August 17, 2023
This artist’s works are available to purchase here! This includes tee shirts and sweatshirts…
From Moths to a Book Tour…
It started one night on her back porch, when she noticed that there was not ONE INSECT fluttering around her porch light. She was particularly disappointed to not have any moths about – she really admires moths…
So she converted both her front and back yards to native plants and grasses… And she helped her friends do the same…
Scarf – The Met Store; earrings – Sorrelli; spruce heather sweater – L.L.Bean; black vest – Lands’ End; boots – Linea Paolo; bag – Hobo; corduroy jeans – J.Crew
“You should write a book!”
So she did; she called it Bug Love…
And NOW, she’s on tour!
Rope pendant – Anthropologie; heart earrings – Ninemoo; gold bracelet – Anthropologie; heart pendant – Ettika; black earrings – Kate Spade New York; black cardigan/blazer – J.Crew; blush corduroy shirt – Orvis; gold cardigan – Orvis; gold tee – Orvis; black pants – L.L.Bean; black tee – L.L.Bean; loafers – Cole Haan; gold clutch – Simitri; scarf – Echo
She goes out for long weekends, mostly, to be interviewed at bookstores, and on television, and sometimes on the radio, and sometimes on podcasts. Her publisher tells her where to go, and she shows up and tells her story!
Over, and over, and over…
She doesn’t want to pack much. She wants all of the photographs from the tour to be similar – it would be absurd for her to talk about conservation, and then have 37 different outfits!
She’s still waiting to drive somewhere and see an insect hit her windshield – THAT hasn’t happened in years!
love,
Janice
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The inspiration art is lovely and that spruce heather shade of green (sweater) is marvellous.
This is very pretty – too bad they don’t do scarves!
That is exactly what I thought ! But I did order the lovely Hobo bag in Mauve!!
Beautiful art and it would be very pretty as a silk scarf! I’d like to see this particular wardrobe with more green than yellow.
Janice,
While I would have to sub out the black pieces here for dark brown ones, my color loving heart does flip flops when you show posts offering 3 accent colors !
Beautiful colors, & I’m happy to report that I regularly have to clean bugs off of my windshield.
Maybe our heroine might venture out in the country a bit more ;-)
Drove from Chicago 4 hours to rural Indiana in July with only one or two bugs on the windshield. In childhood that windshield would have been covered. They’re gone.
We go over to Rockford every few months, through some truly rural areas, and nary a bug to be seen. I remember my childhood being VERY different…
hugs,
Janice
This is great….both the clothing and the story! I too have been trying to convert my garden to native plants with the help of friends and colleagues.
Wow, I really like the artwork and hate the color palette, haha! Even there, the gold color in the color palette is better than the gold color in the wardrobe. The gold of that cardigan is perhaps the least appealing color for clothing (to me) I have ever seen. I like the black, soft green (more of this color than just 1 sweater and a bag!), and peach, but would reserve the gold for metallic accessories. Out goes the gold twin set, handbag, and the black/gold scarf. A touch of lighter yellow like that in the Met Store floral scarf would not go amiss; perhaps a top in this color to work with the scarf. I know blush and mustard had a moment there, but I have poison eye for this combination, so the palette is made all the worse for me by having both of them. Yes, “gold” clothing definitely brings out the emotion rather than the analysis in me (reinforcing the commenter from Wed. who noted some colors elicit more of one reaction than the other).
This is an interesting exercise in how to translate an inspiration piece into a wardrobe. It illustrates very well to me that we don’t have to be overly literal in the inspiration-to-wardrobe translation if it results in something that doesn’t work for us, that we should feel free to experiment and tweak and change things up, even if the end result would not look particularly related to the inspiration starting point. A person who loves wearing gold clothing is going to use this inspiration very differently from how I would. To me, the gold, of which there are just touches in the artwork to begin with, works better as a sprinkling than as a major color.
My takeaway from the inspiration piece is to consider how to blend a stark dark high-saturation neutral like black with a soft muted lower-saturation accent color like the green. What would make these colors work well together for me? Probably “lightening” the effect of the black by using a more faded black, seeking out texture that softens it, fabrics like linen (as my favorite example) that tend to soften the effect of colors.
