← Her Style Podcast | Shopping, Color Palettes, Fashion, Wardrobe, Outfits, Clothing
Her Style Podcast | Shopping, Color Palettes, Fashion, Wardrobe, Outfits, Clothing
271 | Struggling to Find Clothes That Flatter Your Body? Do This First
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One of the most common frustrations I hear from women is this: “I can’t find clothes that flatter my body.” Maybe you’ve been stuck in that cycle—ordering a pile of clothes, trying them on, hating how they look, and sending most of...
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One of the most common frustrations I hear from women is I can't find clothes that flatter my body. Maybe you've been stuck in that cycle, ordering a pile of clothes, trying them on, hating how they look, and sending most of them back. Or maybe you've spent money in store only to let those pieces sit in your closet because something feels off when you put them on. Let's clear the air right away and say that you are not the issue and neither is your body. The real problem is not having the right strategies to find the clothes that highlight your unique features in the best way. Today I'm going to show you the very first step in that process, the step that makes everything else shopping, styling, and editing your closet so much easier. If you want to consistently find clothes that flatter your figure, there's one simple thing you need to do first. Keep listening to find out exactly what it is and what to do next. Welcome to her Style podcast where we're all about empowering you to show up and get dressed every day with confidence. I'm your host, Heather Riggs, a 15 year and counting certified image consultant and color specialist, ready to build a wardrobe and a personal style you love. Let's get started. Ooh, friend, I left you on a big cliffhanger hanger there, didn't I? So we are not going to waste any time. I'm going to reveal this right away. If you are struggling to find clothes to flatter your body, the first thing you need to do is identify your confidence points. This is a brand new term that I just coined for this episode because I was trying to figure out a good way to describe what we're going to talk about today. So if you're in the collective and you're like, what in the heck is that? We're going to explain it. And confidence points are really just the features that you already feel good about. The parts of your body that you're happy to have highlight, whether that's your waist, your neckline, shoulders, arms, legs, curves, whatever the case might be. Instead of dressing from a place of insecurity, trying to hide what you don't like, confidence points are going to flip the script. They are going to become your North Star for choosing both outfits and new pieces. Now, you don't need to pick all of them. I want you to start small and choose just one or two areas that you love and feel confident showing off. For example, you might think, I always get compliments on my legs or I love my hair or my eye color or my Waist is one of my favorite features. It can be absolutely any physical feature, just something we can see from the outside and focus on when you're getting dressed. And if you're stuck, I want you to think back to the compliments that you've received. What do people tend to notice and point out about you in a positive way? That's usually a natural confidence point for you. So. So just go ahead and start right there. And listen up. You are not allowed to say nothing. I want you to look in the mirror and talk to yourself like a friend. If you were your best friend, what would you say to encourage her? Or ask your best friend? I don't care. You can call up a friend. You can ask your spouse or your kiddo or a neighbor or whoever is a great cheerleader for you in your life. Again, we're just looking for one or two physical features to start. Now here's what you're going to do with this information and I promise we're going to tie it back to finding clothing that flatters you. But first, I want you to take some baby steps to put this knowledge into action. So we're not going to start shopping just yet. But once you have identified one or two confidence points that you feel really good about, you can build a couple of super simple outfit formulas around them. And this is what makes getting dressed faster, easier, and a lot more fun. Let me give you a couple of examples just to get your wheels turning. If you love your waist, you feel like you've got some good waist definition. That's an area even if you don't feel like you have good waist definition, but that's an area of your body that you want to try to highlight when you're getting dressed. You could do lots of great things. You can reach for belts. You could try wrap dresses. Opt for high rise trousers that hit right at the waistline with your top tucked into them. You could wear peplum tops, anything that defines your midsection and draws the focus to this favorite feature or area. If you want to highlight your legs, you could wear midi skirts with slits, or opt for cropped trousers or slim ankle pants. You could break out those fitted skinny jeans that everyone's wearing. Again, I promise you they are back in style yet again. Or you could just wear shorts or skirts. Those are great ways to show off your legs. Or try shorter hemlines that allow you to show some