Online Style Party: How I Wear My... Red

Jill of Everything Just So and Adrienne of The Rich Life on a Budget co-host what I call an "online party" on a monthly basis. I learned about it just recently, and absolutely admired the idea (one of my favorites is How I Wear My Animal Print from October 2013). It is inspiring to see so many wonderful women around the world doing fun stuff with their personal style! The theme of December was How I Wear My Red, and I've decided to participate for the first time. Please take a look at all the photographs at both Jill's and Adrienne's blogs:

How I Wear My Red at Everything Just So

and

How I Wear My Red at The Rich Life.

I did not used to have many "red" red garments in my wardrobe - the "red" red seemed loud, overwhelming and not really "me". For years. But I still had a few favorite pieces, even years ago. As some of my readers have already noticed, I love including my old pictures (which were still taken with a film camera! :) to my posts. You can find all of such posts under the label Before The Beginning. My blog is one of the ways I learn about myself, and having both current and old photos of myself in the same post is one of the most helpful tools on the journey of getting to know oneself better. So here are a couple of quite old photographs of my red outfits, both are from 1999 (I was 26 years old and lived in Russia):

The red jumpsuit featuring an American armhole was tailor-made. Summer 1999. Krasnoyarsk, Russia

This jumpsuit was one of my all time favorite garments to wear! It was tailor made for me, and had such a wonderful feature as what we call "американская пройма" (American armhole) in Russian. I read that this deep open kind of armhole became popular in 1950s after Marilyn Monroe showed up in a dress featured it in The Seven Year Itch (1955). 

My jumpsuit neck and arm lines looked very similar to this dress' neck and arm lines (including the long zipper on the back):

Picture from Welltex.ru - a classic dress!

I also wanted to have extra wide (palazzo style) pants, but that did not happen, and I can't remember whether it was due to fabric limitations or suggestions (or misunderstandings) of my tailor. I know I loved the jumpsuit - it made me feel very "me" in so many ways - and one of the me things about it was the tribal pattern in red color. I would wear it today too!

Another very beloved garment was this deep red dress which I made all by myself using a Burda Moden pattern. This dress became somewhat famous - in the newspaper where I worked for many years before immigrating to the US, we did not have a strict dress code, and I used to wear my fancy dresses when I had a special occasion after work (I lived too far away from my work to get back home and change into a fancy outfit). So my coworkers always knew that I had something special going on in the evening when I showed up in this red dress. They started calling it "театральное платье" (a theater dress) since I used to go out to see plays and concerts a lot!

Red "theater" dress was made by me using a Burda Moden pattern. Fall 1999. Krasnoyarsk Concert Hall, Russia

Now back to these days! :)

I actually started wearing more red when I turned 40 (including red lipstick - I wrote about it in this post featuring my boiled wool red jacket by Chico's). I do not think it is about age though - I just think that I started listening to myself more carefully and experimenting with colors much more.

I realized that I suddenly have a lot of reds in my wardrobe nowadays, such as these to name a few:

Red cropped jeans

Red purse for a pop of color - along with red lipstick and red nail polish:

Red mohair ruana on a blustery day:

Red tights with a snake skin print - something I wouldn't do in a million years when I was younger! ;) And red (faux) leather jacket for that matter!

A comfortably casual and yet very sensual red maxi dress:

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention a wonderful red wool coat by Michael Kors which I wore about 4 or 5 years ago, but had to return it (don't do it very often - I usually keep clothes for ages, even if I don't wear them any more). Justin loved this coat so much! I will have to find another great read coat if not for me, then just for him. :)

Wait a minute! And what about my wedding dress? I have to mention my lovely red wedding dress by Ann Taylor (Loft?). We did not have much when we got married. We were poorer than church mice back then. But we had each other and Anna, and my red dress, and our lovely neighbor Janice made the most beautiful flower arrangements for me and my daughter, and there we were - much happiness!!

Hey, that is almost my life story here in a story of just one color! Yes, red is definitely a wonderful color for me! :)