Fall Wardrobe Planning Begins With a Budget

Going back to this previous post, in which I dealt with a dangling question regarding semi-annual shopping & budgeting, the further question of how to "wrap your spending plan around all the items you need" remains unanswered.

Some thoughts:

• Many years ago, when I did my initial cost per wear calculations, I concluded that half of my spending went toward fashiony uniform template items and the other half toward such necessities as coats, shoes, and under-garments.

If you are going to have to have a new winter coat this year, I would definitely take that money and set it aside. The best sales and selection are available in October.

• Do you have a method for figuring out how many of any wardrobe piece you need? If not, I describe one here.


• Identify your needs. You may find my post Creating the Spring Shopping List helpful.


• Now the hard part: you must assign a portion of your "spending plan" to each item on your shopping list.

One final thought: you could just budget the same amount for each piece. That would work for me, since I buy most of my stuff thrift. But realistically, if you are shopping in a real store, with real money, that method won't work too well.

Consider that jackets are often double the cost of pants or skirts, and basic tops can be very inexpensive. If you split the money evenly between those three categories, you could potentially buy one jacket, a pant and a skirt, and maybe 5 tops.

Yes, I think I like it.