Clo.Outfit: And We're Back!

November has been a month of events! Big, happy, sad and crazy events! We moved into a new apartment, we celebrated our 2nd anniversary, said farewell to a good friend, partied out like there was no tomorrow and now excitedly step into the last month of the year.

Here is an outfit I wore on our 2nd anniversary... Last year, for our first anniversary, I wore a dress and this year I wanted to try on something different. I wanted to incorporated reds/pinks into the outfit and dug up this old silk shirt. I always keep a bunch of satin ribbons on hand. These are like instant belts, bracelets, hair ties etc. The boots I'm wearing are one of my Fall favorites. I love the color, the contrast tan piping and the shearling lining. We went to this really awesome vegan/vegetarian place called Dirt Candy and LOVED it! I will be doing a post on it for "foo" soon, so stay tuned!

About the back drop: It was raining cats and dogs outside so we decided to take the photos inside the lobby of our new apartment. More on the apartment and my DIYs coming soon too!!!

What I'm wearing:

Blouse: Allen Solly; Silk; Bought in Hyderabad 7 years back

Belt: Red satin ribbon tied as a belt

High Waisted Shorts: H&M

Tights: Uniqlo

Boots: Endless.com; Vegan

Lipstick: Bite Beauty; Natural. I blogged about this lipstick before here

The shoes got a little wet from walking in the rain

Clo.Chat: Towards a Sustainable and Natural Cosmetics Kit

Get a cup of coffee or tea or whatever it is that you prefer. Settle down and read on.... this one's a long post.

Today evening I lined up all the cosmetics/personal care products I own. Then I counted them all. The count? More than 60 products! Can you believe it? I sure as hell can't. I never thought I owned these many especially since I use about 10 of these regularly and maybe 10 more occasionally. That's about 20 products, which means I own about 40 more products I don't really use.

How did I end up with so many?

• Bought a bunch of products to try for hair/face to find "the one" (rendering the ones that are not, useless)
• Freebies/Samples (Who doesn't love free stuff?)
• Impulse purchases (Oooh, look that shade matches the dress I'm wearing tonight; ka-ching)
• Very old stuff still lurking around eating up space (For supposed future use; useless hope!)

I'm curious though, is it me or do you also find yourself surrounded by so much stuff you don't use!?

These are all the reasons I could come up with to make my cosmetics/personal care products kit more sustainable:

1. In this post, I found that my leading brand hair care product has high hazard toxins it. Applying that same calculation to the my entire collection means x50 the chemicals I'm inputting into my system!  
2. Cosmetics and personal care products have a shelf life and it is really not a good idea to use them beyond that period. Read more here.
3. I live in a 400sft apartment with my husband. I really don't have the luxury of space to keep the stuff I don't use.
4. I'm moving towards using only natural and vegan products; So cleaning up and getting rid of all the synthetic and chemical products means I can add natural products to my portfolio as needed.

Now all of this is nice and dandy. Here is my question: How to apply the three R's (Reduce, Reuse and Recycle) to the cosmetics/personal care products? I've jotted down what I came up with below. I'd appreciate your ideas/suggestions/advice.

Step 1: Put a breaker on the buying for a while. Fix the current mess, then you can do some need-based shopping
Step 2: Reuse, reuse, reuse. I read somewhere that someone mixed blush to white paint to give it that faint pink color - some innovation huh!

• Use old shampoos and conditioners to clean up combs and brushes. Apparently, conditioner makes for a great shaving cream! More tips here
• Look at the number of nail polishes I own! I'm seriously planning to setup a Nail polish swap:  A group of friends get together, buy natural, chemical free polishes in different colors and exchange them! You get to try different colors and  it will cost less. Interested friends in NYC, ping me!
• Still trying to come up with good reuse for hair styling products (curl products) - Any ideas??

Step 3: Recycle the empty bottles. Many times you can recycle cosmetic packaging curbside but a lot of this packaging is made up of plastic#5 which is often left out of curbside recycling initiatives. Fret not, many companies have come up with cosmetic packing recycling initiatives such as Origins (accepts all types of packing irrespective of brand), Back to M.A.C (accepts only MAC products) etc.
Step 4: Buy Less!!!
Step 5: Buy natural and organic products. Safe for the body and the earth (couldn't resist the cliche)

In summary,

So I'm going to clean up my kit and will keep you posted on the updates.

...and now friend, if you have read through this entire post, I owe you a brownie to go with that coffee or tea or whatever that is that you are drinking.

Clo.Outfit: Work With What You've Got!

Unfortunately, the only eco-conscious piece in this entire outfit are the red peep toes. I wish 

I had made a switch to ethical/sustainable fashion sooner, oh well, a start is a start. 

But this really got me thinking about how I should go about converting my wardrobe from chic to eco-chic.  Well, the easier, non-sustainable and not to mention expensive way would be to start buying eco-conscious clothes. But that defeats the purpose of living a sustainable life!

Why buy when there is no need?  It's like buying an organic, locally grown apple instead of an imported apple when you are not hungry; In the end, both will rot! Hence, this day forward, I have decided on the following two things:

1. I plan on not shopping for clothes anymore until I feel the ABSOLUTE need for it. (say my winter jacket is torn to shreds and I can't wear it anymore - such absoluteness is what I'm referring to) and I will blog about it when (and if) I do shop.
2. And when I do make another purchase, it will be form a brand that follows ethical standards and makes sustainable/ eco-conscious goods.

Until then, the idea is to use what I have in my wardrobe to churn out unique yet fashionable outfits.

Work with what you've got.... is the new mantra :)

The outfit:

K gave me tickets to the Broadway show Wicked for my birthday and we watched it this week. The show was AMAZING! Very clever and such great performances. I like dressing up for Broadway shows and wanted a fun semi-formal look. So here is what I went with:

Shoes: Melissa (vegan, ethical)

Tights: sockdreams

Denim skirt: too old to remember

Sequin tube top: Bought 5 years ago in Hyderabad, India

Jacket: Romeo + Juliet Couture

Hat: H&M

Felt ball necklace: Holiday pop-up store (I'm still trying to remember the name)

Bicycle necklace: the bike was gift for my birthday, I added the chain

Plastic Watch: SF MOMA

Makeup: Korres and Tarte (All natural products)

Wish me luck!!

Clo.Lips: Love wine? You'll love this (natural) lipstick

That's right! Bite Beauty - a Canadian brand founded by Susanne Langmuir carries a line of 21 lip products. These high pigment products are based on an all natural recipe with a powerful antioxidant (read Resveratrol) equivalent to 5 glasses of red wine(!!), natural shea butters and organic fruit. No more  parabens, sulfates or other petro chemicals and synthetic dyes in my lipstick!

Now, I can take it easy and wet my lips and not worry about chemicals :)… and while we are on the subject: do you also wet your lips while wearing lipstick ? I can't stop doing  it :(

I'm wearing TANIN rouge crème.

Get them here: Sephora