Timeless Fashion: 10 Classic Navy Essentials That Never Go Out of Style / Classic Fashion For Women

Hello everyone. Today I am doing another video in which I'm going to talk about what I would purchase if I was starting over with my wardrobe. Several months ago I did one like that. It was 10 essential classic items for your wardrobe and they were mostly black and white or off-white. In today's video I'm going to be talking about navy which is one of my favorite dark colors. A lot of people don't like black or they don't think black looks good against their skin or they're like me and they love navy as an option to black when they want something a little less harsh. And also navy is a wonderful summer color because it's nautical. This video I'm going to talk about 10 essential navy items. What I would buy if I was starting over and all I had was those first 10 I did several months ago in that video and I want to add to that collection. This is the navy collection. This is the Breton long sleeve striped t-shirt. It was first developed in 1858 for sailors in France and then Coco Chanel saw it and thought it would look wonderful on women and so she introduced it to the female audience and men and women have been wearing this shirt ever since. What's wonderful about this particular one is it is SPF 50. It's guaranteed to protect you against the sun so it's perfect for walking on the beach, boating. It keeps your arms and your torso safe from the sun. The chino pant has been a classic item for both men and women for decades. In my last 10 classic items video I showed you one in a light light beige or khaki color. I love that one year round but I also love to have a navy one as an option to dark wash jeans. Chinos are just a little bit more refined version of a casual pant like a jean. I've got them in several different colors. Just a wonderful option year round. Okay so we have number one which is a Breton long sleeve t-shirt casual and number two which is the navy chino pant also casual. I want to introduce something navy that's dressy into my wardrobe and I found these trousers. So these are my choice for the dressy item. I just think these are gorgeous. These are grade 6A mulberry silk. They're from LilySilk. They have beautiful detailing. They have cuffs on the bottom. These are long trousers. As you can see it has an elasticized waist in the back only. The front waistband is not elasticized. It has pleats and of course the cuffs at the bottom. It has faux bessem pockets. Grade 6A mulberry silk is that wonderful pearly glossy kind of silk that is so luxurious. And the wonderful thing about LilySilk is that the prices are very reasonable. The value is wonderful. If you've never shopped at LilySilk, they have a large selection of clothing. Beautiful blouse selection. It's enormous. They have trousers, jackets, pajamas, sleepwear. They have bedding. They also have accessories. Speaking of accessories, let me show you a belt I ordered. Put my notes away here. And this belt will make a wonderful accessory to go with navy or black. You can see it's black but it blends beautifully with the navy, the indigo navy. And that's what's wonderful about navy is you don't have to have navy accessories. It's fun to have navy accessories and I will be introducing several. But for dressy wear when it comes to navy I often use my black accessories. A black bag, black shoes, a black belt. This belt is as I said all leather. It is a skinny belt. It has beautiful detailing also. Look it has a leather keeper here to keep this from running away. But this will keep your flap from being loose you know when you put it through the buckle. And it also has this beautiful design here that is on the side but slightly to the front. This gold hardware is distinctly gold. I love bright gold hardware. It's my favorite. I love it on my handbags, on my shoes, on belts. So just a lovely pair of pants. LilySilk is sponsoring this section of the video and because of that they are being kind enough to give all of us 12% off any purchase at LilySilk. Or I believe you can save 15% off if you spend over a certain amount. I believe it's $280. If you spend over that amount and use my coupon code, you have to use my coupon code, you will receive 15% off your purchase. Simply click on the link I give you and then when you're checking out use my coupon codes. The wonderful thing about a dressy navy silk trouser like this in this beautiful mulberry silk is they can be worn for a dressy occasion but also for a more casual occasion. Dressy look, put it with a beautiful silk blouse. For a more casual look in the winter, put it with a turtleneck and black boots. In the summer, for a more casual look, put it with a white t-shirt and tall white sandals. Just a beautiful beautiful pair of pants. I absolutely love these. Now I'm going to show you these in white because I