THE WORK WEEK 01

Monday: Onboarding Day I Why Are We Here and Where Do We Start?

Welcome to The Work Week, a five-part-series where we try to bring a little light to a topic everyone with an office job needs: Work Wear.

There’ll be a post each day of the Work Week:

Monday: Onboarding Day (Explaining Work Wear and the Issues Around it)
Tuesday: The Work Wear Staples Explained
Wednesday*: Five Style Formulas For Your Summer Work Wardrobe
Thursday*: Inspiration and Style Notes on Workwear
Friday**: Work Wear Workbook (How To Work With Your Own Wardrobe)

*These posts will be free for 48 hours.
**This will be a paid-subscriber-only workbook.

---

WHY WORKWEAR MATTERS

Let me start by saying: It’s your job, not a fashion show. However, you wouldn’t have opened this newsletter if you had no interest in fashion or wouldn’t sense any kind of issue around the topic for yourself. Plus, I am a huge believer in the fact that people will inevitably judge you by your first impression, and a good outfit will help you with your confidence and well-being.
Now, if that isn’t convincing enough - there’s new studies on what researchers call ‘Enclothed Cognition’ that have found that your decisions are also influenced by whether what you’re wearing is making you feel competent or not. My friend Tina brought it up in a recent Style Notes interview and you can also read about it here and here.

“The formality of clothing might not only influence the way others perceive a person, and how people perceive themselves, but could influence decision making in important ways through its influence on processing style.”

So how you dress might lead to better decisions, which might lead to more success at work, which might maybe lead to a pay rise. And if none of these things will happen, you will definitely have more fun getting dressed for work.

WHY WORK WEAR IS SUCH A BIG MATTER FOR YOU

I love Substack for its community and the chatters, frustrations and needs around work wear (especially for summer) have been loud lately.

There has been a bit of a discussion under Emily Urbano’s post on Instagram and the topic came up in one of Anna Newton’s recent Style Clinics.

Why is workwear such a sensitive topic for us then? It’s just clothes, right? Surprise - no, it’s not.

• It’s the workplace. It is about performance. We want to look, feel and think a bit more professional. There’s a a bit more pressure in the air around us than usual, and pressure - as we all know - naturally leads to more insecurities.

• This is connected to the first factor but I think it’s also that people - especially your boss - won’t see all of the work you do. Impression is important. What can’t be seen at your desk or in your inbox, could be transported by your outer appearance.

• You run into an identity conflict at work. There’s a work persona and a weekend persona. No matter how great you get along with your colleagues or how much of ‘yourself’ you can be at work, it’s a. how you pay your rent (= your existence) and b. where a lot of private things, like how good you can dance to your favorite song and how many Chloé designers of the past you can recite simply doesn’t matter. You try your best (to marry two personalities) but you don’t succeed.

• This is mainly for women, I think (sadly), but imposter syndrome doesn’t help either. A lot of us are walking anxiety aliens fuelled by very strong coffee at work. I love this article on the topic, highlighting this issue with young professionals.

CALLING OUT THE ISSUES - AND FINDING SOLUTIONS

From my research for The Work Week and from my own experience, there’s three main issues around workwear - that can be ‘fixed’ or at least cured and improved:

Let’s dive in:

1. Not knowing what to wear in a professional setting: This may be an issue for someone in their first job, for someone who has gone from a creative job to a corporate job or someone who has been working remotely and is going back to the office. I think it helps to start with basics and staples and style a few looks that you wear on repeat, fill gaps where needed and trust the process. And maybe get some help by booking a stylist.

2. Lack of personality in your workwear: This is the most common answer but means different things to different people. So I think personal style formulas help and will become a natural process over time. People with this issue probably need more inspiration (within their own wardrobe and figure out where the gaps are, too). This goes hand in hand with the issue of so many Fashion lovers (Fashion with a capital F). The many missed opportunities to wear those new studded flats when we need to wear boring ‘corporate shoes’!

   

   For me, there are three spectrums of workwear styling and you’ll find yourself at either end or in the middle: classic corporate, personality styling and fashion editorial work wear. The lines are blurry sometimes, but it’s a long way from corporate (think ‘Suits’ and ‘Partners Track’) to ‘The Devil Wears Prada’. Frankly, you don’t want to be too dressed up at work, too. Image sources (left to right: 1 2 3 4 5 6)