skin. If you love your shoulders or maybe your arms, if those are one or two of your confidence points, then you could reach for off the shoulder Tops, maybe try halter necklines, sleeveless dresses or fitted sleeves, all of which will do the trick to show off your beautiful shoulders and arms. If you want to bring the focus back to your neckline or your face, then you can opt for V neck tops or scoop necks or collared shirts that are left, you know, leave a couple buttons open just to highlight that area. Or you could even opt for accessories like state statement necklaces or scarves that are going to draw the attention upward to that area. If you want to flaunt your curves, you can wear body skimming fabrics. Wrap dresses are great for this too. Or high waist pencil skirts. Those are really in right now too, those knee length skirts. All of which are going to beautifully showcase your shape. The key here is don't over complicate it again. Just pick one confidence point and use it as your guide and start creating some great outfit formulas or bases that really help to draw the focus there. And this is where we want to talk about what you already own. Most of us think the answer is always to do more shopping. But before you buy anything new, take a second look at your closet through the lens of your confidence points. Let's say one of them is your legs. Maybe you're going to pull out all of your bottoms. Try cuffing up your jeans a little bit to show some ankle, or try pairing them with a shorter cardigan that helps to elongate your lower half. If your confidence point is your neckline, you could experiment with a more open top like a scoop neck tank. Maybe try that under blazer. Or you could add a statement necklace or some dramatic earrings to help draw the eye there. The goal is to style what you already own in new ways that highlight your best features. I want to challenge you to pull three pieces from your closet today or this week whenever you have a chance and style them specifically with your confidence points in mind. You're going to be surprised at how different your clothes feel when you approach them this way and focus on the positive rather than the negative. This is such an empowering way to go about getting dressed. Now when you are ready to shop. And yes, the time will come when you're ready to shop. Or you might be saying, seriously Heather, I need to buy some stuff this season. I have nothing to wear right now. Then knowing your confidence points and starting there will completely change the game. I'm going to give you some really practical hacks to make it a lot easier to find things that are going to flatter your body as well. So the first thing you can do is to filter by feature. And when you're browsing online, I say this all the time. You don't want to browse, you want to hunt. You want to be very specific about what you're looking for. So so you can use the filters or you can search for keywords that are tied back to your confidence point. I gave you a few ideas to get started with. We're going to cover a lot more than that inside our upcoming Wardrobe Revamp bootcamp and of course you can ask me your specific questions. If there's an obscure physical feature that you want to highlight, we can definitely brainstorm that together. But instead of typing in tops or pants, let's get a lot more specific. You might want to try searching belted dress, cropped trousers, square neck top, front slit maxi skirt. Of course you can also throw in colors or fabrics or sizes if you want to go even narrower with your search. But the more specific you can be, you are going to instantly surface more flattering options, cut through a lot of the noise and save yourself hours of aimless online window shopping and a whole lot of frustration. I think the next thing that can really help about knowing your confidence points is figuring out which stores are going to help you nail certain fits and different retailers are known for different strengths. If you are looking for some great waist definition, Banana Republic, Reiss and Anthropologie often carry belted dresses and high rise trousers. Of course that is hardly an exhaustive list, so keep searching from there, but make sure that you're looking for brands that are really known for having some good waist defining pieces. If you're a petite and you're looking for some shorter proportions, you might want to narrow your searches down to places like Ann Taylor Loft also carries petite sizing or brands like Petite Studio nyc. Just hone in on those petite brands and try to find the ones that work best for your signature style. If you like curvier fits or you want to show off your curves, Good American, Madewell and Universal Standard are great for pieces that skim and flatter your figure without squeezing the life out of it. If you want leg lengthening trousers, you could look at Everlane, Aritzia and J. Crew. They all often offer cropped and ankle grazing cuts in multiple inseams. So again, just a couple of starting points to help you on your searches, but think about matching up your ideal brands with your ideal confidence points. And then of course you want to train your eye with product photos. So when you're shopping online, don't just look at the clothes, I want you to study how they're styled on the model and how they read. So ask yourself, where does