228/ 13 Minimal Effort, Elevated Casual Summer Outfits

Dear readers,

This letter began as a follow-up to my article, I Put 21 Minimal Effort Casual Outfits Together In Under An Hour, which I wrote in 2023. I still love those outfits and still own most of the pieces featured. But, I realized that while I’d have no problem wearing those outfits when I return to Toronto tomorrow,1 they feel a little too casual for Paris — at least for me.

The challenge became, what “minimal effort casual” outfits could I put together that felt elevated enough for how I like to dress here?

To me, “minimal effort” means just a top and bottom with no third piece, and little to no styling required. What that in mind, I put together 13 outfits following the same principles in my original article, which you’ll find below the break.

As I was thinking through this piece, however, I realized a big part of the story is how I gradually built a summer wardrobe that’s functional, versatile, and full of pieces I genuinely love — one that I can lever more casual (2023 version), or elevated casual (today’s letter), or even dressy (A Three-Step Approach To Dressing Up This Summer).

Clients often tell me that summer is the hardest season to dress for, and I completely understand because it’s also taken me years to develop a summer style language. Looking back, I can see a few recurring problems that stood in my way, and I suspect they might sound familiar to you too.

Duh! It sounds obvious that one would struggle getting dressed in the summer if they don’t own enough summer-appropriate clothing, but it’s something I see often — not to mention, this was also me!

Okay, so it’s less applicable in Paris where there are four seasons of equal length, but in Toronto — and parts of the world where summers are relatively short — buying summer clothes is almost an after-thought. For me, it felt wasteful to buy a lot of summer clothes, so to hold me over, I’d buy a few inexpensive pieces that were fine but I didn’t really love.

Beyond that, my summer wardrobe ended up being the “leftover” layering pieces of my otherwise three-season wardrobe, e.g. basic tees and tanks. It’s no wonder I struggled summer after summer to dress in outfits that I truly loved and felt great in: my building blocks were absolute shite.

Solution: Most of my clients are thoughtful shoppers who are careful with their money and deliberate about what they buy. But sometimes one can take it a little too far. At some point, you (I) have to accept that not every piece you buy needs to do everything, all the time. It’s way too much pressure to put on yourself (myself)!

Instead ask yourself: