Shop your closet first

The best styling session I ever had with a client involved buying nothing.

Before I shop for anyone, we shop what's already hanging there. It's the fastest, cheapest win available, and it's where I hear the same sentence in almost every closet: I would have never thought to put this together.

That's not magic. It's just that you've seen that blouse on that hanger next to that same cardigan for three years, and your brain filed it under "work shirt" and closed the folder.

A gap is not "I want something new"

Only after we've pulled every real outfit out of what you own do I look for gaps. And a gap is not a craving: it's a hole that's blocking three outfits from existing.

The pieces that close the most gaps are boring, and I mean that as a compliment:

• A quality white tee. Not a pack of three. One that holds its shape and isn't sheer.
• A perfect black blazer. It has to fit your shoulders. Everything else can be tailored; shoulders can't.
• A versatile sneaker. One that works with denim and with a dress, so you stop buying a shoe per outfit.

None of those are trends. Trends are fine, they're seasoning. These are the meal.

The part that surprises people

Buy in that order and something quiet happens: you shop less. One client told me she now wears everything in her closet and doesn't shop as much, because she finally knows what she has.

That's the goal. I'm not trying to give you more clothes. I'm trying to stop the panic buying at 11pm because you have "nothing" for Saturday.

Shop your closet first. Fill the gaps second. Buy the trend third, if at all.