The carry-on edit: two weeks, one bag.

I have not checked a bag in nineteen years. Not out of principle — out of self-interest. The woman who walks off a plane and straight into a taxi is a different woman from the one standing at a carousel at midnight, and I know which one I want to be when I arrive.

What follows is not a minimalism exercise. I like clothes. I like looking as though I meant it. But somewhere between a work trip to Amsterdam and a fortnight in Morocco I worked out that elegance while traveling is almost entirely a question of editing.

Start with a palette, not a list

Choose three colors before you choose a single garment. Mine are almost always ivory, black and one deep note — wine, usually. Everything I pack has to work with everything else, which means every morning offers a dozen outfits instead of one, and nothing is stranded because its partner stayed home.

The discipline is in the neutrals. Ivory and black do the heavy lifting; the third color is where the personality lives. A wine silk scarf changes a plain linen dress into something deliberate, and it weighs nothing.

The fourteen-day wardrobe

• Two pairs of wide trousers, one light, one dark
• One long skirt that does not crease
• Three simple tops — silk, cotton, fine knit
• Two dresses: one for walking, one for dinner
• A linen shirt, worn as a shirt and as a layer
• One jacket that reads as tailoring and packs like a cardigan
• A large scarf, a smaller silk one
• Two pairs of shoes on your feet or nearly: flat sandals or loafers, and one evening shoe

That is it. Everything rolls, nothing needs pressing, and the entire kit fits in a cabin-sized case with room for whatever I find on the way home.

The things that do the real work

Jewelry. A pair of gold hoops and one good chain will elevate a linen shirt you have worn three days running, and they take up the space of nothing. A structured tote that lives inside the case and comes out for day trips. A slim leather passport wallet, so the things you need at borders are never at the bottom of a bag.

And a real notebook. Not for organization — for noticing. I have twenty years of them and they are the only souvenirs I have never once thought of throwing out.

Pack for the woman you will be at seven in the evening in a city you do not know yet. She wants one beautiful thing and comfortable shoes.

What I have stopped packing

Options. The second evening dress I never wear. Shoes that require a plan. Anything white that is not ivory. Full-sized bottles of anything. A book I am not already halfway through. And the vague, hopeful extra outfit for the occasion that never arrives — because if it does arrive, buying something there is a far better story.

The one rule

Lay out everything you intend to take, then remove a quarter of it. You will not miss a single piece. You will notice, every single day, how much lighter you move.