How I’m Assessing and Refining My Personal Style
Have you ever felt the need to reassess and refine your personal style? How have you gone about the project — and what were the results? Here's how I've been refining my personal style…
I've been going through my own personal style reassessment, and I thought I'd share what I've been doing — but I'd love to hear what your tips and experiences on the subject are.
(Possible trigger warning in that I am unhappy at my current weight and body style, and trying to come to terms with it, but still have a ways to go. If you love your body no matter what size it is, you have my admiration and respect!)
{related: how to do a complete wardrobe revamp}
My First Step to Refining My Personal Style: I Threw All Constraints out the Window
Because I spend so much time Internet shopping, the first game I played with myself was: What would I want to buy if I had an unlimited budget, it came in my size, and I had a place to wear it? I tried to throw out “how to dress your body” rules I've learned through the years and really just focus on what products I thought were cool. I started saving evening gowns, T-shirts, lingerie, dresses — whatever. A Pinterest board would have been helpful here, but I just saved the product images to a folder on my desktop.
I did this for months. (It helped that it was the pandemic and I legitimately had nowhere to go, so this sort of sated the urge to shop, to the extent our blog content doesn't already fulfill that need.)
{related: how to cultivate style (vs. trend, vs. frump)}
Step 2: I Looked for Patterns
Finally, I opened up the folder and started pulling the pieces into individual folders. There was “Fancy Kat” for evening gowns and cocktail dresses. There was “Sexy Kat” for stuff that I'd wear on dates with my husband. There was “Working Kat” for workwear I'd buy for networking things, conferences, and the like. There was “Mom Kat” that ended up being some beautiful basic clothes that I could see wearing to school pickup or on a family vacation or out to a family brunch — not too sexy, not to businessy.
There were a lot of leftover pieces that I still loved but didn't really fit into the other folders — they were sometimes bold, sometimes sharp-edged, sometimes a little wacky. I ended up calling the folder “That Girl Kat,” because they were all the kinds of clothes you'd admire on a stranger, i.e., “did you see That Girl?” or “I must find a dress like the one That Girl was wearing.”
(These were just my categories and how things broke out when I looked at the images I'd saved — you may end up with totally different folders. This kind of comes back to the idea of “the weekend you,” named after a chapter in a book by Elsa Klensch in which she noted that many women executives she knew had a totally different clothing personality on weekends, such as “Daisy in The Great Gatsby.”)
I essentially ended up making myself a vision board — this is what it looked like:
{related: how to get your style groove back}
Step 3: I Tried to See What Pieces I Owned Already Fit Those Patterns
This, again, was more of a desktop exercise because I try to save the product images for everything I buy for myself and the kids, with notes about size and the price I paid (including the non-discounted price if I feel like it's relevant).
This was particularly interesting because it absolutely helped me refine my style and review things that I'd been willy-nilly buying. Some things (that I didn't wear often or just never “felt right” went in the Goodwill pile almost immediately.
(As someone who tends to hold onto clothes well past their expiration date, that's saying something!)
The Result: New Lenses
Do I have an entirely new wardrobe now? No — but I feel like I've given myself new lenses with which to view myself and my style, and in some cases the courage to try things that might have seemed a bit out there previously (such as all the leather/leather-look pants I've bought recently!). It's also given me some new ideas for items to pair together, and a better idea of the general “vibe” I want when I'm putting together an outfit.
{related: how to make an outfit look put together}
Readers, what are your thoughts? Have you ever felt the need to reassess your personal style, and/or refine it? How have you gone about the project — and what were the results?
{related: tips on creating a capsule wardrobe for work}
Stock photo via Stencil.
Thank you for sharing this, Kat! It was interesting to see your boards–I am doing this on Pinterest right now, actually, for “personal style,” with a board for hair as well.
FWIW, I did not read negativity toward your body in the post at all.
The new crepe suiting at Ann Taylor is so Olivia Pope and I love it. I also love WHBM for the Figueroa from OITNB feel.
I’m doing something like this right now, more out of my need to be organized than anything. I have been taking daily selfies and saving them in a folder on my iphone so I can suss out which colors really do look best on me. When I can, I get a full length selfie to figure out shape.
And I inventoried my wardrobe on an Excel spreadsheet, because I do everything in Excel, so I can remember what I have when I’m mindlessly scrolling. I’ve made a tab to keep track of outfits, good and bad, that I’ve worn so I can remember what to wear with whatever top or bottoms next time.
It’s a bit obsessive, I realize, but when I got a last minute invitation to a wedding, I looked at my spreadsheet and realized I had the perfect outfit already.
You’d like Stylebook. It’s a great app. No monthly fee.
I’ve struggled with my weight and it’s taking forever to lose the gained inches. I feel uncomfortable at this size/ fitness level so I’m motivated to fix this.
I’ve changed my style a bit welcoming bootcut pants 2 years ago. Add in some classics and I feel like I look good, even if moving around is awkward. I’m using more accessories now.
I had breast cancer treatment for stage 3 cancer during the early pandemic. I have/had very dense breasts. Ladies, please get your breast density level diagnosed and please get extra breast cancer screening if you have dense breasts. Please do this before you are 40.
Here is how my wardrobe and grooming have changed:
Pre-pandemic: dresses, skirted suits, heels. Now: sweater jackets, menswear collared cardigans, long skirts, never heels.
Pre-pandemic: professional makeup, maybe on the lighter side for many women. Contact lenses.
Now:Wear a lot more makeup for frequent videoconferencing. Almost exclusively wear glasses.
Pre-pandemic: chin length bob, beautiful color, frequent blowouts for events.
Now: hair loss due to ongoing treatment, wear wigs on camera and in certain out in public contexts, otherwise, turbans.
Pre-pandemic: Purchased and regularly replaced high quality expensive bras.
Now: due to lymphedema, must wear compression garment bra, compression sleeve and glove.
Pre-pandemic: happy with face and teeth.
Now: moving towards first Botox and fillers, researching facelift, eye surgery,
neck treatment, moving towards cosmetic dentistry
Pre-pandemic: happy with body shape and size
Now: cancer treatment led to a lot of weight gain and menopause. Have worked really hard to lose weight. Have been somewhat successful. Trying to love myself in this version of my body.
Please, please consider giving donations to an organization other than Goodwill. There is a great Clotheshorse podcast episode detailing why it is not the ideal organization to work with for donations.
Kat- where is the grey sweater in the everyday sexy section from?
Anonymous – love your post-pandemic style and sending good vibes your way.
Any suggestions for camp? I love the idea, but always have a hard time making it look slightly more classic.
Yes, I just did this too. It came about because I needed to plan and shop for a conference I was attending. I sat down and organized my things into two categories professional and casual. I then broke those down into 1. pieces I’m currently loving and want to build my wardrobe around, and 2. pieces I’m wearing but not loving and don’t want to build my wardrobe around. I was surprised by how this exercise so clearly and easily revealed the colors I want to wear and those I don’t. From there I began to recognize commonalities that make up my current style which I’m lovingly calling horse girl chic. Lots of earth tones, suede, top stitching, and horse bits. I can now clearly see which pieces I have fit this and which don’t, and know what to look for and what to avoid when I shop. Love to hear about other people’s processes around this topic, thanks for getting the conversation going!
Hi, Miss Kat! Thank you for sharing this! It was an interesting topic. I can now easily see which clothes I have that fit this and which do not, and I know what to look for and what to avoid when I go shopping. I’d love to learn about other people’s approaches to this topic.