January 1, 2018
It’s that time again! I looked and LOOKED at the Hermes scarves for this year – I wanted to find some unique color combinations… I kept changing my mind until literally the last possible minute!
This year’s focal points for gradual wardrobe building are these lovelies:
Black– Hermès Fouets et Badines; Beige – Hermès The Horsawards; Navy – Hermès Les Tresors d’un Artiste; Olive – Hermès Merveilleuses Lanternes; Grey – Hermès Jardin a Sintra; Brown – Hermès Ndop
A word to the wise – these scarves are selling FAST this year – I had to go to the sites for 3 different countries to find these colors, literally just 3 days after I started working on this post! Your best option for finding a fast-selling scarf is to call an Hermes store and ask THEM to find it and send it to you. Their staff is usually delightfully helpful and nice, and it will save you the legwork of trying to mail-order a scarf from a country for which you don’t speak the language.
Fear not – I get no commissions from Hermes, so it’s not a problem for me if you order directly… but do be aware of the horrid fact that there are already wide-spread counterfeits of all of these designs. If it seems too good to be true, as they say…
Hermes says that the colors in this first scarf are black, green and blue… I see some very pronounced yellow too, as well as some tan…
Today I thought that I would pull together some really unexpected combinations. If you wear the following outfit with your cardigan buttoned all the way up, nobody will know that you’re wearing a yellow tee! If the weather warms up, you shed your cardigan, and your outfit changes COMPLETELY…
And that’s one of the reasons that I chose this to be our focal point for a “black neutral” wardrobe – no grey, no red, and no royal blue! That’s a real change of pace…
scarf – Hermès Fouets et Badines; earrings – Elizabeth and James; tee – L.L.Bean; cardigan – Lands’ End; pants – L.L.Bean; loafers – Callisto
(please note the spiral earrings – aren’t they just right with this scarf? and the little round buckle on the loafers?)
Hermes describes these colors as white, rose, water green… There’s always going to be a mostly “softly colored” wardrobe in these ensembles, and it seems that it’s going to fall to the beige scarf again. I have to admit that the whimsical motif of this scarf was a BIG reason that I chose it!
Yes, when you can’t find beige shoes in the right style/shade/material, opt for metallic! I liked the way that these shoes echoed the sort of ornate detailed idea of the scarf. And earrings that unite rosy peach with sea green? Heck yes!
scarf – Hermès The Horsawards; earrings – Salome; tee – L.L.Bean; cardigan – Uniqlo; pants – L.L.Bean; loafers – Naturalizer
A really traditional color scheme, so far, but some of that aqua green and muted coral might show up soon… Hermes says that these colors are bordeaux, green and blue, and who am I to argue?
scarf – Hermès Les Tresors d’un Artiste; earrings – Alok Jain; tee – L.L.Bean; cardigan – Uniqlo; pants – L.L.Bean; loafers – Patricia Green
The “official” colors for this are water green, powdery rose and beige… but I’m sticking with the olive as our core “dark” neutral! Olive so rarely gets a good outing with pastel colors; we’re going to try to correct that this year.
scarf – Hermès Merveilleuses Lanternes; earrings – Latelita London; tee – Uniqlo; cashmere cardigan – L.L.Bean; pants – Banana Republic; loafers – Vince
I love that we’re going to have the option to bring some brown into this wardrobe, as well as a range of muted blue shades…. Hermes describes these colors as grey, glacier blue and green… Oh yes, there IS some green here. This should be good fun, eh?
scarf – Hermès Jardin a Sintra; earrings – Stephen Dweck; tee – Uniqlo; cardigan – Uniqlo; pants – L.L.Bean; loafers – Kenneth Cole New York
Shades of brown, with dark green and lots of grey! Hermes describes this as “brown, taupe, and sulphur yellow.” It’s interesting that don’t even mention the green, nor the grey…
Aren’t the earrings perfect? And the white tee shirt comes in handy when you just CAN’T find anything else that works… Just in case you need a tee shirt like this right now, this one comes in 14 colors…
scarf – Hermès Ndop; earrings – Love’s Affect; tee – L.L.Bean; cardigan – Uniqlo; pants – L.L.Bean; loafers – Vince Camuto
I know how much you have enjoyed these series is past years – I hope that these will live up to your expectations!
love,
Janice
p.s. You can “play along at home” without doing a ton of shopping – just go to your closet and assemble an outfit similar to these, in your chosen color scheme, and make a note of that color scheme for the upcoming months…
For more in the 2018 “Build a Capsule Wardrobe – 12 months, 12 outfits” series, check out the following articles:
Did you miss our 2017 Build a Capsule Wardrobe series? Catch up by starting with the outfits from January 2017!
Like this article? Save it to Pinterest!
Happy New Year! And what a fabulous way to start the new year!
Fantastic variety in colour schemes. Thank you for the effort you put in last year and I am looking forward to building wardrobes with the scarves and flowers. Hugs from Down Under Carol S
Happy New Year! I am /very/ excited for the Olive Green and the Blue/Grey scarves. Those colour palettes are right up my alley and the scarves themselves are beautiful :)
How funny, as I was perusing this blog, I thought, I know, I'll use my new handbag (of many colours), and just see if I can assemble an outfit similar to the one here from my existing wardrobe. Then, so I don't forget, I'll post it to Pinterest. (I now keep a photo of everything I buy on Pinterest). What do I find at the end of your blog? "P.S. you can play along at home…." Thanks for the inspiration, this will be fun! Some lovely scarves there, but since I counted my scarves, I'm not buying any more. Every time I'm tempted, I just think of that number, and walk away…Linda M
Looking forward to playing along at home this year again. I may need to do it twice for two different colour schemes though! What a shame.