want you to see the detail. I ordered a size 6 which is larger than I would normally order but I wanted to make sure I got that looser fit and I thought I could probably get away with it because it's an elasticized waist and sure enough I did. Also LilySilk was kind enough to send me a chart. I will put it on the screen here and you can screenshot it. It gives the inseam measurements, it gives the rise, the rise measurement from here to here and it gives the inseam measurement which is from here to the bottom of the pant so you can make a better decision on which size is the size that would work best for you. I also wanted to show you two items that I'm going to be styling with my navy items at the end of the video. I will put everything together in outfits and that will be at the end of the video. One is this beautiful tie-neck blouse from LilySilk. This is just gorgeous. I have been eyeing this for quite some time and I actually I had it in my shopping cart when LilySilk contacted me about sponsoring this video. So I had already planned on ordering it and it is just a gorgeous blouse. Look at the detailing. You can wear this tie in a variety of ways. I like to wear it actually in a looser bow hanging down but you can wear it up at the neck tied. You can also wear it just loose like this. The detail is just so lovely. It's that gorgeous grade 6A mulberry silk and look at that beautiful pearlescent finish. That is the quality of mulberry silk that is lovely and also I picked out this sumptuous cashmere sweater. Look at this. Their cashmere is so yummy. Let me put this shirt down here. Look how sheer, beautifully sheer it is. This is the best grade worsted cashmere from Mongolia. It's just lovely. Long sleeves. Now this kind of sweater can be worn year-round. I wear this sort of cashmere even in the summer. Not outside but in the evening. It gets so cold in our restaurants. I will throw this over my shoulders that way if I'm freezing in the restaurant I can actually just put it on but often just having it draped over my shoulders is enough. Oh it's just such a gorgeous. Look how lightweight it is. All right we have our casual top which is the Breton stripe top. We have our casual bottom which is the navy chino. We have our dressy bottom which is the silk navy trousers. Now I want another casual item. Summer is coming even though all of these items I'm showing you can be worn year-round. This particular one is especially wonderful in the summer because it is a skirt. This is a navy and white gigum or a check skirt. It is just so comfortable. This is a stretchy cotton so it's easy to move in. It's also not too short but it's not long. It is an A-line design which means it's like an A. It comes out to the sides a bit. An A-line skirt is such a comfortable flattering look on really any figure. If you are hippie like me, even if you don't have hips, either one this type of skirt is easy to fit. You know a pencil skirt can be a little challenging especially if you have a smaller waist and a larger hip like me. So often you have to get skirts altered or trousers altered. This type of skirt I don't find to have to do that. It has real pockets on the front. It has faux besom pockets on the back. Although let me check. No they are actually they are true besom pockets. They're just sewn shut so you can actually open them up and use them. They just have them tacked closed. It also has belt loops so if you want to wear a belt you can. This is such an adorable skirt. I will show it to you at the end of the video styled but you can wear it with kitten heels. You can wear it with flats. It would look adorable with white sneakers, white t-shirt, a navy t-shirt. Just a great skirt. I tend to wear a lot of skirts in the summer because shorts, although comfortable, they're not as dressy as a skirt. They're also not as cool as a skirt. There's nothing restricting you in a skirt like this because it's a stretching material. You can bend up and down in it, go grocery shopping, you know get groceries out of the trunk up and down. It's just a really comfortable but cute skirt and gingham is a timeless timeless pattern. One thing I try to remember when I'm buying a pattern is will this still appeal to me in 10 years or 20 years? Timeless patterns tend to be my favorites because they do. They have a beauty, a timeless quality about them that keeps them wearable and relative to the current times year after year after year and gingham is just one of those. My next item is a must, an absolute must for me in the summer and year round and that is a cardigan. And a cardigan in navy is so timeless. Navy or black but this is all about navy. So we're looking at a navy cardigan here. This is a crew neck style which is up closer to the neck which is the most classic version of a cardigan. It's also a button up meaning there are buttons down the front. Button