Timed Style

By Bridgette Raes

Last Monday I went out to Pennsylvania with some friends. At 6:30 on Monday morning, I took the bus back to New York City with my one friends. Monday is the day that I devote to spending in my office, which is conveniently situated in my home. Because of this, I don’t have to think too hard about what I am going to be wearing. That morning I got up, threw on a pair of jeans and a sweater and put my hair up in a clip. And after dabbing on minimal makeup, I was ready to go. I mean, at this ungodly hour, how much more could I do?

When we got to the bus station I found myself amongst commuters who were getting on the 6:30 a.m. bus for work! I was stunned! Every day these folks get up, and not only have to catch a bus at 6:30, but they somehow have to manage to pull themselves together and look work-appropriate. While I was standing there, in the jeans that I lived in all weekend and my sort-of-brushed-hair, I was in extreme admiration of these people, and okay, I also thought they were slightly insane for putting up with a commute like this daily.

As I looked at the women, some looked nice and others, well, not so nice. Regardless of how they looked, I was certain that these women didn’t have the luxury of dawdle time that or any other workday morning. I am positive that many of these women don’t grab a cup of fresh coffee and watch the weather report with their feet up while their iron gets hot enough to get the wrinkles out of their silk blouse.

No, these women move in the morning. Many of them probably dress in the dark and blindly feel their way through their closets, needing to grab and go and have it be as no-fuss as possible. On top of everything else, women, in general, are multi-taskers and I would guess that on top of their own morning issues, some of the women probably had to deal with at least one unruly child or a husband who suddenly forgot how to dress himself.

Nine out of ten of my clients tell me that they feel rushed in the morning. Be it the act of juggling a family and all that comes with it, or the career clients who have high pressured jobs that get them out the door at the crack of dawn for a lengthy commute, many of the women who work with me want to look good, but they want to look good quick and fast.

So if you are one of those women who needs your style to be like fast-food, then here are some things that you can do to ensure that your time-starved mornings don’t comprimise your style.

Grab and Go Separates

I have a client who is a lawyer and who has a lengthy commute to New York each morning. Her one complaint about her wardrobe was that it took too much time to think about it, and time was something she just didn’t have. I remember saying that her wardrobe needed to be grab and go. It needed to be so stupid-simple that looking good required next to no thought in the morning. My client whole-heartedly agreed.

Just because a wardrobe is grab and go, doesn’t mean that it lacks style or flair. What was probably the most amazing was that after working with this client, her outftts were more thought out and accessorized than they were prior to working together. There were more steps to her outfts each day, but the difference is that these steps were clear and obvious.
Many of you are familiar with Garanimals http://www.garanimals.com/girls_clothes_infant_panda.htm. Garanimals are clothes for children that mix and match. When a parent buys Garanimals, they match up tags that have the same animal on them. As you can see from clicking to the site, the tags of each animal create a group of pieces create mix and match outfits. This is going to sound crazy, but a woman on the go would benefit from thinking about her outfit in a Garanimals manner.
By having mix and match options, you will be able to grab and go quickly.

Keep it low maintenance

I don’t know about all of you, but in the mornings that I can’t get out of the house fast enough, if something requires ironing, I don’t wear it. I hate high maintenance clothing, and I would imagine that any woman who is rushed in the morning feels similarily.

When shopping with clients, especially for spring clothing, if we find something we like but we aren’t sure if it will wrinkle easily I will often scrunch up part of the garment and then release it. If the garment holds the wrinkles, we leave it at the store. After all, who wants to be bothered? Just like people want wash-and-ear hair, rushed women need wash and wear clothing. Choose knits over button-down shirts, fabrics that don’t wrinkle easily, and anything that has easy-care options on the care label.

If you always rush or don’t have enough time make your closets as stylishly low maintenance as possible, this will give you a few extra seconds in the morning.

Keep your closet organized

Everyone should have an organized closet, but women who rush in the morning need to pay particular attention to this. This past week I received a phone call from a gentleman who wants to hire me for his wife who has a high pressure job, a long commute to work and often gets dressed in the dark. The biggest obstacle that his wife dealt with was rummaging through her closet. She grappled with dry cleaning bags, piles of shoes in no order, and no breathing room to easily thumb through and make clothing decisions. Sound familiar?

