The Thoughtful Dresser - Linda Grant

I may not have mentioned it on this blog before but I have a totally materialistic and deep love of clothes and fashion. I am far from a fashionista (I don't have the budget or the sense of style unfortunately!) but I love to gaze longingly through fashion magazines and plan what I would dress myself in if I had half the chance. I think long and hard about what I am going to wear each morning - I attribute this mostly to my job. I work in an emotionally draining and often challenging work area and what I wear can often give me a spark for the day.
I was so glad to hear Linda Grant talk about this passion and desire for nice clothing and the psychological impact it can have on us in The Thoughtful Dresser.
This book is one part Grant's personal reflection on the clothes that have been, and are, an important part of her life and the meaning she has attributed to them and one part social commentary on the way clothes are perceived in our (mostly western) society.
I especially loved the first chapter of the book "In Which a Woman Buys a Pair of Shoes" about Grant's mission on one particular day to hunt down and purchase the perfect pair of shoes:

One day last summer, at the moment of waking, I knew that I had to go out at once and buy new shoes. Shoes which fulfilled another function apart from walking. I wanted high heeled shoes. Ridiculous, sexy, I don't care how much they cost, I have to have them shoes.

Grant also talks about how the clothes we have worn throughout our lives contribute to the story of who we are:

Clothes as text, clothes as narration, clothes as a story. Clothes as the story of our lives. And if you were to gather all the clothes you have ever owned in all your life, each baby shoe and winter coat and wedding dress, you would have your autobiography.

I absolutely adored this book and Grant's take on the history and sociology of clothes and dressing - with some red high heels thrown in!