Sign in Subscribe
By Daniel Hakimi in shopping guide —

How to Build a Fall Wardrobe on a Budget

As the weather starts to get chilly, you're going to want to layer, to try new textures, and to layer. These are good ideas; this is how good wardrobes get made. I'm going to prepare you for a range of temperatures with a variety of options, and most of these options will be dirt cheap.

How to Build a Fall Wardrobe on a Budget
Everything you see here is secondhand.

Some months ago, I wrote a guide on building a warm-weather wardrobe on a budget. This was a tricky thing to do; different people have different conceptions of warmth, and dressing well often involves layering, a concept that upets many people who are just starting to get used to the idea of getting dressed in warm weather.

Luckily, as the weather starts to get chilly, people will be more and more amenable to the idea of layering. You should be open to the idea of teture—textured knitwear, textured shirts... Especially for casual outfits, texture is just good.

My previous article contained plenty of general advice useful for thrifting, particularly on eBay, including advice about filtering and searching. Rather than re-tread that same ground, I'd like to use this article to build on new concepts specific to fall.

Again, this article has a bunch of affiliate links in it, including my saved eBay searches. I stand by everything I recommend.

Base Layers

So, the first tip is not to help you find good clothes specific to colder weather, but to help enable you to appreciate the clothes you already have a little more.

If it's chilly out, and you're not sure the jeans or chinos you have will quite be warm enough, but you like them and want to wear them, you might want to consider a warmer base layer.

For undershirts and long underwear, the common guidance is to go with Uniqlo Heattech. Heattech comes in three levels of warmth: regular, extra warm, and ultra warm. The regular should be good enough for most people on even the chilliest days of fall, but the other two should help in winter. In addition to the "tights" (long underwear), I would recommend gray V-neck "T-shirts" (undershirts). Gray is the least visible under your shirt and on top of the skin (paradoxically, it shows less than your skin tone), and V-necks don't show under a button down (although it seems they stopped selling long-sleeve V-neck heattech, for some strange reason). Other brands provide similar products, but I've had good experiences with Heattech here.

The other option is to go with a "thermal" undershirt, which is only kind of an undershirt, since people tend to wear them visibly. They're most often white, and have a waffle-knit or similar texture. This is a good option if you just want something higher quality, but there's really no shame in Uniqlo undergarments. I don't really wear these, so the only name popping into my head is Buck Mason. These are $88, but again, they'll enable you to wear summer clothes in fall and fall clothes in winter, so there's a value proposition there.

I personally think that only getting a couple of these for the days you need them should be good enough, but if you think you're going to wear them all the time, feel free to stock up.

Pants

I'll take this chance to remind you that I prefer relaxed-fit pants. Now, some of you still prefer slim fits, and some of you want pants bigger than the ones I am about to recommend. Hopefully, much of my advice is still useful.

Vintage Polo Corduroys and Chinos

Polo Andrew Cords and Chinos

In summer, the ideal pants were vintage Polo. All of the cuts I described there are still great for the fall, but this time, you probably want Corduroy. For chinos, the search gets a little murkier, so I limit by country of manufacture; you can also try using the word "pleated" or using specific model names to narrow things down.

Flannel-lined chinos (and other pants)

Heavyweight chinos are generally warmer than lightweight chinos. You know what's warmer than that? Chinos lined with cotton flannel. The extra layer of fabric will keep your chinos super cozy. It also affects the drape in a way I think is cool, and brings a little extra something if you cuff them.

L.L. Bean is the first name that comes to mind, but here's a fuller eBay search anyway

Giant Fit Cords

J. Crew's Giant Fit Cords are some of my favorite pants. They're soft and drape beautifully.

J. Crew hasn't released them yet this season... but their giant fit corduroys are just so damn good. Here's a link to their giant fit chinos for now. Those are also good.

Jeans

Jeans work just as well in the fall as they do the winter. Vintage pairs from Levis and Wrangler are great. Current pairs are solid too. I wrote about Levis last time, so let's dig into Wrangler this time.

