Oldies but Goodies

Last week, I mentioned that my Tuesday schedule is killer.  I teach three classes - one of which is a 4 hour evening class - and hold office hours, so I'm on campus for more than 12 hours straight, all told.  While my upper level class is intellectually invigorating, by the time I leave campus I am exhausted.  Since the new term is still young, I'm still trying to bring my best sartorial game to campus, but I know I need to be dressed for comfort on Tuesdays.  Yesterday I chose an old standby and an even older old standby.¹

 1. Dress - Rabbit Rabbit (remixed)

Jacket - Vision Apparel (remixed)

Black Tights (remixed) & Amethyst Tights (last purchase before GAAD) - We Love Colors

Shoes - r2 (remixed)

Necklace - Etsy (gift and remixed)

Regular readers of our little part of Style Nation will recognize this dress.  I've worn it for the last 30x30 challenge, I wore it for the first day of the fall semester, and for the first day of the winter semester last year (and many times in between).  This tweedy jacket, though, I've only worn on the blog once or twice.  It is an old, but lately neglected, friend.  I've had it since 2004, and wore it constantly during the fall of 2004 and the spring of 2005.  It used to make me feel very scholarly to wear it with jeans, while riding my bike to campus, when I was in graduate school.  When I gained weight while living abroad from 2006 to 2007, it fell out of my closet rotation, and even after I took off (most of) the weight in 2008, for some reason it just didn't become a regularly worn piece again.  I really don't know why.  I still love this little jacket, and vow to try to wear it more over the next few months.

Do you have any pieces in your closet that connote scholar to you?  Do you have any long-lost closet friends that you think you should work back into your regular rotation?

Jeans, Blazers, and Qualitative Evidence

Last Wednesday I ended 10 days of wearing pink for the Blogging for Breast Cancer AWEARness challenge, (I only managed to get outfit photos of 7) with jeans, blazer, and loafers.  I felt a little bit like one of my favorite undergraduate professors and one of my dissertation committee members.  Both men almost always wear jeans, a button down, and a blazer and bike to campus even in the ice and snow.  Because of them I tend to think of the jeans and blazer combination as one variation on the quintessentially scholarly look. 

 Jeans - Express (remixed), Blouse - BCBG (remixed), Blazer - Rafaella (remixed), Bonnie Loafers - John Fluevog (remixed), Purse - Nine West (remixed), Sunnies - Vera Wang (via the Wang Stork and remixed)

This was only the second time I had worn jeans into campus this semester.  (The first was for an 8am Friday morning department meeting, and half of my colleagues were in jeans for it.)  I do wear jeans in the classroom, but, since I started teaching my own classes several years ago, I usually wait until several weeks into the term.  I also tend to prefer them for days when I'm planning to do more discussion than lecturing in class, which was the plan for last Wednesday.  As a young female academic, I think it's necessary to delineate some of the boundaries between myself and my students.  I wonder if jeans read so casually that they can break some of those barriers down...?  Bailey at least seems to think so.  I offer as completely unscientific qualitative evidence the fact that the moment I walked downstairs in my jeans that morning she jumped up on me uninvited -- usually she doesn't pay any attention to us when we're in the house.

The topic of jeans in the classroom is one that we've visited in the past here on Fashionable Academics, but it's been awhile, and we have many new readers since then.  So I ask: do you wear jeans in the classroom or to your office?  Do your departmental colleagues wear jeans?  If you don't, why not?  Is it because of a dress code or because you think they're too casual for the workplace?  If the latter, why do you read them as too casual for the work place?

Autumn Hues and the Mystery of the Wang Stork

Lately all I have been wanting to wear are neutral colors and autumnal shades, particularly olive and gold.  So when the weather played nice (if a bit windy) today, I donned my favorite fall-ish A-line skirt, an ecru colored blouse, and my olive cardi with gold buttons and hopped on my bike for a ride into campus for office hours and lecturing.

  (Skirt - Anthropologie (thrifted and remixed), Blouse - BCBG (remixed), Tank - New York & Co. (remixed), Cardi - New York & Co. (remixed), Shoes - John Fluevog, Necklace - Etsy (remixed), Ring - Boutique in Salamanca (remixed), Bag - Nine West (remixed), Sunnies - Vera Wang (the Wang Stork)

So these Vera Wang Sunglasses appeared hanging on my mailbox one morning a week or so ago.  I have no clue as to their origin.  Are they a bribe from my student who is one of my neighbors?  Are they a pair of shades that belong to a friend who dropped them?  Are they a mysterious gift from a secret postal admirer?  Did I fill out some survey for which I was rewarded a pair of Vera Wang sunglasses and then forget about it?  Were they dropped by one of my neighbor's visitors only to be mistaken for mine by another neighbor?  I've no friggin' clue.  But when I mentioned this mystery on Facebook, a friend commented that you don't question the Wang Stork.  So thank you, Wang Stork, whomever you work for....