As a result, many mornings this woman would wear whatever she could easily grab and throw on. As her husband pointed out to me on the phone, these choices were definitely not the best ones. I wasn’t surprised.

So, time-starved readers out there, keep your closet pristine, organized and clear. Get rid of dry cleaning bags, they aren’t good for your clothing anyway. Make your closet hassle free. I don’t care if the rest of your home is total chaos, just make sure that your closet is navigable.

Lay it out ahead of time

You have probably heard the importance of laying out your clothing ahead of time. I have never gotten into the habit of doing this, however when I do lay my clothing out ahead of time I am ALWAYS glad I did. My mornings seem to have a seamless flow to them when I lay my clothing out the night before.

If you are someone who doesn’t do this, or feels like it is a hassle to lay your clothing out, remember that it takes time for a new habit to stick, so give yourself a chance with this one. Perhaps make a promise to yourself that for the next month you will, no matter what, lay your clothing out the night before. After a month of giving it a chance, see how it has affected your ability to get out the door more quickly in the morning. If you find that it makes no difference, then let it go and try something else.

Also, if you have others who depened on you, like your children, or a husband whose dressing ability seemed to regress once you got married, than lay their clothes out the night before, too. Well… lay your children’s clothing out the night before and tell your husband that he is a big boy and he can find his own clothes to wear.

(c) Bridgette Raes Style Group 2005

Style takes time

By Bridgette Raes

A few weeks ago I got an email from one of my very first clients. This client and I worked together back in 2002 when we first started Bridgette Raes Style Group, and since then we have remained in contact. Getting this particular email, however, was particularly touching, It read:

"Reading your wonderful newsletter I realized that my wardrobe has morphed wonderfully with your tutelage. The more flattering colors and shapes are taking over! I have followed your principals as much as possible, with many mistakes... BUT, the end result is that a few years later I looked FABULOUS on a cruise in January, feel completely confident that I will look great visiting my son in St Croix next month. I am still working on finding the right winter pants, a raincoat, outer jackets and so on... but I am holding out for the right thing. Thank you. I don't even mind my mistakes that much... I just know what I will get rid of when I can acquire the right items! Yesterday I bought fabulous pale pink slip on flats for summer and know they will look great. In the past I would have stuck with black shoes."

The first thing that made me happy about what my client said was that even though it has been two years since we worked together, she is still stylish and able to pull herself together well. One of the key things that we strive for is a lasting and effective personal style transformation. Not being able to dress every one of my clients every morning, eventually I have to let them go to "fly on their own." Getting this email made me happy to know that this client is still looking fabulous, and everything she learned from working with me has continued to stick.

The second thing that I acknowledged from reading the above message was that developing a wonderful personal style is not an overnight transformation. Sure, many clients who work with me have the ability to plunk down a decent amount of money when shopping with me, and even though the results of working together are immediate, to completely and fully embrace a new style takes time. After reading the above message I thought it important to tell all of you this, because it is easy to get frustrated with our style, or to feel that we are not transforming quickly enough.

I call a client's personal style transformation becoming fluent in your own style. Just as becoming fluent in a language it takes time -- it is not an overnight process -- if you stick with it and trust, over time you will get it down pat. So even if you aren't a client of ours and you haven't reaped the benefits of one-on-one work, we thought that this week we would list some suggestions on how you can, over time, embrace your own personal style in ways that are lasting and effective. It is my hope that all of you reading this will have the same degree ofl success with your own personal style as our client above.

Tip #1- Forgive yourself

As my client said, even after working with me she made many mistakes. Mistakes are valuable lessons that we need in order to put us on the right track. As the saying goes, in order to figure out who you are, you often have to figure out first who you are not. Making a clothing mistake just reminds us of what isn't our style, or what isn't right for our bodies. Even I make a mistake from time to time with my wardrobe. I bring something home and quickly rethink my choice. Truthfully, this has happened only a handful of times over the past few years, but even I am not perfect.

When you do make an error, take some time to assess the mistake and learn from it. I often tell the following story when I speak: When I was just starting out as a designer, I had a job that required me to dress for work. Being in my very early 20's I didn't know much about my personal style, and I often looked to how others dressed in order to figure out what I should buy. I remember needing a few suits for work. I looked around at other women and noticed that many business women wear skirt suits, so I figured that I should get a skirt suit. I bought a lovely grey skirt suit and wore it once, and never wore it again.

