Charleston puts on its best face in October. The light softens, the live oaks stop dripping, and for a few weeks one can leave the house in something other than damp linen. I have been editing my fall closet for fifty years now, first for a magazine and now for myself, and I have come to think the project gets easier, not harder, after sixty. The trick is to stop chasing the rack and start chasing the silhouette.
What follows is the wardrobe I keep returning to, and the one I would build if I were starting over at a size 16, 18, or 22. The principles travel in any direction.
Begin With the Bones of the Outfit
A fall wardrobe rests on three pieces, regardless of size: a coat that closes properly, a pair of trousers cut for your actual body, and a sweater of consequence. Everything else is decoration. I learned this from Bunny Williams long before she was a household name, and I have never had reason to doubt her.
For trousers, the wide leg is in its second or third good year, which means the better houses have finally figured out how to draft them for a curvier hip. Lands’ End and Talbots both cut a respectable wide-leg crepe through their plus ranges, and the rise is high enough to do its job. A barrel leg is also having a moment for fall 2025, though I would test one in the dressing room before I committed; the shape rewards a longer torso.
Fabric Is the Whole Conversation
I have always paid more attention to fabric than to label, and at our age the choice matters twice as much. A heavy crepe drapes; a lightweight ponte holds its shape without strangling the waist; a brushed merino sweater wears warmer than a chunky acrylic and weighs almost nothing across the shoulders. If a garment looks promising on the hanger but feels papery between thumb and finger, put it back.
For fall, I would build the closet around:
- Wool, cashmere, or a serious wool blend — not the thin novelty knits
- Cotton corduroy in a fine wale, which is back this year and ages well
- Heavyweight ponte for trousers and column dresses
- A real flannel shirt — the LL Bean Scotch plaid is still the benchmark
- Suede or nubuck on at least one pair of shoes, for the texture
Color, Honestly Considered
The trade press is calling for primary colors in 2026 — cobalt sweaters, pillar-box red shoes, a yellow dress. I am all for color, and have never understood the impulse to retreat into beige after seventy. That said, I would not buy a fuchsia jacket because a magazine told me to. I would buy a clear cranberry, or a deep teal, or the particular rust that appears in the marsh grass behind my house in November, because those colors agree with my coloring and my life.
One useful exercise: stand in front of your closet and ask which three colors you actually wear. Build the new pieces around those, and let one bolder color in per season as the accent. A camel coat with a clear cobalt scarf will outlast every trend cycle.
Where to Shop, As of This Fall
Several of the catalogs I have used for years are still going. Catherines, owned by FullBeauty Brands, mailed a fall/winter book this year and continues to cut to size 34W. Their pieces lean traditional, which I do not mean as a criticism — a well-cut twinset is a perfectly respectable thing. Lands’ End remains my reliable source for outerwear; their plus-size wool peacoat has been in the line for years, and it earns its keep in any climate north of the Carolinas.
Kiyonna, made in Anaheim since 1996, is still operating and still strong on the column dress and the wrap silhouette — useful pieces for a daughter’s rehearsal dinner or any occasion where one wants to look composed without looking effortful. Talbots and J.Jill both extend through plus, and Universal Standard, which is younger than the others, sizes from 4XS to 4XL in pieces I would not be embarrassed to wear to a board meeting.
The Pieces Worth the Investment
I would spend the most on three things and economize on the rest:
- A coat. A wool coat in a neutral, cut to your shoulder and long enough to clear a dress hem, will outlive several rounds of trousers. Try it on over a sweater, not a tee shirt.
- One pair of leather boots. A flat or low-block-heel boot in good calfskin, in a color that flatters your trouser palette, makes everything else look intentional. Resole them every few years.
- A jacket of some authority. A blazer in a heavy wool, or a beautifully tailored cardigan jacket in the manner of a Chanel knockoff, lifts a pair of jeans into something else entirely.
Everything else — the tee shirts, the leggings under a tunic, the nightgowns one only wears for Beauregard the cocker spaniel — can come from wherever it comes from. No one is grading the under-layers.
What I Would Skip
The metal-hardware tops on every fall 2025 trend list. The cropped anything. The deliberately oversized blazer pretending to be tailoring. None of these will read well in a photograph from your granddaughter’s graduation in five years. Skip them in favor of a clean line and a fabric you would touch on purpose.
A Final Word on Looking Like Yourself
The most stylish women I have known were not the ones who chased the season. They were the ones who decided, around the time they turned fifty, what they actually liked, and then refined it for the next forty years. Sister Parish wore the same sort of dress, more or less, from 1955 until she died, and she always looked exactly right. There is something to be said for that kind of consistency.
Build the closet you want to live in this fall. Buy fewer pieces, in fabrics that will hold up, in colors that flatter your particular face, in cuts that respect your particular figure. The rest will sort itself out, and you will have more time for the porch and the dog.