Campus Wear: Teaching v. Non-Teaching Days

I think I tend to dress like a nanny (see below) or a crunchy mom on the days that I go to campus but do not teach.

1. Nanny Wear
Top - Ann Taylor Loft
Cami - Banana Republic
Skinny Cargoes - Ann Taylor Loft
Helmet - Target?

This is what I wore last Wednesday when I rode my bike to campus to do work in the library, attend a 1-hr reading group, and then go to the gym. When I ride my bike it is a bumpy 8-mile round trip ride and requires me to wear a backpack. And when I dress like this I tend not to wear makeup or really do my hair:

2. Scarf - Tie Rack (defuct)
Earrings - Jessica Simpson (ugh: I really want to lie and say I got them at Filene's, but I loved how they imitate the rose windows of stained glass so much that I paid full price at Macy's)
Hair - Brushed and still drying

On the day I wore this outfit I did run into a student whose friend thought I was an undergrad.  Then I attended a reading group, where I may have irritated an emeritus professor when, discussing modes of taste in philosophy and literature at the time, I recalled my reaction to reading Alexander Pope as an undergrad (why the hell can't this just be in prose?). This is the draw back to looking young and dressing non-professional.  But I didn't feel like jamming my backpack full of a professional-looking outfit just to wear for 5 hours before I go to the gym. I'm fine with changing on days that I teach, but on library days I'd rather just bring a single outfit (plus gym clothes).

Compare to today, where I tried on multiple outfits and finally settled on The Most Versatile Dress I've Ever Owned:

3. Dress - Anthro/Corey Lynn Calter
Cardi - Anthro/Sparrow (gifted - thanks Mom!)
Scarf - H & M
Legs - Bare (all hose had run!)

This shot was horrible, but I uploaded photos to my computer this morning and left without the camera. Here's a shot of the dress alone:
I've worn this dress to a wedding (LHdM's), a rehearsal dinner, my exam defense, a conference, and countless times to teach in. It dresses up or down and is one of the most season-less, flattering fits ever. I love pairing it with red, gold, maroon, purple, green, and teal. Today I went with black and maroon.

4. Earrings - Anthro
Hair - Done

It doesn't take a lot for me to look put-together, but a little effort really does make a difference. And although what I wear does not actually reflect how much knowledge I have on a subject or how much time I spent lesson planning, I would be a fool not to acknowledge that there is a general perception that correlates scholastic readiness with sartorial readiness.

5. Shoes - Indigo by Clarks
Wine Rack - Not full :(

Giving my Belts a Break

Typically I am a belting addict, but last Wednesday I felt like giving my belts a little break from their regular duty.  Since I've been biking to campus whenever the weather nice and it was a beautiful sunny day in the 70s, I wanted an outfit that wasn't constraining in any way.¹

1. Dress - Rabbit Rabbit (remixed), Cardi - New York & Co. (remixed), Boots - John Fluevog (remixed), Boleyn Necklace - Wendy Brandes (remixed)

I know some people manage to bike in tight fitting wiggle dresses and pencil skirts, but, although I'm perfectly happy biking in heels or tall boots, I've never been one for limiting the range of motion of my legs while riding my bike.  Plus, I'm pretty sure it would result in a pretty serious disaster on the steep hill I have to bike up on my way to campus.

What constraints - practical or of another nature - do you have to deal with while dressing?

Biking and Convocating

I have spent a lot of time this past week either biking to or from campus or in orientation sessions and mixers for new faculty at my university.  On Monday I got a reprieve from orientating, but discovered that my presence was expected at two opening convocation ceremonies.  The institution where I was a visiting faculty member last year was big on academic regalia, and caps and gowns and doctoral hoods were de rigueur for such ceremonies, so I was relieved to learn that I didn't have to find some random gown to wear.*  My chair told me that business/ casual dress was the order of the day for opening convocations here.  So I opted for a dress instead of a gown.¹

1. Dress - BCBG (remixed), Tank - H&M (remixed), Shoes - Mia (remixed), Necklace - Boutique in Murano, Italy, Purse - Nine West (remixed)

I have been loving riding my bike to campus.  Admittedly, I have to arm myself with a comb to combat helmet hair and pettipants to combat the flashing of colleagues and students, and I have to pedal up a couple of sizeable hills.  However, it's all worth it when I fly down the biggest hill on my way home!

* I refuse to buy the gown and hood from my doctoral granting institution until either my husband or I have a tenure-track job because it is almost $1000 -- in other words, it costs more than my wedding gown.  Have you ever bought a cap/hood and gown?  How much did it cost you?