Outfit ideas for Alt Girl work best when one piece leads and the rest stays quiet. The shoulder seam should sit on the bone, not past it. Hold it up to the light. Opacity is the thing product photography hides best. The groups below run from the decision that matters most to the ones you make afterwards.

What decides this is shoulder seam, sleeve length and opacity. Everything else is preference. Two from the first group show the range: Elie Tahari's Gilded Top at $149, and Rat & Boa's Cobra Blouse Lime at $125. The first is the considered buy; the second is the one to start with. The shoulder seam should sit on the bone, not past it. Hold it up to the light. Opacity is the thing product photography hides best. A higher price mostly buys materials and finishing, and occasionally it buys nothing at all.

If the top is the point, keep everything below it plain. From the second group, Elie Tahari's Nolene Milano Sculpt Cropped Jacket ($398) is the one that earns its place, because it works in more than one context without being restyled. The third group is smaller and deliberately narrower, dresses, for the decisions you make after the main one. None of this needs the whole group. One piece from each is usually enough.

There are 20 pieces here from 17 brands, $23 to $795, all in stock when this was written. We would not buy all of them, and neither should you. Eddie Bauer's Women's Sunwashed Cotton V-Neck Tank at $23 is the low-risk way in, and tibi.com's Cedric Suiting Detached Zipper Skirt at $795 only makes sense if this is a category you already use constantly. Read as a set, they get you close to Alt Girl without any single purchase being compulsory. Nothing here is included because it is famous, and price is not used as a proxy for quality anywhere on this page. If you take one thing away: the piece you reach for on a rushed morning is the one that was worth the money.