Note: NONE of this is a criticism of Janice’s work here, which is stellar as usual; it’s just a color scheme that is not to my own particular taste! I share my reaction more as an illustration that even when we don’t like what we see, we gain such insight from thinking about things like: What about this do I not like? What would I like more? What about this inspiration and/or capsule resonates with me? What can I learn here?
P.S. Readers in the southern US (and elsewhere) that are experiencing 110+ F temperatures today, you must be *loving* the idea of a winter vest right now, right? Man, the fashion industry cycle really does not align to our weather very well, does it? I know that it’s never too early to start planning for the next season in theory, but in practice, even with temps in the low 80s F I am struggling with fall clothing!
The gold/caramel shade would be lovely on the right person, but it is difficult for some of us! I was thinking taupe rather than gold, as I think it would play well with the green and blush; but I’d also like to lighten the black, and I’m not so sure about taupe and grey. But maybe charcoal for the tops and stay with black on the bottom. Alternatively, I could darken the gold to a chestnut, soften the black to charcoal, and I think it would work well for my coloring. I always do these mental tweaks to Janice’s beautiful wardrobes—I think of them as like recipes, places to start in order to get a general effect, rather than as chemical processes that have to be followed to the letter! The scarf is lovely.
I’m near the beginning of converting my yard to natives. It will be a long slow process that I’m taking in small steps, but people who know assure me that that is a good way to do it.
You are such an important part of this community; you know that, right? And we love your insightful, kind analysis…
much love,
Janice
I always love your analysis. Sometimes I can’t digest it all at once and have to come back to it!
Janice and Sheila, you’ve made my day. Thank you for such kind words. I am very grateful to be part of this community!
Sally, a very insightful comment! I believe that your analysis holds true for the types and shapes of garments, as well. People who don’t like pants can sub in skirts. Prefer pullover shirts to button-up blouses? A—line skirts to pencil skirts? Go ahead. To me, Janice’s work presents an idea of a wardrobe each time, and we must adapt it to our preferences and requirements. The fact that Janice has a large following tells me a lot of us appreciate her approach.
I add myself here Sally! And I love how Dame Eleanor referred to Janice’s perfect capsules as recipes that you can to suit your taste. Living in Spain I always laugh when a famous chef/restaurant or even a streamer is tagged as a criminal because they added something to the “paella” recipe. Poor Jamie was almost denied back into the country for adding chorizo. I just think that there’s a taco for everyone.
Wardrobe wise, that’s why I follow Janice, she never says what we should dress or buy, but with her great sense of timeless style helps us highlight what we like and why and then translate it to our wardrobes. Simply great!
Cheers and blessings.
I gasped when I opened your post today! Such beautiful art, and I love the wardrobe, too. I’d love to see more of the artist’s work in your wardrobes.
While these are not “my” colors I absolutely love them!!!! This wardrobe would be great. :) I think for her down times she really needs a t-shirt from the website that has her moth on it. I went to look and they are pretty fun (although some of the slogans were a little much for me). I would wear the tee with the black chords and and the gold cardi and be perfectly happy!! Then she would have some print too. Actually I would change the neckline on the graphic tee first. If you sew this is one of my ways of wearing fun tees even though the high neck of a unisex tee feels like it’s strangling me. I just cut the neck a little lower and cut the rest of the binding close to where it was sewn. Then I use contrasting/matching close enough ribbing from my stash to sew a new lower neckline.
PS. Sally in St. Paul I always love your analysis and feel like it is given in the kindest way to be helpful and respectful. :)
Maybe a cliche but I’d love to see butterfly or bug ear studs. Nothing over done, perhaps just gold .
I came SO CLOSE to doing that, but I was into the whole “bug love” theme and gave her hearts instead. At least for travel – I suspect that she owns a few pairs of bug earrings!
hugs,
Janice
This morning my newsfeed sent a YouTube video called “King’s College Cambridge wildflower meadows harvested by shire horses.” My computer skills are to poor for me to be able to share the link here. It is so sweet, and the comments show that many are now planting native and wildflower gardens. The video is a perfect match with today’s TVF post. Hope you can find it.