There are two key Wrangler cuts: the classic cowboy cut (13MWZ) and the higher rise, more flared 935NAV. Those are two simple searches since the sellers tend to include the model numbers, but you can always try looking the hard way.

Wool Trousers

Again, Polo Ralph Lauren is a good place to go. These pants come in similar cuts, but you won't find them searching by name. Unlike before, I have one recommendation I like even more: Oxxford. My favorite wool trousers are made of their "fawnskin flannel."

This eBay search includes those and a couple of other brands. It's a relatively short list, of brands that I know are worth thrifting; each brand here has pants in good cuts, although Rota pants will tend to be more expensive.

Even More Pants

Shirts

My favorite denim shirt and vintage Brooks Brothers Makers OCBD

Denim Shirts

Denim shirts are good. Everybody recognizes denim as a casual texture. And it ages very well; vintage denim shirts are going to be super soft and have some extra charcter through a little wear and tear. My personal favorite is a vintage shirt from Dickie's "Vaquero" line. If you want to buy new ones, I'd recommend Wrangler. They have a lot of other options too, just make sure you're getting something with texture in 100% cotton (they also have a cool cotton-hemp blend, but that's more expensive and hemp is usually a summer fabric).

OCBDs

If you want a brand new OCBD anywhere south of $100, I'd really recommend Spier and Mackay.

Vintage OCBDs from Brooks Brothers Makers, J. Press, or L.L. Bean. Note, however, that each of these searches is likely to turn up a lot of shirts made of the wrong fabric, or with the wrong collar style. You want oxford cloth and a button down collar. OCBDs are generally either a solid color or an even stripe called a university stripe; other patterns exist, but might be a red flag when you shop online. Good luck!

Flannel and Chamois

Say you want something a little warmer than that. The two vintage darlings I'm going to point out here are Pendleton flannel shirts, many of which are made of wool and L. L. Bean Chamois shirts. These options are both more casual than Oxford, in case you couldn't tell.

Knitwear

Uniqlo's Lambswool sweater; a secondhand shetland from Paul Stuart; and a secondhand cashmere cable knit from Hawick x Ben Silver.

I'll start off by linking to Derek Guy's famous twitter thread about buying a cashmere sweater on a budget. I've compiled his recommended brands into an ebay link, whith slight changes for my own preferences, and this is the first place you should look for vintage knitwear. You can set a price ceiling if you want to filter down to, say, everything below $100. I got my best piece of knitwear, the Hawick of Scotland cashmere cable knit above, for about $30 off eBay; it's not in great condition, but this sweater is better used than anything I've bought new.

If you think you want cheap cashmere new, I would highly recommend merino instead; it will last longer and pretty much serve you just as well.

A better value than that would be a shetland sweater; they come with a naturally interesting texture, and sometimes specked. The downside is, many options are often itchy, or at least not as soft as flat merino... But my brand recommendation is pretty good on that front.

If you're shoping new, I'd recommend Bosie. Many brands selling widely-beloved shetlands are really using (and charging an extra margin for) Harley of Scottland Shetlands. For a little more, you can go for a four-ply from their Blue Monagger line. These will last for ages. If these options are too expensive, Uniqlo Lambswool is only $50 (and may yet go on sale). It won't last quite as long, but this is a budget guide.

If you're not into shetlands, Spier and Mackay generally has a lot of good values, including a lot of merino and cotton knits. Again, new cashmere is not for those on a budget.

Aaaaaand as a final option, if you want to try something funkier, consider a Mohair sweater. It's best for moderate weather, so it might be too late to buy for this fall, but some of these pieces are really special. Also pay attention to the blend: a lot of these contain some acrylic, and some of that is normal, but you should know what blend works for you.

Outerwear

Outerwear tends to be more expensive than you want it to be. But good outerwear is important. So let's go through our options.

