I’ll be honest – it was mother nature’s mocking of me last summer that finally pushed me over the edge and changed how I thought about dressing with extreme minimalism. If you remember from previous chapters I love mixing few staples to make outfits that work for whatever occasions come up that day, but British weather laughed at that approach. Emma’s (remember her, the one who doesn’t understand my tiny closet?) cousin was getting married in the Cotswolds over the summer.
Reception was a garden party type thing. Dress nicely but don’t get too crazy with it. I decided on one linen button-up shirt, pair of lightweight wool trousers, leather oxford shoes, and cotton blazer.
Four pieces that I could mix and match to create outfit variations, totally minimalist-approved. Spoiler alert – I’m not built for British summers.
When we showed up it was sunny and hot enough that by eleven AM I was sweating through my linen shirt.
Perfect. Thirty minutes later we’re running from a random hailstorm into a marquee they’d put up just in case. This_was_fine scream-left.
By lunch it decides to be about forty degrees out with high humidity. It wasn’t nice. Fast-forward four seasons in a six-hour day and we had stretched my minimalist approach to its breaking point.
Lesson one – linen holds onto sweat stains and becomes a wrinkled husk as soon as you sit down. Wool trousers are great when its cool but will kill your legs in the sun. Leather soled shoes will suck into dew soaked grass.
All of my favourite summer fabrics were awful. Emma, bless her cotton socks, looked charming and refreshed the entire time. She wore a basic navy dress made from some sort of technical blend, had packed a lightweight cardigan that she tied and untied around her waist several times through the day, and had an “emergency kit” with umbrella, sunglasses, and a thin scarf-like scarf she was constantly twisting around her head when it spit rain. “You Americans,” she told me as I frantically tried to peel my stuck-to-my-back cotton shirt off, “weather is never that predictable where you’re from.” I’ll never forget that weekend.
It completely shattered what I thought I knew about dressing minimally. Clothing-wise, my entire life has been about getting away with the least amount of pieces possible as long as they’re versatile enough to be worn in many situations. If an item can be worn for lots of occasions it only takes up one spot in your closet.
British summers aren’t predictable though, they’re an assault on your carefully curated wardrobe. You need redundant layers, clothing that can be adapted to multiple conditions, options. If something as basic as weather could expose the holes in my “fully optimised” wardrobe than I better understand what I was doing wrong.
Diving back into my new obsession, I learned that pure linens and cottons, my go-tos for summer months, do not do well with erratic weather. Linen looks sharp for all of thirty seconds before it begins creasing and losing its shape. Cotton gets heavy and soggy when it’s humid, drying slowly and feeling uncomfortable for hours.
Neither are ideal for the rapidly changing temperatures you experience with British summers. This led me down the rabbit hole of technical blends. Cotton/tencel feels like a breathable natural fabric but returns to its original form after being creased and dries far faster than plain cotton.
Wool blended with silk sounds ridiculous for summer but is surprisingly effective in a wide range of temperatures. It’s cool when it’s hot, warm when it’s cool, and water-resistant. My enemy, man-made fabrics suddenly seemed like a viable option when viewed through the lens of versatile pieces.
Layering was another issue I had to overcome because at its core layering more pieces goes against my whole “fewer is more” philosophy. Emma explained it to me by telling me you’re not packing more clothes, you’re packing more modules. The cardigan isn’t an extra outfit, it’s another item that works with your current outfit.
Same with the scarf, the blazer, etc. They all have to work with your existing wardrobe but add new options when combined with one another. Purchased a weightless merino wool cardigan that rolled up small enough to fit in my pocket.
Lightweight blazer that’s made of some technical fabric that’s breathable, yet water resistant. Silk pocket square that Emma showed me can double as an emergency scarf or, when you twist it around your head, a headwrap. Sounds ridiculous but it actually works.
Same with shoes. I was a leather sole guy under the assumption they were more “refined.” Not great when your shoes get glued to the ground. Began researching rubber soled shoes that didn’t look like trainers or boots.
Turns out there’s a whole world of shoes with rubber soles but leather-like exteriors that actually grip. Lifesaver. This also meant I started carrying what I like to call my British summer kit.
Compact umbrella, sunglasses, and microfiber cloth I can use to clean raindrops off of glasses or shoes. Goes against my philosophy of never carrying a bag, but again, getting stranded in the pouring rain isn’t being practical, it’s being foolish. Needed to adjust colour pallet as well.
I defaulted to all white and light colours for summer because it’s summer. Everything you wear gets soaked with raindrops that show and absorbs every sweat stain imaginable. Dark colours, meanwhile, feel too heavy and absorb too much heat when it actually decides to shine some sun on us.
Found a nice compromise with navy’s, olive greens, and muted blues. Dark enough to hide the weather, but light enough that you don’t feel like you’re wearing winter clothes. Had another garden party to attend a few weeks later.
Different friend, same landscaping warfare. Packed all of my new “weather ready” modules and hoped for the best. Technical cotton-blend shirt that looked nice but handled moisture wearily.
Wool/Silk blend trousers that adapted to the changing temperatures. Rubber soled shoes I wasn’t terrified would lose all traction. Even my layering wasn’t huge mood swings as I added or removed pieces Joanna could see I put thought into my outfit.
The whole thing was a success. I looked like I actually tried through three different types of weather, plus a short but nasty downpour. Emma was impressed, which I’m gonna be honest was about 50% of my goal there.
All of this comes at a slight cost to my total number of pieces. Cardigan, technical blends, larger colour pallet, added weather kit. I had to increase my summer wardrobe from about fifteen pieces per season to maybe twenty-five.
Not drastic by any means but definitely a leap for someone preaching about cutting down to fifteen. What I learned from this experience is that dressing with extreme minimalism isn’t about reaching a goal number of pieces you “can” get away with. It’s about having only as many as you need to for your lifestyle.
If you live in Cali like I do you can probably get away with way less because weather doesn’t vary as wildly. But if you live somewhere with British summers, or Seattle rain, or Midwestern humidity, you’ll have to dress differently. Your minimal closet will have to change based on what you actually need for your life.
Kind of came to the same conclusion I did with writing code for different browsers. You can’t write one version that works everywhere and expect it to just work. You have to customise your wardrobe for the OS you’ll be running it on.
Emma keeps sending me articles about thinking of clothes as tools, rather than just something you throw on.
Every piece has to justify its existence by being useful, not just looking nice at a weekend brunch. I actually think that takes more discipline than my old way of doing things, pretending like weather wasn’t a thing and hoping for the best.
Still tweaking the system. The techy fabrics are improving but are still much more expensive than your standard cottons and linens. Modular layering still feels like I’m wearing a costume if I’m not careful.
Finding that balance between prepared and over-packier. But guess what? Another garden party is coming up next month.
Actually excited to see if I can weather the storm. Pun. Packed my technical shirt, added layers, weather kit.
Bring on the British “sun.”
