lot with shirts because I don't want to overlap too much with my dress shirts.

- Suggestions for a good inexpensive blazer?

- Favorite inexpensive jeans? ( right now Nordstrom Rack / Filene's basement seem to have good deals on Lucky jeans / Mavi / 7 for mankind )

Any other tips or advice?

 

[jet]

 

[Robert]

jet be on the rampage.

 

[hnlax]

Originally Posted by jet

Exactly. There are a lot of these exact threads. Look for the one "how should a college student dress?" thread. You may not be in college, but what you're looking for is similar to what's laid out in that thread