the hemline hit? Is that a flattering spot for you? Does the waist look defined or is it shapeless? Maybe that's not as important for you, but you want to think about all of these things and kind of run it through the lens of your confidence points and what you're going to be highlighting. Is the neckline open or closed? Make sure to pay specific attention to the areas of the body that you want to call attention to and also maybe the things that you want to try to minimize or draw the eye away from. And ask yourself how it reads on the model. Sometimes brands are showing them on different sizes as well, which is super helpful. But ultimately, before you buy something, ask yourself, does this look like it's going to highlight one of my confidence points? If the answer is no, then it might not be worth it. But if you love the effect that you see, the chances are it is going to highlight one of your confidence points. And that could work just as well for you too. Also, don't skip over the value of tailoring. Remember, sometimes a $20 tweak at the tailor, like a shortened hemline, a cinched waist, or a shoulder adjustment can help a piece to perfectly highlight your favorite features and look 10 times more flattering. So please don't ever eliminate that as an option. Even if you need to put a portion of your shopping funds for this season into alterations, it can be such a game changer and completely worth that extra expense. And then, of course, if you're unsure about whether a certain style or silhouette is going to flatter you, there's lots of ways to try something before you buy it. Of course, you can just go and shop in stores without the intention of buying things, just to try stuff on and see what you like. But you could also try a rental service like Rent the Runway or Nuuly. I know I've been talking about them a lot, but it's really just been such a huge asset for my own personal style lately. But you can try a rental service and then experiment with different styles and see what flatters your confidence points without committing to them long term. And also, consignment or thrift stores can be amazing not only to give clothes a second life, but to help you uncover new fits without overspending. And this is just going to work so well for you because knowing your confidence points is going to reduce overwhelm. You're not going to be throwing Spaghetti at the Wall when you go shopping, you're going to be looking for specific things, features that matter to you. They also are going to make online shopping easier because if you are using those specific keyword searches and filters, you can quickly spot the best options for your body. And knowing your confidence points is also going to help you avoid fantasy shopping. Instead of buying clothes for a life or a body that you don't have, you're going to be building a wardrobe for the one that you do have. And if a piece almost works but doesn't flatter your confidence point, you can just just let it go. Leave it behind. If you don't love it, just leave it and it can completely transform your mindset. Instead of getting frustrated and saying, I can't find anything that flatters me, you can remember that you are shopping with higher standards and reframe it as I know my confidence points, I know what I want to highlight, and I'm just looking for pieces that bring out my best. That simple shift is going to change the entire way that you think about shopping and getting dressed. You're no longer wandering around aimlessly trying all the things. Instead, you're going to be choosing pieces with clarity and confidence. The next time you're stuck, don't start by hiding insecurities. Start with your confidence points. I want you to build simple outfit formulas around them, shop smarter with those specific features in mind, and remix what you already own in fresh ways that are going to help call attention to them. All right, again, here's your action step. This week I want you to identify your top one or two confidence points and then pull three outfits from your closet that highlight them. Just try it. I promise you you're going to see how much easier and more enjoyable getting dressed can be. And if you want more help pinpointing your confidence points and learning which colors, silhouettes and styles will consistently flatter you, come join me inside our Wardrobe Revamp bootcamp. It's happening September 16th through 19th. It's completely free and it's the perfect place to refine your style foundations, including dressing to flatter your figure and and shopping from a confident and empowered place. You can head to herstylellc.combootcamp to save your spot today. I cannot wait to see you there and back here for the next episode in just a couple days. Thank you for listening to today's episode. If you want to stop copying everyone else's style and start dialing in your own swoon worthy signature look, head over to take my free 5 minute personal style quiz, which you can find at the link in the show Notes. If you've enjoyed our time together, please be sure to rate, review and subscribe to her style podcast so you never miss an episode. Finally, I invite you to make this a two way conversation and send me a DM over on Instagram eatherigstyle to let me know how I can best support you on your style journey. I'm always here for you in style and service. Until next time.