Years later when I was cleaning my closet I looked at that skirt suit. There was dust on the shoulders of the jacket because I never wore it. Instead of just tossing it, I thought about why I never wore the suit. I realized that when I wear a skirt suit, I don't feel powerful. It isn't that I think skirt suits don't look powerful in general, many women do look powerful in a skirt suit, but I realized that personally I feel more powerful in pant suits. I never bought a skirt suit again, and have decided to stick with pant suits. Perhaps my feelings on this will change in the future, but for now I acknowledge my feelings and dress accordingly.

Assessing your mistakes and thanking them for sending you a message about what your personal style is (or isn't) will give you the power to make wiser decisions in the future.

Tip #2- Style is ever-evolving

Everyone's style flows with the times! If it didn't, we all wouldn't laugh at pictures of ourselves from ten years ago. There are people whose style doesn't change EVER and those are people who often look stagnant or stuck at another time in their life. Everyone's style needs to change so it stays in rhythm with the changes of life. Granted, I think at the core our style doesn't change that radically. I have always leaned towards a more classic style with a twist; however, how I dress that modern classic style has morphed plenty in the past years.

So, as a result, we are on a bit of a slippery slope when it comes to our own style. Just when we think we have it, our tastes change, our life changes or fashion in general changes. It often becomes a one-step-forward, two-steps-back feeling. So what can you do?

Try to identify your core style, that foundational personal style that, regardless of current trends, still identifies you. For example, my style is very classic, and as I have mentioned in articles past, I think Michael Kors should be sainted. Regardless of how I "ice the cake" (so to speak) with the fun stuff like a great handbag, a stunning pair of shoes or a cool top, my style is still very classic in nature.

By identifying your core style that remains consistent over the years, you have a foundation with which to start. You will become less frazzled when the trends evolve around you, navigating those trends with more confidence, assessing how exactly you can "ice" your core style with fringe. Doing this will also ensure that your style will remain true to who you are on the inside.

How can you find your core style? Look at your style over the past years. Have you been attracted to very avant garde things, or very classic things? Are you on the cutting edge of fashion, or do you like the classics that will remain for years to come? Identifying your core style takes you one very important step in the right direction.

Tip #3- Take the bad with the good

We often want to beat ourselves up when we make a fashion faux-pas. As it hangs in our closet as a glaring mistake, we often want to beat ourselves up for our erred judgment and what seems like wasted money. As my client said in her note to me, she doesn't mind when she purchases the wrong thing because she just knows that when she does find the right thing, she will get rid of the mediocre that isn't working.

I like to refer to these things as life-support items. Sure they aren't perfect, but they work. We all want to wave the magic wand and have the perfect wardrobe tomorrow, but the reality is that it seldom happens this way. Look at the life-support things in your closet and figure out what you can do with them while you are in the transition of finding the perfect things. I am always on the search for the perfect-fitting pair of pants, and in addition to losing a considerable amount of weight over the past year, many of the pants that I currently own aren't perfect winners. Do I still wear them even though they aren't exactly what I would want in my closet? Admittedly I do.

Being a business owner still growing a business, I don't always have the financial luxury of tossing everything in my closet that doesn't work! I wish I could, but this unfortunately isn't a reality. So I reserve my stunning pants for times that I know I must look impeccable, and hold the not-so-great for when I don't have to look perfect. For example, I have a great pair of jeans that I wear when I know I must look good, and my less well-fitting jeans have been relegated to errand running and laundry days. What I say may be riddled with contradiction, but let's get real, most of us don't live in a world where we can transform our wardrobes overnight. This is an ever evolving process, so by identifying what we would like to eventually get rid of and dog-earing them in our closet, we can create a wish list of things we need to concentrate on purchasing when we find them, or when the funds become available.

Tip #4 Give it time

Like playing an instrument or learning a language, developing a personal style that we love takes time. We want it overnight , but that just doesn't happen. Committing to focusing a little time on your personal style is the first step of a long journey of style transformation. Learn to love the process and the discovery of who you are and what you want to represent to others visually. When you make a great purchase or find something that is a home-run, acknowledge that it is another step in the right direction and that you are on your way! Truth is, we are never done perfecting our personal style, so if you look at it as a journey of self-discovery vs. being a one shot deal, it will loosen the expectations that you may have about what it means to be stylish.

(c) 2005 Bridgette Raes Style Group