Keep your cash; reinvent your closet

 

This summer, I built an entirely new winter wardrobe for about twenty dollars. If you are a college student on a budget, it can be hard to re-make your wardrobe. However, if you are like me, you may enjoy dressing nice, and sometimes re-doing your wardrobe is important.

Here are some tips to help you follow all the great trends and still have a bit of change in your pocket.

Styles come back: You know what’s big right now? Big, comfy sweaters with fall colors and crazy prints. You know where you can find a lot of sweaters like this? Old ladies’ garage sales, or your grandma’s closet. I’m not even kidding. I visited a garage sale across from my house every Saturday this summer. There, I found some of the best sweaters that looked exactly like what they’re wearing on the cover of vogue. And rather than spending $30 a sweater, I bought five for six dollars.

Check out your parents’ storage. Odds are your mom may still have a pair of high waist pants, which are slowly coming back into style. Don’t automatically dismiss a piece of cheap or free clothing by saying, “that’s so eighties.” A style will come back around.

Speaking of garage sales: Chadron has about twenty garage sales every Saturday. Yes, I’m hyperbolizing, but there are a lot of places to check out. The next time you get the itch to go shopping, drive around town to check out what kind of garage sales you can find rather than hitting up Wal-Mart. Besides being dirt cheap, the best part of checking out garage sales is that you probably won’t see anyone else with the same clothes as you.

Shop in your own closet: “I love the idea of re-purposing or recycling garments, sew your own garments if you can,” Yvonne Moody, professor of Family and Consumer Sciences said. Not everyone has access to a sewing machine, nor does everyone know how to use one, but there are easy ways to re-make clothes without sewing.

It’s easy to take a shirt, cut the arms off, tie it in the back, and come up with a cute blouse. Even better, if you have shirts, pants, or skirts you don’t use, you can easily dye or
bleach them.

You can also splurge on things that would spice up your wardrobe. By adding a jacket or a piece of nice jewelry to a T-shirt, you can completely re-make something you might never have worn otherwise. Scarves – or great jewelry – jackets or sweaters can build a whole new look for some of your summer clothing and stretch it into another season.

Shop at the end of a season: Right now, you’ll probably find a swimsuit for about 10 bucks. At the end of winter, you might find a nice winter coat for 75 percent off.

Shopping at the end of a season provides you with great deals that you can put aside for the next year. Maybe you can’t wear it right away, but you have something to look forward to for the next year.

Avoid shopping as therapy: “I just got broken up with.” “I just finished a really difficult paper.” “My friend is being catty on Facebook.” File these under really bad reasons to go shopping.

“If you are shopping as emotional therapy, costly mistakes can be made,” said Moody. Don’t throw away money on clothes you won’t wear often just because you’re not having a good day.