down means a collar is buttoned to the shirt. So this is called a button up cardigan. This is the classic shape of a cardigan. The seams of the shoulder are not dropped. They are just at a normal position on the shoulder tops. The length is not cropped very short and it's not very long. This is the classic cardigan. It is timeless. It never goes out of style. It comes back occasionally as a hot, trendy item but it never went out of style. That's just what fashion designers do with all classics to try to make you want to buy them because you think they're trendy. But then they push them aside and say they're not trendy anymore because they're trying to sell their new trendy items that are not classics. So whenever anything classic is trending, I pay attention and that's when I often pick up my new classics in a different material or a different color. But believe me, they never go out of style. That is just a marketing tactic that you see influencers using as well as fashion brands and marketing people. It's unfortunately just the way it works but it's nonsense. Classics do not go out of style. So this is the cardigan. I love to wear this multiple ways. I've talked about it multiple times before. I wear it draped over my shoulder or I will button it up and put the arms tied around my shoulder or hanging loosely. I will wear it obviously and have it unbuttoned and open but you can wear it and button just the center buttons or just the top button or button it all the way up and wear it as a jumper or a pullover. Some you can even reverse them and have the buttons down the back. This one might work like that. It's just a timeless wonderful option. You can get them in a variety of materials. This one is a cotton blend but I have multiple cardigans in different colors. I also have a matching shell and that's a nice thing to do is to get a sweater set either in a shell or a matching three-quarter sleeve t-shirt or long sleeve t-shirt that also works beautifully. So I just wouldn't be without a navy cardigan year-round. I mentioned earlier that for accessories when it comes to dressy navy items I like to use black very often if I don't have navy and often I like to use black anyway because black just looks beautiful with navy. I believe in a dressy outfit but me personally when it comes to a casual navy outfit I like to wear either a brown leather belt or a navy belt. One of my favorite belts for casual is a combination of both. It mixes brown leather and navy in a stretch. You can get different kinds of woven stretchy belts. I will link below one similar to this. This one I've had for quite some time. As you can see it's just combining leather with fabric. This is a stretchy cotton blend and gold hardware because I love gold gold hardware. I love wearing this belt with my dark wash jeans and my medium wash jeans. I wear it with white jeans and a navy top. I wear it with navy pants, navy skirts, always for casual though. I do prefer to if I'm going to have a dressy look I will have a leather or a patent leather or a faux leather either black or navy belt. For me it just feels dressier but for casual I love doing the brown leather and navy or just brown leather. Keeping in the casual accessory category I want to talk about shoes. I love ballet flats. I think they are just so feminine, so comfortable, and they work beautifully with casual outfits. I wear them with shorts, I wear them with skirts, chinos, jeans, summer dresses. They're just such a wonderful slim very feminine shoe. Now depending on the manufacturer you can also find them that are very comfortable where they're a cushioned footbed and this happened to be a cushioned footbed. I don't think this particular one is available right now but I did find some cute ones online and I will link to those. You've seen me wear ballet flats a lot. This is another shoe that does not go out of style. You will see it in style or trending often you know and it goes in and out in and out of trending. That doesn't mean it's out of style. It just means they're not pushing that that season. Another shoe I think is an essential is a dressier shoe and I would choose a kitten heel slingback. I've talked about slingbacks a lot on my channel simply because I find them much easier to fit my foot. I think these are also more comfortable because there's not as much rubbing on my heel just a strap and I can adjust it or it's elasticized. You can buy them where they're just elastic so you don't have a buckle. These are I would say a two inch heel. I've had these for quite some time but they are still available so I will link them below. I just think a kitten heel slingback is such a also a feminine shoe. Easy to walk in because of the slight heel it elevates the foot just enough to elongate the leg and just such a ladylike pretty silhouette on the foot. Now for number nine of our 10 classic