I had exactly forty-seven minutes to get from a designer showroom in the Garment District to a career panel at FIT, and every taxi in Manhattan had apparently decided to take a collective lunch break. There I was, running down 7th Avenue in a downpour, protected from complete ruin only by the New Yorker’s best friend – the $5 street umbrella that you know will flip inside out the moment the wind picks up.
A fashion writer racing through Midtown isn’t exactly breaking news. What made this particular sprint noteworthy was my outfit: vintage Levi’s that I’d thrifted for $30, paired with a white T-shirt from Target’s Universal Thread line (approximately $8 on sale), layered under a camel coat from The Row that cost more than my first car. On my feet were pristine white Supergas, and hanging from my shoulder was a Bottega Veneta Jodie bag in a shade of green so perfect it made my heart hurt a little every time I looked at it.
This is how I dress most days – mixing pieces that cost less than a decent cocktail with items that required serious financial planning. It’s not just a budget strategy (though God knows no one’s getting rich in fashion journalism); it’s my fashion philosophy. I call it the “CEO at Target, Intern at Neiman Marcus” approach, and it has saved both my bank account and my style credibility more times than I can count.
When I finally arrived at FIT, damp but not destroyed, a student asked me the question I always get: “How can I look like I belong in this industry when I can barely afford ramen?” I glanced down at my outfit and realized I was literally wearing the answer.
“When you focus your budget on certain key pieces, no one will ever notice – or care – that the rest of your outfit cost less than an Uber ride,” I told her. The look of relief on her face was worth the minor case of pneumonia I was definitely developing from running through the rain.
Here’s the thing about fashion that industry insiders know but rarely admit publicly: even the most discerning eye can’t tell the difference between a well-made $30 white T-shirt and a $300 one once they’re actually on a body in motion. What people notice are the distinguishing elements – the unusual cut of a jacket, the perfect drape of a coat, the distinctive shape of a handbag that hasn’t been duped to death by fast fashion.
I developed this strategy out of necessity during my early years at The Thread, when my annual salary barely covered rent in my shoebox Brooklyn apartment. My editor, Morgan, was the first person to school me in the art of high-low dressing. I watched her stride into meetings wearing H&M trousers topped with Dries Van Noten jackets, looking more put together than colleagues wearing head-to-toe designer. “No one needs to know what cost what,” she’d say, applying lipstick without a mirror because she had that kind of unnerving confidence. “They just need to think you know what you’re doing.”
The first real investment piece I ever bought was a black blazer from The Kooples that cost $595 – a sum so astronomical to me at the time that I kept the receipt taped to my bathroom mirror for two weeks, alternating between waves of buyer’s remorse and the thrill of ownership. But that blazer transformed everything I owned. Suddenly my $15 Zara tank tops looked intentional instead of cheap. My thrifted jeans looked vintage in the good way, not the “she can’t afford new clothes” way.
I wore that blazer to my first Paris Fashion Week, layered over a Uniqlo turtleneck and paired with trousers from & Other Stories. A street style photographer took my picture outside the Chloé show, and when it appeared on a major fashion website with the caption “effortless French-girl style,” I nearly choked on my pain au chocolat. I was a Brooklyn girl with exactly one designer item to my name, standing among people draped in outfits that cost more than six months of my rent, and somehow I’d pulled it off.
That’s when I formalized my approach: invest in the “architecture” of your wardrobe – the coats, blazers, and bags that create its structure – and save on the “interior decoration” – the T-shirts, simple sweaters, and basic jeans that fill in the gaps.
Fifteen years and many fashion cycles later, this strategy has never failed me. My wardrobe now contains exactly five “CEO at Target” investment pieces: the aforementioned Row coat (bought during a rare Bergdorf’s sale when I got an unexpected bonus); the Bottega bag (acquired after saving $50 from every paycheck for fourteen months); a Celine blazer (a sample sale miracle); a pair of Manolo Blahnik pumps that are somehow immune to New York sidewalk damage; and a vintage Cartier Tank watch that I split the cost of with my parents as a “graduation, birthday, and next Christmas combined” gift when I landed my first editor position.
