Style Tip #259: Just Because It Looks Good Doesn't Mean It Will

More than half the time, the individual articles of clothing we're wearing are perfectly fine, wearable pieces. The only problem is that when they come together, it's like mixing lamb and chicken into lobster bisque. It just doesn't work. But I'm no chef, so correct me if I'm wrong.








Many of us have had a time when we've entered a store and we see a pair of shoes that look so good that we just cannot not buy them. I had one such moment last night where the choice was between a classic pair of dark brown lace-up loafers and on the other hand, a very beautifully constructed pair of boat shoes in a shade between cream and light brown. 




To cut a medium-length story short, I chose the dark brown lace-up loafers. Why? Had I gone with my love-at-first-sight intuition and selected the boat shoes, I would have ended up with a very nice, but very impractical purchase. 


Let me explain.




Many a time when selecting a purchase, we tend to choose an article for how it looks on its own. We fail to realize that dressing doesn't just consist of wearing a pair of beautiful shoes and nothing else. By failing to do so, we forget to consider one very important factor when it comes to good dress-sense: outfit co-ordination.

Dark brown leather loafers, on their own, may look like the plainest pair of shoes made by the plainest shoemaker in the plainest corner of plain-et Earth... but when you pair them with a fitted light blue shirt, a good leather belt and white fitted shorts, the formerly modest pair of loafers joins forces with the rest of the ensemble and the entirety morphs into an extremely elegant, put-together weekend look. 










On the other hand, if I had chosen the boat shoes, I would have on my hands right now a specimen that would be very pleasing to the eye. But the merit of the shoes would end there - frankly because I would have nothing much to pair the shoes with. If outfits were NBA teams, great outfits would be the Spurs - a team with complementary players who work together to get the job done, and not the Lakers - a team that lives on the strength of one Kobe Bryant. 

"It's aight team, I got this"

Rather than being the result of a single article of clothing, a nice outfit is the fruit of the co-ordination of several key components - a pair of great shoes, a winning shirt-trouser combination, a belt that isn't out of place and a nice watch as the cherry on the cake. 










That being said, it's also not true that we should never allow ourselves the freedom of clothing experimentation - if you have more than a few bucks to spare, splurge on that funky belt you've always wanted, go for that pair of quirky brogues your mother warned you about... but if you're looking to assemble a wardrobe that will serve you long time, you can never go wrong by starting with the classics.