I do not believe in going into debt for fashion, or that you have to spend tons of money to have great style. I do believe that looking at price tags before trying something on can cause you to spend more money.
The first thing you do while shopping is look at the price tag. Usually that price tag tells you it is okay to try something on, the item is a great deal, or it will cause you to put the item away wishing you were an instant lottery winner. The last two cause havoc in your closet and will ultimately cause you to spend more money.
The next time you are shopping try on this new mindset about price and you will discover that you make much smarter purchases and wardrobe investments.
· When you come across a great deal, proceed with caution. Don’t let the allure of a deal throw out your good judgment about fit, versatility, and need. If something doesn’t fit or won’t work for your lifestyle, don’t buy it. Practice only spending money on items that suit all of your style needs.
· When something is out of your budget don’t put it back and wait for the depression to set in. Try it on. The more expensive item could be a better investment than the multiple deals you continue to buy. For example, the perfect fitting pants can be hard to find. You go from store to store settling on pants that kind of fit. They allow you to leave the house fully clothed but are not the best fit. You’ve now bought 4 pairs of imperfect black pants and have spent $200. The expensive pair that you would have never tried on are also $200 and fit like a glove. These are the better investment, and you no longer waste time looking for the perfect black pant.
· Until you try something on and determine it is right for your personal style, price doesn’t matter. Decide if an item fits and will work in your wardrobe, then think about whether or not it is worth the price tag. I always recommend clients stay within their budget but remind them to calculate the cost per wear for items they purchase.
· Don’t let discount price tags sidetrack you from your shopping mission. If you are looking for clothing that helps you create a more put together image for an upcoming meeting, a super cute casual dress that is on sale isn’t going to get you to that meeting with professional style.
Learn how to make smart clothing investments the next time you go shopping by signing up for Charleston Style Concierge’s free ezine, Get Great Style.
Why is fit so important for great style?
Without fit, you have no style. A trendy blazer that is too big will look frumpy and outdated. The same blazer too small appears as if you are trying too hard and will remove the chic sophistication from an outfit. Learn about your body type, and dress it appropriately. It is sometimes hard to see our bodies as they really are. Get advice from a personal stylist, or ask a trusted friend to help you examine the fit of your clothing.
What are some general fit rules for petite women?
When you are petite, there are a few rules to live by. First, be mindful of the colors and patterns you wear. Choose rich color palettes to add sophistication to your look and keep people from thinking you are a teenager. Choose patterns that are proportionate to your size. A large pattern will make you look small in comparison. Second, use clothes to help you project a more elongated body image. To do this, eliminate pants with cuffs, and don’t wear heavy, blocky shoes. Both abruptly stop your leg line, ruining all efforts to elongate your body image. Make sure your tops and jackets hit you in the right place. When your top comes past your crotch, you make your legs look shorter, making you look shorter. Lastly, befriend a good tailor. Some of your wardrobe pieces may need to be tailored to get a perfect fit. Pleats seem to come in and out of style.
How do I know if pleats are a trend I should try?
Pleats add fullness and volume to the front of a pant and therefore add fullness and volume to you! Don’t be fooled by the pleated pant as a cover-up for a midsection you want to hide. Remember that pleats will just draw attention to the spot you want to camouflage. If you try a pleated pant, choose more fitted pieces for your top half. If your pleated pants are tapered, take them straight to the closest Goodwill store. Tapered pants are a fit disaster by themselves but will also add even more width and focus to your hips.
How can I minimize the appearance of my hips?
Wear straight or wide-leg trouser-cut pants. You want to create a straight line from your hip to the floor with the silhouette of your pants. Always avoid pleated pants. Pleats add width to your hips and draw the eye to them. Watch out for poorly placed front pockets. The farther out a pocket is placed, the more it will accentuate your hips. Pockets that are set closer to your zipper are ideal. Avoid side-zip pants. If you break up the front of your pant with a zipper, you reduce the visual width of your hips. Wear tops and jackets that define your waist. A defined waist will draw the eye away from your hips.
For great style, start with great fit. For help fitting your body shape contact Charleston Style Concierge, a styling company that teaches clients how to get an effortless style.
