A contender for best summer uniform

Plus: what makes one good?

Uniforms make getting dressed much easier. A summer uniform has the potential to be more playful than a winter uniform, which is noteworthy because uniforms are rarely associated with playful dressing. By simple virtue of the colors and patterns and textures that summer clothes are frequently rendered in, though, there is more versatility.

And this — versatility — is what makes a summer uniform good.

You want to know: how often can I wear this thing I call a uniform? Under how many circumstances (dinner? Beach? Work?)? Over how many circumstances? (Insert event with implicit or explicit stringent dress code expectation here)?

Can I wear it while drinking a pina colada? When it’s really hot? When it’s really raining? How about breezy? (Ideally, a uniform can accommodate most seasonal weather conditions.) Can the uniform be principally translated into multiple different outfits (e.g. can you recreate the uniform using lots of different garments in your wardrobe)?

Can you style it with flats, with heels, with different kinds of jewelry (bead vibe, gold vibe, pearl vibe, etc)? Will it still look good if your body changes? If your hair’s down? If it’s up? If it’s long, if it’s short, and on.

Last summer, my “uniform” consisted of tiny shorts with shirts or sweaters/jackets-as-shirts or shirts under jackets-as-jackets and mules or fisherman shoes.

It was a nontransferable and limiting choice for a uniform, and I’m glad I didn’t recommend that you adopt it as your own but I think I have an idea that is relatively universal and actually, technically, not at all my idea. Jenny Walton put up this great selfie a couple of weeks ago and I’ve been looking for an a-line, knee-length skirt since then.

Or, I *was* looking for an a-line knee-length skirt — under the guise that this outfit template could be a flexible uniform for summer with:

• its airy short-sleeve button-down, which could be reimagined as a beach cover-up

• and its darling skirt that encourages ventilation.

I started a search on The Real Real, looking for white cotton Prada permutations because I figured that’s probably what Becky Malinsky would tell me to do (in the end, she told me to search Jil Sander) but then after I published the last dressing dispatch on dusting off old dresses and wearing them new ways, I had a eureka moment about taking another old dress —

This is a Prada dress that I got from the French consignment shop/site Re-see a bit over a year ago. It’s styled with a Jil Sander bag (but if you only click one link this newsletter, let it be this bag from Etsy!) and Gabriela Hearst sandals

And layering a short sleeve button down over it, then pairing the combo with flat summer sandals that crucially feature a back strap and don’t cut off the curve on the top of my ankle (shoes that do this often make our legs look shorter).

This shirt is Rebecca Taylor — here is a fancy one from Bode, or this other striped RT one from Nordstrom Rack.

Checks all the boxes for the questions above and lo and behold, a fourth consideration for how to wear an old dress a new way is born in the same breath of that of a new summer uniform. Feels as efficient as child labor to me, which I do not say sarcastically. Will never forget the no.1 thought I had during the first round of contractions when I was giving birth to Madelaur: the contractions ease when you push, and pushing makes the baby/babies come out. So you keep doing the thing that makes you feel good and receive your desired outcome. The process is so well designed.

It (the uniform, not child labor) obviously works just fine with a proper skirt and shirt too, and I do encourage you to consider that a polo could establish the same effect. I’d go for a men’s one because they’re priced better and sized bigger.

Do you have any a-line skirts, pleated or otherwise, or tank dresses (slip dresses or skirts of a slimmer silhouette might be preferred for your body type) with low necklines hanging around that could be repurposed to establish this Milanese vibe I obliterated last Tues when I wrapped my leg against the below traffic pole?

Tombolo shirt (here’s a less conspicuous terrycloth shirt from The Real Real; there are more on sale here), Awake Mode skirt (this could be good with bike shorts under), Rene Caovilla sandals

And some skirts just in case you’re in the market:

From left: Les Reveries’ fringe skirt for $192, Jil Sander’s red cotton guy for $40, Sindiso Khumalo’s blue thing for $278, Carolina Herrera’s orange one for $92, Aje’s white number for $395 (this one from Rebecca Taylor for $295’s good too), Christian Dior’s vintage scribble boats for $55 and wait, also, actually, I’m adding this from The Real Real. Escada florals for $108

Plus shirts if you’re down for that too (could be button-down or maybe a polo — mens ones work well for this):

From left, a Wales Bonner striped shirt, on sale but still $520 for a curved hem in case you choose to wear something straighter or just prefer a bit of shape, a J. Crew mens shirt for $69, a metallic polo for $440, which actually makes me want this more than anything else — and a terry cloth button down for $89. Men’s sale sections are generally a good place to look for one.

IN CONCLUSION, HERE’S YOUR TIP SHEET