How to Style a Polished Nautical Spring/Summer Work Look with 30 Wears: Red Crochet Top

It's definitely been a minute since I shared an item from my wardrobe that has reached the 30 wears mark! I actually have several that have hit that goal since my last post, but with July 4 just around the corner, the time felt right to share a red short-sleeved knit top and the navy and white striped outfit in which it featured last month. As always, a thank you to Mica for inspiring me with her 30 Ways to Wear series.

I purchased this red top and its navy counterpart back in 2017, and both of them have been great options for spring, summer, and fall outfits. I love that they have the comfort and ease of a t-shirt but are prettier, more interesting, and more of a smart casual/business casual alternative. The crochet detailing at the yoke creates nice structure around the shoulders and upper chest, but the floaty fabric below that gives an elegant draping effect. Both the red and navy ones are still in great shape at 30+ wears each...washed in cold water and hung to air dry; that's my secret for extending the life of clothing.

I had discovered earlier in the spring that my thrifted CJ Banks navy work pants (Goodwill, $5.59, 2/2020) were fitting me like a dream this season, so I have been creating outfits using them ever since. Usually I experience the opposite - a well-fitting item doesn't work as well anymore - so when these pants suddenly fit more perfectly, I didn't want to squander the opportunity to wear them! (And no, I have not lost any weight, but I don't know...maybe my weight has shifted around??)

Because these pants have a polished office-appropriate design, I decided to create a red/white/blue nautical spring/summer outfit that would be a bit more elevated and polished than is my norm. Still firmly in the business casual camp, but without as much of the rough-around-the-edges vibe I usually wear. The navy pants, red crochet top, and this thrifted CJ Banks navy/white striped cotton cardigan (Goodwill, $5.99, 12/2018) that is in immaculate condition came together for a great base outfit in a classic style and traditional summer color combination.

OOTD 5/9/24

Continuing in the classic, polished line, I wore these pretty navy flats that always read as dressier than a typical ballet flat but are as comfortable and easy to wear (as opposed to a heeled shoe, which is always less comfortable for me than flats, though I know people vary a lot with what is comfortable in shoes!).

Since the stripes have a seriously nautical feel to them, I doubled down with a lightweight scarf with white anchors against a navy background and a red stripe down the edge. I tied the scarf using genuinely easy method #5 (loop with ends brought through) from this post.

OK, despite this being a "polished" look, I simply couldn't resist wearing one of my many red and navy paper bead bracelet sets as the basis of my daily bracelet stack. This set is unusual in that it has five paper bead bracelets: 3 with 1" bicones, 1 with 0.5" tubes, and 1 with 0.5" bicones. The paper beads are rather skinny in this set, measuring from 3.5-5mm around. I finished off the stack with a striped red bead bracelet and a navy/red bead bracelet. For a truly polished and classy accessory, a simple silver bracelet would be hard to beat, but I liked the more organic, laid-back, colorful handmade bracelets in this outfit for my own style.

If you look closely, you'll see that the red tube beads in the third bracelet do not all have the exact same pattern! That's because I used these three different small images from catalogs in making the beads. I didn't have enough of any one of them for a full bracelet, but because they had the same colors and a general navy-and-white-on-red look, I decided to make the three different beads and combine them for my bracelet. Print mixing meets making do at its finest, haha! Tube beads are great to make because you can make a small bit of paper go a long way by adding your "nice" paper to the end of boring paper, since only the end part will show when the bead is rolled. {stretch bracelet tutorial} {bicone paper bead tutorial} {tube paper bead tutorial}

Y'all know that truly polished hair and make-up are well beyond my capabilities, but I did up my game a bit here! I added some smoothing product to my hair and brushed it out so it is straight-ish, relatively speaking. (The product also made my hair look a bit darker, which created more value contrast between my hair and skin, which wasn't a bad idea given the high value contrast of the white and navy stripes.) My make-up is still very minimal, but I did wear a bit of foundation, powder, and (fittingy for the color palette) red lipstick. Of course the pièce de résistance is the DIY anchor charm earrings! 3 beads in my color palette on a stick plus a charm that echoes the motif of the scarf and voila, perfection. This may not be the most polished choice but it's definitely a well-coordinated one!

So that outfit was actually the 31st wear of my red crochet top. Number 30 was this black, white, and rabbit-y outfit that I shared in the introduction to my 7 color capsule wardrobe post, worn at the end of last summer.

30th wear: OOTD 9/21/23

Here are some previous OOTD featuring the red crochet top from the spring and summer seasons. I tend to wear the red with navy/denim or black neutrals, but I do sometimes mix it with accent colors in the Green or Blue-Green families of the color wheel as well. The top works alone or layered and untucked, partially tucked, or even fully tucked.

OOTD 8/1/19

OOTD 7/4/21

OOTD 9/26/21

OOTD 8/28/19

OOTD 8/2/21

OOTD 7/7/22

Do you ever experience something in your closet suddenly fitting? Do you find flats or shoes with a heel (perhaps a low heel) more comfortable? Do you ever wear nautical pieces or color combinations in summer? Where are you on the spectrum from Polished to Rough-Around-the-Edges (RATE)? Are you more polished vs RATE for some occasions/seasons than others?

Blogs I link up with are listed here.