Janice,
Happy 2018 ! A whole new year to enjoy your offerings , starting out great ! My two favorites are the scarves Les Tresors d’un Artiste, probably because of the frigid temps here right now, and then The Horsawards for late Spring and Summer. The Ndop would work for me too, until the grays come into play. I struggle with even warm grays, but I’ll keep an open mind ! In fact, we are having a very casual gathering of friends at a late luncheon today in the home of one of the couples, so I plan to wear brown slacks, with thermal leggings underneath, a warm white turtleneck, also with a thermal top under it ,and a green fleece 1/4 zip pullover , plus a Cashmink scarf . Hat, gloves, boots and coat of course ! As I said, it’s quite casual and in the country. All of the thermal underpinnings are in case the car gets stuck , Heaven forbid !
Happy new year – and wow, what a great start. Such interesting choices. I like the last one best (Ndop), and do hope you add lots of greys and some sulphur yellow!
Alice
What a fun way to start the new year! You really have chosen some unusual color palettes, so it will be interesting to see how they build as the year goes on. I am pretty sure that the black wardrobe will not be my best one this time around – looks like navy will get the honors, and maybe the gray. -nancyo
I tried the link to the pewter loafers, and got a different shoe. Is that fixable?I am working on a pewter, silver shoe wardrobe. BTW, Nordstrom has the cutest jelly slides in silver, that I bought because of the slight heel.
Sending wishes for a healthy, happy and peaceful 2018.
Joan Cecile
Do you get the hot pink shoes – check what colors are still available and you should see the pewter. If you're seeing something entirely different, send me a link and I'll see if I'm smart enough to fix it!
hugs,
Janice
It worked this time. Last time a different shoe entirely. Thanks!! Pewter, here I come. I am phasing out black from my closet (including shoes) and I don't have good luck with navy or gray shoes. Blessings.
Joan Cecile
What a great way to start off the New Year! I am ready to play along with the brown wardrobe (no surprise), but also, unexpectedly for me, the navy. Navy is not normally one of my color preferences, but I have a couple of pairs of travel pants in that color and it works well with red, which is my favorite color, so I will go with it! I have the navy pants and white tee and just ordered a red cardigan, so I am off to a good start there. I own corduroy pants in the forest green color, a dark brown long-sleeve tee, and a white cardigan, so with a bit of rearranging I am also in good shape for the brown wardrobe. I can't wait to see what you have in store for February, and if I will be able to continue these two wardrobe color schemes from my own closet!
I really enjoyed looking at these. For anyone new, this is a really fun series. I didn't really "get" it for a couple of months, and then it finally hit home — how different the same types of garments can look in different color schemes and styles. It's really an education!!!
WOOHOOOO! Can you tell I'm excited to see this post? I've been looking forward to this, can't wait to play along.
Love these color palettes. This may be the year I cave and buy an Hermes scarf!
Oh Janice, these colour choices/combinations are really out of the box – interesting and beautiful! In past years I've had two or three clear favourites at the start, wavered as the year has gone on and the collections have grown, and then have become happily dizzy until the final resolution. This year I'm in love with all the colour schemes in the first month! I really like the cothes in the starting capsules that you've chosen too. I wonder where my choices will lie in December. This is such a good series, I'm going to look forward to every month.
Robyn (also Downunder)
Happy New Year, Janice! I have followed your blog for some time but this is the first time I've commented. So excited to see the new scarves for the year, and the wardrobes you develop from them! Love the black and the grey for this year. Janine
Happy New Year, Janice. Such a wonderful collection of colours. I hadn't thought of asking our Hermes store to find a particular scarf for me. Great idea. You must some times struggle to find just the right colour but I noticed that you have never used clothes from the UK company Kettlewell. They make the most wonderful collection of basic clothes in every colour under the sun. Such divine colours and they group them into Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter to suit your facial colours.
I wonder if the brown palette will fall too quickly into relying heavily on the grey — love these wardrobes but….
Happy New Year, Janica, and thank you for everything!
I wander if you could possibly add a tab for this awesomness?
And I have a huge, huge favor to ask – please could you copy pieces of each wadrobe and past them into their 6 articles – that would grow over the year, or you can publish them as 6 separate articles at the end of the year? That would be listed in the index page of this new tab? (Together with pictures of their scarves?) ((and doing the same for the last's year wadrobes?…. *sigh*)) I hope this makes sense.
As these wadrobes grow longer I find it increasingly difficult to navigate… for the last year I was forced to copy printscreens onto the power point presentations for two of them, since it was the only way for me to use it, and I am not happy doing that… I would prefere when I read your original work, each time to visit your original pages. But I can't jump between 6 wadrobes searching for that one in 14 article series to find what I need, it is overwhelming. That is why I would be gratefull if you could copy and paste this same material in 6 articles, one for each wadrobe.
hugs,
Sania from Zagreb