New Year's Dress

To work on Monday, December 31st (yes, we government workers toil for you even on the eve of major holidays), I wore:

• Dark ochre Prada wide-legged twill trousers from Buffalo Exchange;
• Fir-green melange, scoop neck, long sleeve, cotton T from Banana Republic, bought at the outlet center between Boulder and Vail (can't remember the name) last spring;
• Short sleeved wool shrug by Preloved, bought at Cali & Mo in Denver. It is in tones of fir green, rust, and grey, and constructed from recycled pieces of old sweaters - so the sleeves are a chunkier knit in a Fair-Isle pattern, while the bodice has a zigzag pattern and the cleverly folded collar is ribbed. Cali & Mo, more on which later, is an oasis of well-edited vintage and small designer goods in the middle of the most chain-store centric shopping in Denver, the 16th St. Mall. Preloved is a Canadian company that uses recycled fabrics in most of their lines - the line carried by Cali & Mo is Handcut by Preloved, their higher-end line. I also used to find pieces from their regular line at Urban Outfitters on Newbury St. in Boston, but only sporadically.
• Gold heart pendant on gold ball-chain necklace (one of the few heart-motif pieces I own, and one of the few fine jewelry pieces as well - I - and my pocketbook- prefer vintage costume and modern art jewelry), given to me by family friends for my 18th birthday/high school graduation;
• Large faux-tortoise ring with dark green plastic cabochon from Forever 21. Whatever their other shortcomings, I think they have some great, unusual, cheaply priced cocktail rings if you are willing to dig through the dreck;
• Uggs to work, rubber-soled, pumpkin-orange flats from Royal Elastics (Australian sneaker company that makes size 5, online) at work.

Then I took the bus to our friends' house, where my husband was already ensconced in the kitchen preparing our New Year's Eve feast, and I changed into:

• Sweater dress by Preloved, from Cali & Mo (well, when I discovered that they carried the line, they happened to be having a sale!). It is sleeveless, with a deep v-neck (actually, too deep - as with most dresses, I have to take it up a the shoulder for it to fit properly), and a pencil skirt, classic 50's wiggle-dress silouette, but comfy! The bodice is ochre, pale blue, pale gold, grey and tan stripes, while the skirt is all dark chocolate brown, but pieced from parts of different sweaters with various ribbed textures, so that it highlights and contours curves very subtly. I wore the above-mentioned Preloved shrug over top, both to keep my shoulders warm and to cover up the part that needs to be altered, so all you could see of the dress was the dark brown;
• Dark brown tights, I think from my Mom;
• Tan Fluevog Rubini boots;
• Olive and moss green Bakelite clamper bracelet, the original GlamaRuth's;
• Vintage earrings - tear drop shaped hanging hoops of Japanned metal (blackened), setting off orange, tomato red, and olive green rhinestones, from EBay.