essentials in navy. That would be a casual handbag. I love handbags as you know and one of my favorite styles is the Longchamp Lupliage. I have this handbag in several different colors and several different sizes. This is the original small. Now this is the brand Longchamp. It is a French luxury leather brand that was established in France in 1948 and in 1993 the CEO of their company came up with this idea called the Lupliage. I believe that means folding in French. This is the Lupliage. It is a handbag. This happens to be the small version that is wonderful for travel because you can fold it up like that but then it opens up into a very nice sized handbag. It is a combination of nylon. This is nylon body and leather and it's a textured leather. Let me show you this up close. In the navy version the hardware is gold which is another reason why I love the navy bag. I love the gold hardware so it has the combination of a top zipper and then a leather flap that goes over it and snaps. So sometimes I will just carry my bags with just the leather flap closed and leave it unzipped. It's up to you and then it's just a very roomy bag inside. Now I like to use a felt insert to give it a bit more shape. I use my Speedy 25 felt insert. It does have a pocket here but I don't use it very much. This nylon is so easy to care for. You just wipe it off. The wonderful thing about Longchamp is the quality but at a reasonable price for luxury. For example this handbag I consider this a luxury handbag because it's $125. For me anything over anything over $100 for me is luxury if it's a handbag because you can easily find handbags that are under that. Now they also have larger sizes. I have the shoulder bag in this Le Pliage original and it is slightly larger even though it's called a small. They have many different sizes, many different colors. You can also sometimes find navy with navy leather. It just depends. Every store that carries the Le Pliage gets different colors. Another great version of this bag is actually a crossbody. They have a design your own Le Pliage. I believe that's about $300. It's slightly smaller but you get to choose the hardware you want to use, the color of the leather. The choice is this brown, black, or white. Of course the color of the nylon. You can also have it monogrammed and it comes with a shoulder strap that's also long enough to be crossbody. Number 10 on my list is a dressy navy handbag. This happens to be the one that I have. I've, my goodness, I've had this handbag for probably also about 10 years. When I purchased it I purchased it also with a matching belt so that I had the same texture and the same color of navy to go with it. And I use this so much but I don't use it with just navy. I use it with gray. I use it with white. Just a wonderful bag. This is by Salvatore Ferragamo. It is their classic Vera bow bag. I love Salvatore Ferragamo and I love their Vera bag and their Vera shoes. This is another luxury leather goods brand that has more reasonable luxury prices. You know Louis Vuitton or Chanel or Hermes are so much more money but they're really not better made. This is a beautiful handbag. Ferragamo makes gorgeous handbags. I have several of their styles. I also have a shawl by them I showed you. Several pink items I bought from them. I have their shoes. Just a gorgeous gorgeous line of handbags and shoes. They use textured leather on this bag and the bow is fabric and the hardware is distinctly gold which I love. And this I wear it cross body or I wear it shoulder and if I want to wear it as a top handle I just do this. This small Ferragamo Vera bag is not available right now in navy blue but I did find the larger size in black, in brown, in light beige. I also found the Vera bow bag in a shoulder bag in a smaller size like mine in light beige, in a dark brown, also in black. I also found navy bags that are less expensive just as pretty. One in navy that's a top handle bag. One that is a faux raffia bag and a clutch and another one that is a clutch or a shoulder bag made of navy crystals. I will link everything down below. So that is my 10th and final item. I hope you enjoyed my list. If you think you would do something different I would love to know. Please leave a comment down below or on my blog or on Instagram. I'd like to know what you would put together if you were putting together 10 navy items or maybe you would pick a different color. Maybe you'd choose 10 items in another dark color. Please let me know. I'm sure everybody else would want to know too. We're all learning from each other all the time. I will list everything I showed you in the description box below. I will also put it in the comments section below this video and I'll put it all on my blog with links. Coming up next are my outfits. Thank you so much for watching my video and I will talk to you in my next one. Bye!