October 2014 • Every Day Dress by Rebecca Collins

fun at work

Feeling that there’s a super magical power in a good sweater and a silk scarf. Monday comes and it’s fun at work.

Not wanting to bore you but this cashmere crew has been the total go-to for weeks now, added the silk scarf to at least look more ‘dressed’.

Colleague Erika has it going on, she’s in heels and a jacket. 🙂 We’re in trunk show mode and days can get downright busy.

Her client Suzanne, while she liked the raspberry jacket, really wanted to know more on the scarf, says she has tons and just never really wears them. Showed her how to tie one on, kind of explaining that the less precious it looks and the more kind of effortless, the better. Oh, we have fun at work.

Every day dress, hope you’re all having fun at work this week.

fashion lifestyle

about face

Lots of commentary going around about one of our favorites (maybe Bridget, maybe Renee): thinking that what we all do requires time, money, and choice, and that we, as women, should value that option and leave well enough alone. And, when getting down to the nitty-gritty, why not support (or simply just not critique), what one of us might feel important, or necessary.

Really don’t want to get too deep here, it’s just that I’ve been working with women since the age of eighteen; let’s all feel good in our skin.

We’ve all seen it, sometimes great, sometimes too much, and sometimes you just can’t tell.

Every day dress, about face, keep the faith.

lifestyle

roasted, and baked

Saturday night, all tucked in, going nowhere, and couldn’t be happier. Travel, while great, has me roasted.

To compensate, it’s been all things work and domestic. Brussels sprouts, clipped off with kitchen shears, combined with some olive oil and good old kosher salt, and roasted in the oven. Almost like eating potato chips, ha.

Baked the cookies for the new neighbors, they’ve been here since August, and delivered with, shocker, a bottle of wine, always feeling just a bit behind. 🙂

Every day dress, roasted, and baked.

Thanks everyone for reading. Thinking this might be a good little feel good about what you do blog. Thinking that if you like to dress and you like to cook or even simply like to eat, you might find something of interest here. Everything we all do matters. For those that like numbers, site visits are about 200 per day, so you all out there, small group and couldn’t be happier, seem to keep coming back. Thank you.

Have a great and safe weekend. xo

food

sometimes sneakers

In being real, sometimes you find yourself doing the runaround wearing sneakers. Maybe you even have great new boots for the season yet your day’s activities might call for lots of movement. So, sometimes sneakers it is.

Simply make sure you pair them with real clothes and leave those other pants, you know which ones, in the bag. They should be fresh, too, those old running shoes with the wide stable bottom won’t look as clean.

Every day dress doing the runaround last weekend in Boston MA. Same sweater and jacket and jeans as seen all season, pairing them up differently and together, keeping things easy.

Sneakers | Nike

Sweater Jacket Belt | Worth New York

Tank | Helmut Lang

fashion

lulu, in provence

In keeping with the kind of dress and cook thing, had the divine pleasure of meeting Madame Lucien Peyraud, Lulu, last month, while wine tasting in Bandol, France.

She has cooked for family and friends for well over fifty years, at Domaine Tempier Vineyard. Better yet, she’s blended marriage and kids and cooking and working and loving and even sailing all together to create a wonderfully rich life. Husband and I stopped in on our exact 27th wedding anniversary and without saying a word her daughter called her in from the back room to sign the only English cookbook on the premises. And, she was dressed in a dress. 🙂

Lulu’s Provencçal Table, by Richard Olney with foreword by Alice Waters, (the woman who really kind of introduced me to great good food some seventeen years ago at Chez Panisse), is a sweet little keeper of food and lore all taking place in the beautiful French countryside.

Lulu in Provence, you make my heart sing.

Every day dress, dress and cook, continues. For the record, wore a has seen many seasons Roberto Cavalli dress. Nothing like a good throw-on.

fashion lifestyle travel

dress and cook

Kind of at a blogging standstill so decided to just jump right back in with the things I seem to do best: dress and cook. Simple they may be but they both move us all through the day.

Yesterday for an off-site client meeting wore the few new things that have been added to the rotation: sweater, scarf, bag. Pretty standard, especially when paired with black jeans, a bit of the difference being doing the sweater in cashmere and making certain that the jeans are hemmed to a good length. So many of us run around in jeans all day and really by paying attention to the length of your pant your style standard can be instantly upgraded.

Dinner was simple oven baked wild cod, pan roasted organic sweet grape tomatoes, blanched and then sautéed green beans. Salad and bread on the side and dinner done. No cookbook, no google search, no recipes needed.

Not going for any fashion or food empire here, intent is to inspire the women (and men) that matter to me to do small things every day that make their days better.

Every day dress, dress and cook. xoxo

fashion food

bring it home

Haven’t posted since last week Saturday, busy week. Two weeks in France can set you back a bit, no complaints.

Travel abroad teaches so much. Always fun to bring it home. Tonight’s dinner snapped on the iPhone made from last weekends ham for the dozen or so teenaged girls for a Sunday morning post football game sleepover. Ham and Lentil Soup and Grilled Gruyère Sandwiches on days old sliced crusty bread. Anything I read about French cooking tells me that they never waste a thing, use everything to everything.

Every day dress, bring it home.

food

dress for dinner

There’s something magical about the shift from day to night: a new chapter, a new beginning, another coming together.

To mark the transition, it’s always nice to dress for dinner.

You might change everything you wore before or simply light the candles, reapply your lip and (finally) brush your hair, the key being the mind-set to move beyond.

We love to dress for dinner, whatever that may be on any given day.

Photos taken at rented château in I’lsle-sur-la-Sorgue France | Hermès scarf, worn as dress

Every day dress, dress for dinner, wherever you may be. Yeah, photos a little blurry, we were really liking the wine. xoxo

fashion food

sometimes short

Amal Alamuddin, you own sometimes short. Oh my god, those legs! How do you look like that? Your wedding weekend ensembles to Mr. George Clooney, superlatively exquisite.

Your combination of brains, beauty, style, total triple play. Wishing you and yours endless years of happiness.

Loved everything about your Venice wardrobe, late September. Fashion royalty.

Here is what was going on with the every day, late September, in Provence: a simple silk dress picked up for 60€, market day, and probably plus thirty pounds. Balanced it out with flat quilted Dior boots. For the every day, just like you, if we dare, never really want to show too much skin, all at once.