A mama on Pinterest wrote this under a pin of a floral dress: “I just want to feel like me again, but I can’t wear anything cute because I need easy access.” Spring is when that sentence hurts most, because the shops fill with pretty things in pale colours and most of them come off over the head. I spent one spring in the same navy cardigan over the same grey tank, watching everyone else in florals, and I thought that was simply what feeding a baby cost.

It cost nothing of the sort. The pretty spring pieces that open are the same pieces that have always opened: a wrap, a shirt, a cardigan, a V-neck over a tank, a dress with buttons down the front. Put a clip-down tank under any of them and the floral dress is a nursing dress, the linen shirt is a nursing top, and the morning gets four minutes shorter. By my third spring with a baby I had ten outfits on a rail that I could feed in, in daylight, in a park, without a cover, and I wore them in rotation until June.

These are those ten. Each one has the pieces, how it opens, and the one thing that makes it work on a feeding day. The pieces are ordinary shapes, so you will find half of them in your drawers and the rest anywhere at any price. Dressing on purpose was part of how I came back to myself after each baby; a rail of ten outfits that open is a small way to start.

Outfit 1. The floral wrap dress, for the christening and the lunch

A wrap dress in a small floral on a navy or sage ground, a nude clip tank under it, taupe flat sandals, a crossbody bag. It opens at the front with one hand, the tie fits at six weeks and at six months, and a busy print hides the small marks of a feeding day better than anything plain.

Choose a jersey or a crepe with enough weight that it does not cling, and a V that sits where you want it with the tank filling the gap. Ten nursing-friendly outfits from one wrap dress if you want the whole week from it.

Outfit 2. The nursing tank and the long cardigan, for the park

An ivory clip-down tank worn as the top rather than under one, a fine longline cardigan in taupe or sage, light jeans, white sneakers. The cardigan is the cover, the warmth on the bench, and the thing that comes off with one hand when the sun comes out. The tank does the rest.

This is the outfit for the days you are not sure of the weather, which in spring is most of them. A scarf in dusty rose near the face is the lift if you want one.

Outfit 3. High-waisted jeans and the blouse that buttons

Light-wash jeans with stretch, a mid rise that sits above a scar, in the size you are this month. Over them a soft blouse that buttons at the front, in ivory or dusty blue, half-tucked. Three buttons from the top is a feed; untucked, it covers the waistband completely.

This is the outfit that looks like you before the baby, with the ease of now. Ten postpartum outfits built on jeans shows the rest of the jeans’ week.

From the capsules

The Year Round Capsule

Two hundred nursing-friendly outfits from fifty-six pieces, fifty for every season, laid out and then worn. $29 once, yours to keep.

See the capsule →

Outfit 4. The button-down shirt and the pull-on skirt

A linen or soft cotton shirt, white or chambray, sleeves rolled, over a dark tank. Below it a midi skirt that pulls on with an elastic waist, in navy or a print. Sneakers for the day, sandals for the evening. The shirt opens three buttons; the skirt asks nothing of your waist.

This is the one I would wear to the first coffee with people who are not children. It reads as a decision, and it takes a minute to put on.

Outfit 5. The breezy maxi, for the warm days

A button-front maxi in a light cotton, in a soft print or a plain dusty blue, the buttons undone from the top for a feed and from the bottom for walking. A tank under it, flat sandals, a straw bag, a hat if the sun is out. One piece, no waistband, covers everything you want covered and opens where you need it.

If the maxi is a V-neck with no buttons, the tank under it still makes it work: pull the V aside, clip the tank, done.

Outfit 6. The denim jacket and the V-neck tee

An ivory relaxed V-neck tee over a nursing tank, a denim jacket worn open, taupe trousers with a soft waist, white sneakers. The jacket is the spring coat for most of the season, the tee lifts from the hem or pulls aside at the V, and the whole thing goes into the washing machine on Sunday.

On the cool morning, a fine cardigan goes under the jacket. By lunchtime both are in the pram basket.

Outfit 7. The loose romper with straps that give

A soft, loose romper or jumpsuit with a V-neck and adjustable straps, a tank under it, slides. Pull the V aside, clip the tank, feed. The straps loosen for the chest you have today and tighten later. Choose one with a drawstring waist that sits high, not a fitted one, and in a darker colour because it is one piece and there is nowhere to hide a mark.

The honest note: the romper is for the day you are mostly at home or in the park, because the bathroom is a whole operation. Worth it on the hot day.

Outfit 8. Joggers, a tank and a light blazer, for the school gate

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Dark jersey joggers with a drawstring below the scar, a nursing tank in ivory, a light unstructured blazer in taupe or navy worn open, clean white sneakers. The blazer is the piece that turns soft clothes into an outfit, it opens by definition, and the tank under it is the whole nursing system.

This is the outfit the mamas I interviewed for the Back to Work capsule wore on the first day back on a casual floor. The Everyday Motion Capsule is a hundred outfits built on this idea for the walk, the school run and the park.

Outfit 9. The lightweight tunic and leggings

A soft tunic in a V-neck or a button-front, long enough to cover the top of the leggings, over a tank. Thick black or navy leggings that sit above the scar, ballet flats or sneakers. Lift the hem or pull the V, and the length of the tunic is the cover. This is the easiest outfit on the list, and it is the one for the day you slept three hours.

Choose the tunic in a colour that is kind to your face, because it is the only thing near it. Dusty rose, dusty blue, sage, ivory. First Look will tell you which, free, from one photo.

Outfit 10. The midi skirt and the sweater that opens

A pull-on midi in a soft jersey or a fluid fabric, a fine-knit cardigan buttoned to the middle and worn as a sweater, a tank under it, ankle boots for the cool start of the season and sandals for the end of it. Unbutton from the bottom, lift, clip. The cardigan-as-sweater is the trick that makes every knit on the rail a nursing knit.

This is the dressed-up one for the dinner or the christening when the floral dress is in the wash. It is also, with the boots, the last outfit of winter and the first of spring, which is why it earns a place.

How the ten become a spring capsule

Count the pieces: a wrap dress, a maxi, a romper, a shirt, a blouse, a V-neck tee, a tunic, a cardigan, a denim jacket, a blazer, jeans, joggers, taupe trousers, a midi skirt, leggings, two tanks, sneakers, sandals, flats, boots. Twenty pieces in five colours, and the ten outfits above are only the first ten they make; mixed, they make fifty.

If you want the fifty laid out and then worn, each one with how it opens, that is the spring section of the Year Round Capsule: two hundred outfits across the year from fifty-six pieces, in the same ordinary shapes as here, with three pictures of you in them on the house. Shop your own drawers first; most of this list is already there.

The spring I spent in the navy cardigan was not a fashion problem. I was pouring everything into a toddler and a newborn and had decided, without noticing, that nothing was left over for me. The rail of ten was how I noticed. It took one afternoon to build, nothing new to buy, and the first morning I got dressed from it in four minutes I felt something come back that I had not known was gone.

If you want someone who knows your closet to pick from it each morning, so the ten become whatever ten you own, that is Anah inside the Atelier. If a top on the rail might or might not open, Will it feed tells you from a photo, free. And if you only do one thing today, put a clip tank under the prettiest thing you own and go outside in it.

Ten outfits, one afternoon, and the florals are yours again. The focus is on you, mama.