Coats, Coats and More Coats

It's nice to reassess what you own sometimes, isn't it? Especially if you're like me and have limited storage. Twice a year I pack away the winter/summer clothes and shoes in various places around the house, then promptly forget about them. Sometimes this is great: I found a fab pair of brown ankle boots last week that I have no memory of ever buying! Sometimes it's not so good: I turned out a blanket chest full of winter woolies and the general reaction was "hmmm". I think I must have been on a charity shop haul and just bought anything warm, regardless of whether it was nice or not. Needless to say most of that will be getting re-charity shopped!

Coats are even worse. They live in the depths of the coat cupboard, are buried under layers of stuff on the hat stand or even get shoved up on the rail in the loft so they're well out of the way. I just cannot remember what I own! In September last year I did this round up and totted up that I own all these coats (not counting jackets, waterproofs or fleeces):

I've got more now! We have the two quilted jackets:

The two capes:

And a few navy ones...

Quite a few really!

As such I'm not buying into the "omg perfect winter coat!" hype that shops like to chuck our way at this time of year. I don't think anyone could argue that I'm short of coats at the moment! The only thing I'm lacking that I'd really like to have (other than a plain black one, but they're no fun to buy so I'll do without) is a green duffle coat. I will find the perfect one eventually but it's proving damned elusive so far.

Winter Coats

There are lots of things I love about this time of year. Coats are one of them.  I'm not alone in this.  A quick look through my blog roll is showing up all sorts of posts talking about autumn/winter clothing and coats seem to be top of the list for a lot of people. I love it. I can happily debate the merits of colour vs pattern, tweed vs fur, fitted vs casual, for ages. Pockets, buttons, collars, trim: they’re all much more fun on winter coats than they are on summer jackets.

I never used to be able to join in with these conversations. Roll back to 2009 and I had one boring black winter jacket that had lasted me about four years and I just couldn’t understand why people had or needed 47 coats. I mean, black goes with everything, right? One black coat should do nicely. Then I suddenly saw the light. I don’t know why or how it happened but now the understairs cupboard and hat stand in my room are overflowing with coats and jackets of all sizes, shapes and colours. Look! This isn’t even all of them, just the ones I’ve managed to take photos of.

L - Posh tweedy. R (top to bottom)- vintage via Vix's ebay shop, H&M via ebay, French Connection

L - vintage Aquascutum. R (top to bottom) - H&M via ebay, Kookai via car boot sale, Very.co.uk

It may seem as if I’ve got most of the bases covered: I have tweed, smart, colourful, faux fur, leather, vintage and cosy coats already. There’s always room for one (or two) more in the coat cupboard though. As with most of my clothing purchases, I'm always in search of value for money when looking to add a coat to my collection. That doesn't have to mean stalking ebay and charity shops and totally ignoring the High St shops. I'm always happy to pay decent money for the perfect thing. Case in point, the tweedy coat in the first picture. I adore it and don't care how much it cost.

On my current wishlist are the perfect duffel coat (because I always did want to be Paddington Bear) and the perfect cape (because I can’t be a bear all the time and maybe I can pretend to be a tall, glam cape-wearer instead). I intend to hit the shops good and hard until I find them.

This looks like it could be a winner

This is cute and sparkly.  Love it.

Somebody hold my handbag for me.  I've got some serious trying on to do!