Everything else? A mix of mid-range brands (Reformation, Sezane, COS), vintage finds, and – I’m not even slightly ashamed to admit this – items from Target, Old Navy, and Amazon Essentials. My white button-downs are from the men’s department at Uniqlo. My black turtlenecks come in three-packs from Amazon. My jeans are a mix of vintage Levi’s and whatever Madewell has on sale. My workout clothes are exclusively from Target’s All In Motion line because I refuse to spend serious money on clothes I’m just going to sweat in.
I recently conducted an experiment at a fashion week dinner, wearing my mid-range/bargain/investment mix as usual. Over the course of the evening, I received seven compliments on my outfit – five specifically mentioned my Bottega bag, two praised my “perfect white T-shirt” (Target, $8), and no one at all noticed that my black trousers were from H&M’s men’s department and cost $34.99.
This isn’t just about creating the illusion of wealth – it’s about creating a wardrobe that functions like a team where every player has a specific role. The investment pieces do the heavy lifting of establishing your fashion credibility and outlining your silhouette. The bargain basics handle the daily work of, you know, actually covering your body without requiring careful handling or specialized cleaning.
For anyone looking to adopt this strategy, here’s my tried-and-true formula:
First, be brutally honest about what category each wardrobe item belongs in. This requires setting aside your emotions and examining each type of garment with cold logic. Ask yourself: Will anyone notice if this is from a high-end brand? Will it last significantly longer if I spend more? Does quality make a noticeable difference in how it looks on my body?
For me, coats, bags, and shoes almost always warrant investment because they create the overall impression of your outfit and take the most daily abuse. T-shirts, simple sweaters, and workout wear almost never do. Jeans fall squarely in the middle – a good vintage or mid-range pair will often look better than ultra-expensive designer denim that’s trying too hard to be unique.
Second, save aggressively for the investment pieces rather than compromising on “almost” versions. I can’t tell you how many almost-designer bags I bought before my Bottega, each one costing $200-300 and none of them delivering the satisfaction I was looking for. If I’d put that money toward the real thing from the beginning, I’d have gotten there faster and wasted less along the way. The goal isn’t to have a closet full of stuff – it’s to have the right stuff that makes everything else look intentional.
Third, take immaculate care of your investment pieces while being realistic about everyday items. My Row coat has never seen the inside of a bar with sticky floors. My Bottega never sits on the ground, even at picnics. Meanwhile, my Target tees get washed in cold water, tumble dried on low, and replaced when they start to look sad. This two-tier system keeps the special things special while allowing you to actually live your life in the everyday pieces.
The beauty of this approach is that it works at any budget level. When I was making $32,000 a year as an assistant, my investment pieces came from contemporary brands like Vince and Theory, purchased on extreme markdown. My basics came from Forever 21 (I know, I know, but it was 2010 and we didn’t know any better). As my income increased, the ceiling of my investment pieces rose while the floor of my basics got a little higher too – upgrading from fast fashion to more sustainable options that still don’t break the bank.
Even now, with a senior editor’s salary, I still have strict mental categories: coats, bags, shoes, and blazers can justify four-figure price tags if they’re classic enough to last a decade. Everything else needs to fall well below that threshold to earn a place in my closet.
The most frequent question I get about this strategy is whether people “find out” about the lower-priced items and judge me for them. First of all, no one in fashion is doing a label check on your white T-shirt. Second, the industry has evolved past the point where head-to-toe designer is impressive – it often looks more like lack of imagination than abundance of style. The most respected editors I know are masters of the mix, pairing archival Comme des Garçons with current-season Zara in a way that showcases their eye, not their budget.
Just last month at a market appointment, I was chatting with a designer whose dresses start at $1,800. She pointed at my feet and said, “Love those Superga sneakers – I have the same ones.” Then she leaned in conspiratorially: “I’ve also got the Amazon dupes of them in three colors for rainy days.” If that isn’t validation of the CEO at Target, Intern at Neiman Marcus philosophy, I don’t know what is.
So the next time you’re debating whether to spend half your paycheck on that statement jacket or investment bag, consider this: paired with well-chosen basics that don’t break the bank, it might be the most financially sound fashion decision you’ll ever make. After all, no one needs to know you’re the CEO at Target and the intern at Neiman Marcus – they just need to think you know exactly what you’re doing.