I checked out the pants in today’s post and discovered they are corduroy and great looking, but limited in colors and too high waisted for me.
Thank you, Janice, for an uplifting post this morning.
I’d love to wear these accent colours with an off-white neutral to replace the black, and perhaps tan footwear. The art is beautiful! And Janice, I love the moths on the wardrobe borders. I too like the heroine’s story. We have a garden of mostly native trees, shrubs and flaxes, & we live near our small town’s botanic reserve. We get tui & piwakawaka (fantails) in our front garden, & on very exciting occasions a kereru or two (native pigeons). They love the kowhai tree.
Like many other commenters, these are not really my colors (especially the gold – I’m with the people who would like to see more green) – but wow, the art and clothes really struck me as beautiful today!
I am in love with the art. The capsule not as much. However, I really looked at the art to define all the colours. There is the blush that deepens to a coppery coral, the light gold to dark gold, the black, a cream, and not just one, but 2 greens! Green 1 is the blue-toned that ranges from pale to a deep spruce. Green 2 has a yellow tone and again goes from pale to deep. I would make my neutral a warm cream with the golds and the yellow green as my accents and use copper for a bag, scarf, bracelet. That sounds so appealing.
I agree Kari!! I liked your analysis too. And thanks for commenting the other day to my wardrobe – therapy ❤️❤️❤️.
The moth print is beautiful! Love the accompanying story. I want to convert our yard to native but so far my husband isn’t on board.
Ah, the “turf war”. I think sod is silly, he thinks mowed grass is gorgeous… In our house, the route to less grass was thru the kitchen – fresh herbs & tomatoes & fruit trees were a win, and then there’s room to tuck in other ecofriendly things… A decade later, the yard is a bird nursery in the spring & a butterfly buffet later on. In a very urban suburb. Plant it & they will come!
(Sorry for the hijack. But it’s so amazing to see what happens if you just get some stuff blooming out there!)
I also loved this post and especially the story! Cheers to all of you who are committed to help with a bug friendlier garden/backyard. As I tell to my sustainability students, everything counts!
I also would like to see a bit more green, but I’m among those who do like the gold. Maybe I would swap the tee for a striped one in cream and gold and would also add some denim.
I will come back to these tidy ensambles to find inspiration after cleaning out my own closet.
Cheers and blessings to all!
Thank you for doing this palette! It’s like you reached into my closet for this one. I love black with muted southwestern desert accent colors, though it’s an unusual palette and hard to find inspiration for. So I love this!
I was surprised so many people dislike the mustard cardigan. I have one just like it in linen, and it’s the perfect bright second layer for summer days in London. It works very well with my coloring (softish autumn) and helps soften the dark neutrals I love so they work better for me. Perhaps it wouldn’t work for everyone, but I hope I don’t offend people’s eyes when they see me in it!
I have one that is perhaps a slightly more muted mustard, but it ends up going with so much and I get so many compliments when I wear it. The funny thing is it really isn’t one of my colors and I can’t wear it as a shirt, but as a cardigan it totally works somehow!
Like Dame Eleanor, I was thinking that charcoal grey would be better with this. Instead of the gold, perhaps a soft camel? The Met Store scarf has the right saturation for the accent colours.
The green and blush accent pieces would be lovely with charcoal and camel! That would turn it to a two-neutral wardrobe, which might be better for some heroines. Like Sally, I love color, but I’m still figuring out how much of it (and in which shades) I can manage now that I have grey hair.
I need to look for a painting with camel and charcoal in it… Thanks for the idea!
hugs,
Janice
I remember insect spatter on windscreens and headlights in the summer.
Come to Arkansas if you want bugs on your windshield! We have plenty! LOL I love the art Janice! So pretty! I don’t wear much black any more but I think these accent colors would be lovely with navy! Your wardrobes are always inspirational!
The picture is really great. In the capsule you can see why I only use black sparingly in my wardrobe. Instead, I wear white/beige in the summer. And in winter I have gray and dark green as a base for sage & honey. It was fun reading all the comments here. And thank you Janice for your contributions. I dug up my garden years ago and planted it colorfully… one corner is a real jungle and is now full of life. Best regards