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#94: Clothes to Hibernate In

My mood board for winter 2025.

Zoe Suen
Oct 02, 2025
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This week a now-viral TikTok landed on my algorithm, outlining a regimented plan for the three stages of winter—a scheme intended to set our bodies into rhythm for eventual hibernation as our tan lines blur and we become one with our base layers.

I applaud the ambition, I really do, but as a work-from-home freelancer I can’t help but see the intense self-regulation as a waste of the creature comforts my schedule (or lack thereof) allows. Instead, I did what I tend to do at the start of a season, and made a mood board.

More so than previous ones (see summer pyjamas; spring whimsy; a full email of red) , this Fall/Winter pool is specific in its mood, yet generous with its parameters. Not unlike the winter plan, it proposes habits and templates—long wool coats; perfectly sized staples; plenty of blacks and greys; cool-toned make-up—that I think will provide some mental and physical comfort in soup season.

I don’t know about you, but summer is when I dress most spontaneously and recklessly, relatively unmoored by weather in flux. Winter is for being hugged by your clothes, relying on them to get you through the weeks, and hopefully trusting that you still look like yourself, if a witchier and more Brontë heroine rendering, which is what I am going for below, as you will soon see. I expect this will be very helpful when I’m packing for our honeymoon in November/December; maybe that’s a topic for another email entirely.

Crucially, I have a lot of clothes that slot into these looks nice and modularly—the couple of items on my wishlist (also mentioned below, in captions), are fairly pared back. If this isn’t your desired mood exactly, I hope you can at least be inspired to identify your own template, and hunker down in the satisfaction that they make getting dressed until spring a little easier.

Karo Rose & Zoe Mohm by Philippine Chaumont & Agathe Zaerpour for Fane’s FW 2022 Lookbook.
Painting by Anna Weyant.
Source unknown.
To those who’ve done the pop of red, I raise the pop of orange: Aoi Yu; Lauren Manoogian; unknown; Javier Bardem for Interview mag.
Kim Min-hee in, I assume (because of her bag), Lemaire.
A J Crew catalogue from 1995.
Gert and Uwe Tobias
Third knit’s a charm: Louise Trotter takes a bow at Carven SS 2025, by Isidore Montag / Gorunway.com.

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© 2025 Zoe Suen
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