The word fit gets thrown around a lot in our lives. Something may not fit your lifestyle. Your last job just wasn’t a good fit. Or maybe last week you were really fit to be tied. With so many things in our lives revolving around what fits, how is it that fit gets thrown out the window when it comes to our style?
Does it fit? That is the question you heard from your mother right before she came into the dressing room with her fit checklist. There were a series of squats, bends, and seated positions before the pants in question were deemed a good fit. Now, as an adult, you may have your own fit checklist, but does your clothing really fit?
When it comes to great style, fit is key!
Join our new super stylish Get Great Style group on Facebook.
Do you want to always know what to wear?
Do you want to feel confident about your style?
Do you want to be able to get dressed quickly and effortlessly?
Yes! Then this group is for you.
This group is a resource for men and women who want to create a personal style that is attainable and effortless.
This group will offer:
• Style tips.
• Ideas about how to incorporate seasonal trends.
• Tools and resources to help you get great style.
You can also become a fan of Charleston Style Concierge. Visit our fan page.
Check out this article from Forbes.com that provides great tips about dressing for the office.
http://www.forbes.com/2009/02/09/workplace-office-clothing-women-style_0209_suit.html
Often, if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Effortless style however, sounds good, is good, and can be true. Creating an effortless style takes some work and discipline, but the reward is a style that makes you feel confident, happy, and proud of who you are every day.
There are plenty of skeptics who don’t believe great style can truly be effortless. Yes, it takes effort to achieve effortless style, but a little effort upfront will make your life and style much easier on a day to day basis.
Imagine never having to try on three different outfits each morning before work. You could sleep in 30 minutes longer! Imagine if you didn’t have to frantically rush from store to store in search of something to wear for an unexpected social event? Life would be easier, and getting dressed would be EFFORTLESS!
Creating an effortless style isn’t about having a lot of money or a lot of clothes. You can create an effortless style simply by doing five things.
For help developing your own effortless style contact Charleston Style Concierge. We can help you develop your style in one hour with our Virtual Style Consultation. Feel great every time you walk out the door. Don’t settle for anything less.
Do you think your image doesn’t matter? Close your eyes and picture yourself in the produce isle of the grocery store, choosing apples. Without any real thought you pick up one apple after the other until you find the perfect one. Some of those apples may be bruised or old, but some of the ones you discarded simply had an image that negatively impacted you. Lucky for us, we can be aware of our image and make changes that ensure we put our best foot forward each and every day.
No matter your profession, age, or where you are going, image always matters. Like it or not, in our society we only get seconds to make a first impression. In that very brief time period people make split decisions and judgments about you that are hard to undo.
A big part of the image you portray comes from the clothing you wear. Coco Chanel said, “Dress shabbily and they remember the dress, dress impeccably and they remember the woman.” Wearing clothing that fits well, is age-appropriate, and shows your unique style will help you portray the image you desire.
What is your clothing saying about you? If you’re not sure, Charleston Style Concierge can help. Sign up for our monthly ezine and shape up your image with FREE style tips and tricks.
Add some excitement to your Valentines Day with the gift you really want:
EFFORTLESS STYLE.
Enter to win a
($100.00 Value)
Enter to win your Virtual Style Consultation.
During a 60-minute Virtual Style Consultation over the phone, we’ll discuss your style goals, answer your questions, and uncover the best way for you to get effortless style. We will use a style-assessment workbook and digital pictures you send to help develop the personal style you desire.
In your 60-minute Virtual Style Consultation, you’ll learn . . .
Here’s how it works: Using a style assessment and digital photos, we will help you determine the right clothing for your body type and easy ways to update your current wardrobe. All you need to do is fill out our style assessment, send photos, and show up for the call. It’s that easy.
Celebrate you this Valentines Day and enter to win.
Winner to be randomly chosen and announced on Valentines Day, February 14th.
GIFT CERTIFICATES ALSO AVAILABLE
1. There are mirrors everywhere. If you hate what you have on you will be less likely to keep a good spirit and finish your workout.
