bold minimalist

ately I've been all about brights.  I'm sure it has something to do with the bright and sunny skies.  I used to heavily tend towards maximalist, more vintage 70's colors and patterns, and over the years I've come to appreciate and love a more modern, clean look.  In my home decor I've found that I really am liking that look simply because it feels cleaner.  Just the other day we took a bunch of older vintage furniture with that maximalist color/pattern to donate to the thrift store and the clean slate has me so excited to redo one of the rooms in our house that's been relatively untouched since we bought it.  Just having the space nearly empty has my brain working overtime with new ideas.  
When we bought the house we brought over all our existing furniture, but we were coming from a tiny house with just one living space that functioned as our living/dining/office space, so we only had enough furniture to fill a 12x12 room, plus our bed.  I frantically sought out the cheapest thrift store furniture so we could have stuff to sit on and eat at, but in the months/year since, I've had time (and money) to invest in the furniture that I really would like.  I think this thrift store donation purged the last of the desperation furniture and I'm excited at the prospect of creating a couple spaces that really fulfill our needs and aesthetic wants.

 

dress/courtesy of isla :: bra/free people :: necklace/courtesy of adorn by sarah lewis bag/courtesy of fossil :: shoes/courtesy of lulu's :: shades/courtesy of bonlook
Yesterday morning when I woke up it was chilly.  I threw on some jeans and a sweater and headed out to run errands and brought Dusty in the car with me.  She loves car rides, but I haven't brought her with me lately because she'd probably overheat just driving around in the car since I don't have A/C at the moment.  By 1pm the weather had started clearing up and with the sun coming out came the heat, but luckily my morning errands included picking up a package which had this dress inside.  It's so light and airy and I immediately threw it on and it was the perfect outfit for the summer weather.
This black bra was a gift to myself (along with another similar bra and a necklace) and I'd been searching for the perfect outfit to highlight it's awesome straps.  As soon as I pulled the dress out of the envelope I knew that bra would go perfectly with it.  I think that this dress' silhouette would definitely be something I'd shy away from a few years ago.  I knew that the fit-and-flare style worked well with my body shape and I was pretty into that vintage 50's style, so something like this would've been well outside of my personal style (and comfort zone).  I love feeling more free to try out new shapes and silhouettes these days.  Back then, just wearing dresses was still a bit outside of the comfort zone I'd established over many years of wearing jeans and little boys' tees, so I wasn't really ready to start messing around with silhouettes yet.  I'm not sure if this shape is called "flattering" by others, but it makes me feel awesome, so that means it's flattering in my book!