What clothing items to splurge on and what to skimp on when building your wardrobe

If you are like me, you want to try and be more frugal when it comes to buying clothes. I have had all of the bad habits related to buying clothes that you can think of. I used waste my money on all of the latest trends until I discovered that dressing in classics and adding a few select trendy pieces each season was a much better way to go.

It can be confusing trying to decide which clothing items are worth spending a lot of money on and which items you really should not waste your hard earned money on. If you focus on building a classic wardrobe that works for your lifestyle, you will be able to get a lot more mileage out of your clothing. So, in building your wardrobe there are key pieces that you should really buy the best you can afford and other pieces that you will cycle through your closet much faster and should spend less.

Some examples of what to spend on:

• A quality suit. Even if you don’t wear suits to work, you should have one in your closet. You never know when you might need one. Buy a classic style in wool.

• Sweaters. Cashmere sweaters are a classic for men and women. They are lightweight but warm. Think cardigans, crewnecks and v-necks. If you spend $200 on a good quality sweater and wear it 15 times a year for eight years that works out to be $1.67 per wear (a bargain compared to the $30 I once spent on a trendy shirt that I wore once before it went out of style).

• Shoes. Always but the best quality shoes you can. They will hold up better and look better than inexpensive shoes. Also, you can usually have high quality leather shoes re-soled to extend the life. Remember to maintain your shoes by having the heel tips replaced as needed and so on. Before you throw out a classic pair of shoes, remember that a good shoe repair shop can often perform miracles on your old scuffed up shoes.

• Handbags and briefcases. These are your statement pieces ands they speak volumes about who you are. Buy the best you can afford…I recommend that you splurge on these items. If you take care of these pieces they can last years and even be handed down. If you are wondering who to take your bag to for maintenance, try your favorite shoe repair shop.

A few examples of what you should spend less on:

• Trendy items. Obviously the trendy pieces that you will wear a handful of times should make up the smallest portion of your clothing budget. So, trendy items are things like a bright orange shirt, a bubble skirt, gaucho style pants, fatigue print pants, and so on. You get the idea.

• Summer clothes. Summer clothes are generally made out of more fragile fabrics and will not hold up over time.

• Tee Shirts. I think of tee shirts as a wardrobe staple. However, it is not necessary to spend a lot of money to buy a high quality tee shirt. If a tee costs more than about $25, you should probably keep looking. You can find nice quality tees at the Gap.com and Banana Republic.

• Khakis. Khaki pants like tee shirts are another wardrobe staple that should not cost more than $50. Again the Gap.com and Banana Republic are a good place to look.

I like to stock up at the end of the season sales. They are a great way to save on classic pieces for your wardrobe. When you are buying classics, they will still be in style next year so you can stock up. I also like to check out on-line merchants like Overstock.com, they often have specials like $1 shipping. I have found some great deals on Overstock for example; I recently purchased a pair of boat shoes for half the price I found on the manufacture’s website. I love finding bargains like that.