Recently several clients and friends have asked me how to deal with dressing in the summer with the vastly varying temperatures either going from: -Arctic office conditions to sweltering desert heat outside or -Starting the day off at a cool 65°F in the morning with the mercury rising to 95°F in the afternoon. While we’ve all heard that layering is crucial especially in Colorado, it can often be a bit of a nebulous concept that usually brings winter sports to mind versus dressing for an office day, out and about seeing clients, or even keeping up with the kids. In this post I’ll give you a few ideas for layering in the office. In my next post, we’ll talk about layering for business casual and casual environments. If your office is extremely frigid due to air conditioning that just won’t quit, (why they can’t get a handle on this in 2010 I’ll never know,) start each day with either a camisole or tank top. These aren’t your weekend/work out pieces, because depending on how insanely hot it is outside you may be stripping down to this layer at some point. (Keeping this in mind, always be conscious of your bra straps.) Next add a cotton or (Read more...)

Yesterday morning I was having coffee with a good friend/business colleague. I was wearing my  new scoop neck, animal print top, (see picture.) It’s not necessarily low cut, but it’s not terribly modest, either. At one point, I was writing something down and leaning over the table a bit. I just happened to glance at my friend and noticed her eyes looking down, which promptly made me look at my top. Yep, I could see right down into it. Now I know my friend, a female, wasn’t trying to look down my shirt, but the truth is that skin and cleavage are simply distracting. Once I noticed, we had a chuckle over it, but be assured I sat up straight the rest of the day, and I won’t wear the top for business again. The moral of the story? When you’re in the fitting room, pay attention to: -the way your tops and blouses move with you -how low they’re cut -and how they fit, not just how cute they are.

Something from Clinton Kelly's Makeover America show at Macy's last month has been weighing on my mind. Before the fashion show started,  Clinton mentioned to us that as women, we should try to wear some blouses. He was rather comical when he tried to imitate a woman, "Ooh, but that's so fancy!" To which he replied, "No, it's not. A blouse is just a shirt for women." This got me to thinking; I hardly have any blouses in my wardrobe. There are a couple of reasons. One, I have a hard time with fit. My back is very wide, so I always get pulling through the bustline. Two, most of the blouses I see either have ruffles or bows, and I'm not a ruffle and bow kind of girl. However, because of these reasons, I never have a blouse on my shopping list. I don't really put out my radar for blouses for myself. Now that Clinton has given me the challenge, I'm going to put at least one blouse on my shopping list for fall. It might mean that I have to go up a size and have it altered. Knowing that I'm not going to be buying a ton of (Read more...)

The other day when I was pre-shopping for a client, a woman in her late teens or early 20's struck up a conversation with me. (This is precisely why I only charge for two hours of pre-shopping.) The woman was very sweet and proceeded to tell me that she used to wear a size 8. Now she wears a size 18 and just doesn't know how to dress her body anymore.

She had a curvy figure, which is really just a euphemism for an hourglass figure, as you can see below. We've heard for years that the hour glass figure is ideal, but it's simply not true. The challenge that women with hour glass figures deal with is that their waists are much smaller than their hips and bust lines. If you're not dressing correctly, it's easy to look much heavier than your really are.

I gave my new friend a couple of tips and would like to share those and more with everyone today. Looking at the photos of America Ferrara below, the outfit (Read more...)

If you have never been to SOL Lingerie in Cherry Creek North, you must go for a bra fitting. They are truly experts!
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In just a few mere days, all of the Fall Fashion Preview issues of the fashion magazines will be hitting the newsstands! Admittedly, it's a pretty exciting time of year for me. Although the magazines have been giving small glimpses of fall for most of the summer, September is when the big, thick, "bibles" hit. You may be wondering why I'm talking about this. It's simple, one word, okay well two: Wardrobe Planning! By seeing the new trends and designer offerings, you can begin to get a good feel for what you need to update and complete your wardrobe. (Read more...)