General tip: Some jackets come with a removable liner. Some people like to wear those liners alone. That effectively gives you three jackets: the liner, the jacket without the liner (which won't be as warm, and will be easier to layer over other things), and the jacket + liner combo (which will be warmer). Accordingly, you might find this sort of combination to be a better value than just buying a single-layer jacket.

Alternatively, you could just take your fall jackets and use them as a midlayer under a larger coat, but the liner jackets often zip in and just fit right within the outer shells they're paired with.

Waxed Cotton (Barbour)

A miniature inspo album for Barbour jackets. Yes, Henrik's Jacket is from Barbour.

There's something about Barbour's waxed cotton jackets. They're getting a little harder to thrift (you want to find one that doesn't need a rewaxing today), and a little harder to find cheap on sale ($200 is a good target, but you might find yourself spending closer to $300, and good luck if you're looking in early fall).

Here's my eBay search, highlighting Barbour waxed models that I think are good. The letters "SL" in a model name refer to a "super long" cut. This search catches some barbour jacket accessories like liners, belts, and hoods. It also catches a few common misspellings, and their collaborations with Engineered Garments and Noah.

Their quilted models are also reasonable options, but wax is where it's at.

Here's a Put This On guide to different styles.

Barn Jackets

People have also been into barn jackets lately. They're heavy canvas workwear jackets, so they kind of age in this way that's simultaneously ugly and beautiful. And yeah they're having a moment. Here are some options. Again, the vintage star is L.L. Bean, but I've compiled a search with a few more options that should all work. You could narrow that looking for a quilted lining or flannel lining (note that old flannel linings can pill over time). For new options:

More Outerwear

Tailoring

My favorite flannel suit and tweed jacket, both thrifted

I generally recommend thrifting for tailoring in person, but here's an eBay search if you want it, and I list some ready-to-wear brands below. As I said before, don't be too much of a fit perfectionist while thrifting, but take the jacket to a tailor. Two things to keep in mind: the shoulders need to fit, which is not to say that the seams need to sit exactly on your sholder joint, but that the sleeve needs to drape cleanly from the shoulder and you need to be able to move comfortably. And the jacket length is more or less impossible to change.

For fall and winter, you generally want heavier fabrics (300GSM, at least), but I filtered my search above down to the two big categories: corduroy, flannel, and tweed.

You know corduroy. It's a distinctly casual cotton fabric, whether you get it as a suit or sport jacket. Most corduroy is good in the fall, but you might want something made of wool for the colder parts. Avoid "bedford" corduroy or other lightweight corduroy, usually associated with fine wales, as that tends to be lighter and breathe more.

Tweed is the hard-wearing, sometimes-stiff, sometimes-itchy stuff. It's the stuff British aristocrats wore hunting in the countryside, and after a decade or so of that they'd patch up the jacket with leather (at the elbows or shoulders or whatever), and just keep wearing it for the rest of their life. It's mostly used in jackets, and not suits. Brown checks and grey herringbones are common and fairly versatile. Gray herringbone tweed looks great with a dark wash denim.

Wool flannel is a loosely-defined category, and it can further be subdivided into worsted and woolen flannels. Permanent Style has a great guide here, but tl;dr: worsted flannels are smoother and last longer, while woolen flannels are softer and fluffier. A gray flannel suit is pretty classic—somewhat more casual than your simple worsted twill, but it has some history, and it will keep you warm. Simon says that the term "flannel" is generally only used to refer to milled cloths used in suits or trousers; a standalone flannel jacket would actually be somewhat unusual, but not necessarily bad.

Cashmere, whipcord, and cavalry twill might also be good options, but may be harder to find or more expensive.

Footwear

Fall footwear is... mostly just going to be whatever footwear you were already wearing. You still want sneakers, oxfords are still great for formal situations, loafers are still my default shoe, and you probably already have a pair of boots or two. But there's

Shearling-lined Shoes

Sometimes you want something extra warm, or something special. Anything lined in shearling (or, on a tight budget, faux shearling) will keep your feet nice and toasty. Here is a list of options.

Further Reading

Previous

The Magic Behind The World's Borough

You might also like...