Having transformed the styles of women over the past eleven years of working as a personal stylist I can say that the most important part of upgrading any client’s style is to really teach them the importance of accessorizing their outfits. If you want to look stylish, you don’t need more clothes, you need more accessories. Accessories are any non-clothing items, including shoes, handbags, scarves and jewelry. Today’s post in this series I am going to, yet again, drive home the importance of accessorizing.
See your accessories like a spice rack
By now you may be familiar with my chicken analogy when describing basic wardrobe items. Like chicken, your basics need to be accented with something to make them tasty. Your style rut is equivalent to throwing chicken into a pot of boiling water and just eating it…blech! It’s edible, but it sure isn’t exciting. Like spices, the best way to pump your basics up is through your accessories. This is why I want you to view the accessories you own as your clothing spice rack.
If your spice rack contained only a few spices, like oregano and salt, for example, the variety of what you could cook would be limited. The more spices you own, the more you can do with your food. The same is true for your accessories. If all you own are a string of pearls and a pair of basic earrings the variety in the types of outfits you can create is limited. You need to add more spices to your rack.
Tips for those who have never accessorized before
If you’re new to accessorizing or you walk around glazed over at the store when you see all the options available to you, I am going to, first give you some tips for how to accessorize.
First, let’s talk about how you decide on what accessories to purchase. It’s so fascinating that women struggle with shopping because it requires nothing more than buying the things you are drawn to. Accessories are typically one-size-fits-all and are buys that are more emotionally driven. So, why the hesitation and avoidance of buying accessories? I’m not entirely sure why women avoid it. Honestly, when it comes for shopping for accessories, the best advice I can give you is to trust your gut and let your instincts do the choosing.
Yet, shopping for accessories does involve some sort of planning to ensure you get the most out of what you purchase. Just like you wouldn’t buy six bottles of cumin for your spice rack, you wouldn’t purchase 6 accessory items that look exactly the same. Once you cover an area of need you move on. Last Friday I was in a store and saw a pair of earrings I thought were gorgeous. However, I didn’t purchase them because I could identify that I already had a pair at home in a similar color. When I look through the accessories of a new client I often notice they possess a lot of sameness in what they own. You want to avoid this.
Next, look at your wardrobe and see if there are color themes. For example, you may be drawn to earth tones or poppy brights. Wherever the colors of your wardrobe are most based is where you want to go with your accessory colors. However, you don’t want to stop there. You also want to look at accessory colors that will complement what you own. I’ll give you another example from my own wardrobe: I have a burgundy dress that I often wear with celadon earrings. That pop of color in my earrings is what makes the outfit interesting. In addition, if you’re wardrobe is more neutral based, your options for the colors you add truly are limitless. I will show you some example of what I mean later on.
Does accessorizing create more to do?
The belief about accessorizing is that it just creates more to do. Most women struggle enough to figure out what to wear, making the additional step of accessorizing a needless chore. However, accessorizing isn’t time consuming, it’s a time saver. Let’s take a very basic work outfit, like a pair of black pants and a pink sweater, for example. Without any accessorizing this outfit is completely acceptable, but it may not be all that exciting. It is through accessorizing that this outfit can become more interesting and how more variety can be created. Accessorizing is how this very basic look can be changed up to look different, which will give you more variety, maximize the use of what you already own, create less of a need to purchase more clothing and will save you time trying to figure out something else to wear. It is through accessorizing, you could create several very different looks in one outfit simply by changing up how you accessorize it. Going back to the chicken analogy: If the black pants and pink sweater is your chicken (the base), the variety of spices (accessories) can give you a ton of different chicken based (black pants and pink sweater) recipes.
Accessorizing examples and how they can help you get more with less
Here are three different work looks changed up three different ways each to show you how it is through accessorizing that you can create more variety in your wardrobe.
Look #1
Here is a basic pair of pants by J. Crew, a top by Catherine Malandrino and a cardigan from Modcloth. All of these items are pretty basic and simple. As you can see in the three different outfits it is accessorizing that gives this outfit three very different looks. With a neutral based outfit the accessorizing options are limitless.
In the first look, I added a pair of black booties by Jessica Simpson, a basic gold necklace from Stella & Dot, and green earrings by Minu Jewels. In the next outfit, to change things up, I added a burgundy pair of Clark’s pumps, a pink necklace by Blu Bijoux, and a green cocktail ring by Robert Chiarella. Lastly, to put a third spin on the same base, a yellow Blu Bijoux necklace was added, a gold bracelet, and green Ron White pumps.
Bridgette’s accessorizing tip: When choosing a statement necklace, keep the earrings simple, and vice versa. Personally, I don’t care for earring and necklace sets.
Look #2
Next, let’s talk about this simple black dress from Reiss. If you are not changing up your little black dress you are seriously missing out and losing money on all the mileage you can get from it.
In the first look, I added a pop of color with a pair of green Wednesday Collection earrings and styled the look with a pair of black boots by Rockport. Next, using the same burgundy pumps above (you want to use your accessories more than one way), I added a turquoise blue necklace by Elyssa Bass and a basic pair of studs by One Oak. Lastly, for a totally different look, this versatile pair of grey pumps, by Jessica Simpson, were styled with the dress and a yellow necklace by Blu Bijoux was added for a punch. For a finish, I styled in basic gold studs by Kendra Phillip.
Bridgette’s accessorizing tip: It’s smart to have at least one pair of gold and silver earrings, both short and long, on hand in a pinch. They don’t have to be boring, just versatile.
Look #3
Accessorizing outfits does not mean that the clothing in the outfits have to be neutral or colorless. Here, I chose a pink T. Tahari top with a grey skirt from Zara. As you can see, you can still play with color even when your outfit is colorful.
In the first outfit, I chose the same black booties as the first look (that I envisioned being worn with black opaque tights. I chose a fun pair of gold chandelier earrings by Ali NY, and used the same green cocktail ring from the first looks. Next, to work tonally with the pink blouse, I chose the same burgundy pumps and added a pair of Robert Lee Morris earrings that not only pick up the pink and burgundy of the outfit but also add in some new colors and finished the outfit with the same gold bracelet used previously. In the third outfit, all pieces that were previously used in prior outfits is used here.
Bridgette’s accessorizing tip: In addition to gold and silver, when in doubt go green. Green is a colored neutral that will work with any color that you are wearing. A green necklace or pair of earrings will get you tremendous mileage. Other colors that have nearly the same versatility are yellow, teal and, believe it or not, orange.