2. A lot of stylish active wear has wicking technology to keep you cool and dry.
3. There are other people there!
4. Choosing workout clothes that don’t make you feel good about your body will deflate your motivated spirit.
5. Style always matters because it gives you the confidence to conquer anything, including that really hard workout.
Until I met Mel, with Virtual Fitness Coach, I would not have believed that I a)needed a personal trainer or b) could afford one. I started working with Mel about a year ago and discovered why I never got the results I wanted even though I was regularly going to the gym. He creates workouts that keep me coming to the gym and ensures that I will see results if I’m willing to put in the effort. I interviewed Mel so you too could get some insight into the best way to live a healthy and active lifestyle.
Lee: “Mel, tell us a little bit about yourself and why you started Virtual Fitness Coach.”
Mel: “I’ve experienced what most people who want to lead a fit and healthy lifestyle have experienced. I’ve allowed work and life to get in the way of exercise and healthy nutrition. I have been severely overweight and unfit. Not anymore. I learned what I need to do and have practiced and preached that for the last ten years. Now as I approach my 50th birthday, I’m fitter than most people half my age.
While working as a personal trainer, I realized that for every person who can afford to hire me one on one, there are thousands of others who need my knowledge and skills that can’t afford to hire me. That’s when I set out to ‘virtualize’ myself and create an affordable option for the masses through Virtual Fitness Coach.”
Lee: “What is the best way to lose weight and get fit?”
Mel: “There really isn’t one ‘best way’ to lose weight or get fit. I think the biggest challenge to losing weight or getting fit is acknowledging the fact that it’s a permanent thing in your life. A little like children! If my 16 month old son decides to get up an hour earlier than planned, I can’t just ignore him because I’ve got something else I need to do. The same goes for eating healthy and exercising. When you acknowledge the fact that what you do or don’t do today for your health and fitness affects your future quality of life, you’re on your way.”
Lee: “You are a busy entrepreneur, a father, a husband, AND a personal trainer. What kind of advice can you give to help people make fitness a lifestyle choice they keep forever?
Mel: “You can’t let your life keep you from exercising. Over the last 25 years, there have been a few years where you would barely recognize me because I was so fat! And now as I hit 50, I’m in the best shape of my life. I’m able to look back at the mistakes I made and see that I allowed my life to get in the way of exercise. Today I’m ten times busier and in great shape compared to my fat days. So there’s something missing from that observation. Simply stated, it’s goals. And by goals I mean something with an end point that you work towards. I just signed up for the ING half marathon in Atlanta at the end of March. So did my wife. Which means we’d better get running!”
Lee: “How can you get fit if you can’t afford a gym membership?”
Mel: “Sometimes joining a gym isn’t the best option. Especially if you can only go at peak hours when parking is impossible and you’re fighting for equipment. It makes the decision not to go and work out a lot easier. But if you buy just a few simple items such as: resistance bands, a jump rope and a pedometer you can have some of the best workouts you could ever imagine. Just ask some of my clients who I take outside to jog/walk and exercise with resistance bands.
Lee: “I’ve heard a lot of people say they don’t lift weights because they are afraid they will bulk up. Is this true?”
Mel: The old saying among trainers is “abs are made in the kitchen”. Which means if you want to lose weight and have a flat belly then the majority of your effort should be focused on what you eat. It’s even more of an issue if you want to ‘bulk up.’ In my 30 years of training I’ve helped less than 5 women gain muscle size. And all of them came to me with that as their primary goal. And they all realized that for them to get bigger it was a simple matter of eating more food than they could ever have imagined. So, if you’re leery about lifting weights and bulking up just take a look around a gym and seek out the girls with the best physique and I can bet you they are the ones lifting the heaviest weights.
Lee: “Why hire a personal trainer?”
Mel: “The best way to describe what it’s like to hire a personal trainer is to use a GPS device as an analogy. A GPS takes the guesswork out of the equation. You plug in your destination and then sit back and relax as this voice guides you until you’ve reached where you want to go! That’s a trainer. Whether that’s one on one, or as a virtual coach.
More often than not, each piece of your brand image was created when you needed it, but not altogether in a strategic fashion. Your image may look fine, but does fine help you grow?
Eventually as you scale, your image foundation cracks, and the way your business presents itself no longer helps propel growth – costing you time and money to fix.
When you unlock your brand power, you get to pick and choose how people perceive you and your brand.
Our Image Mastery System™ takes the 5 key brand components that you already have and ties them together in a way that amplifies your results and achieves your vision.
