The Getting-Dressed Trick That Helps Your Career

Starting a company and building a brand is hard enough without thinking about what to wear every day. Funneling your mental energy into your professional life becomes wildly easier if you adopt a style uniform with pieces that you can unthinkingly reach for.

The trio to live in this spring? Lace-up wedge sandals (we love this Sorel pair), a maxi dress, and a timeless trench coat. Each is comfortable, adaptable, and able to easily go from a stretch of meetings to a working dinner out.

To prove it's the ideal combo, we asked model and health coach Victoria Raemy to give the look a spin around New York City. What she wears has become even more important as she focuses on her coaching business: She needs to look like a business owner you want to trust with your health, but not one who's too formal.

The best part about the sandal-maxi-and-trench uniform? Its ability to work for the wearer. In Victoria's case, that means everything has to be super practical: Clothes are made for wearing and food is meant for eating—no fuss about it. The California-bred, New York City-based twenty-something described her style as “functional and versatile,” factors that have become even more vital as she hones in on creating her own company. 

“I’m starting a business while modeling, my job for the past eight years—I have very little time to think about styling outfits,” she says. “I like things that just go together.”

That style MO explains her penchant for dresses, neutral hues, and anything that doesn’t have a prescribed "this must be worn with that" vibe. "My personal style isn't very color punchy," she says. "I love dresses because it's one piece you put on and you're good. It can be an entire statement in one."

Experienced in pounding the NYC pavement thanks to all her years attending castings, she's also serious about what she expects from her footwear.

“Comfort is a 10 out of 10 in terms of importance for me. I’m on my feet all the time, going up and down subway stairs. I won’t wear uncomfortable shoes.” And because her modeling career has meant hours spent alongside stylists and designers, the aforementioned comfy shoes still need to look super trend-forward.

To harness the full power of a style uniform, each item needs to be able to be worn with multiple pieces in a full range of situations. That all-important sartorial flexibility is found in spades in Sorel's wedge sandal. The lace-up style benefits from the stellar construction the brand is known for, giving high marks on both the comfort and practicality charts. For Victoria, that makes it the ideal spring shoe to be worn with breezy dresses for coaching sessions and jeans for modeling gigs.

Victoria shares a lot of clothes with her model sister Jessica, and adopting a style uniform has made it easier for pieces to be traded back and forth. While their personal styles definitely differ—Victoria is more buttoned-up to her sister's sexy, boho vibe—each has mastered the art of putting her own spin on an item. (See more of Jessica's style here.)

"We're the same size, head to toe," Victoria explains. "We have this running joke, 'If you buy it for you, it needs to be applicable to me.' We'll text each other photos from dressing rooms, like 'Do you want this as much as I want this?'"

Worn throughout: Lein Dress; Anine Bing Trench Coat; H&M Bag; Young Frankk Earrings; Kate Jones Ring; Annika Inez Ring

Worn by Jessica: Milly Dress; Merlette Coat; Hunting Season Bag; Abel Necklaces; Ursa Major Rings

Styling: Lindsay Grosswendt; Hair, Charles McNair; Makeup: Rommy Najor; Styling Assistant: Julia Virkler