Notes on Styling | 68 | The text that made my year.
Hello my Lovelies,
Christmas is well and truly on the way! ☆
We all know December can bring with it the feeling of many balls being juggled to get to the finish line. Presents to be bought. Work to finish. People to be thought of, and if there’s any little sprinkling of time left, maybe just maybe a little ‘me’ time?
I don’t know about you guys, but I’m not quite sure where this year went. It’s been a busy (crazy/ mental/ insert your adjective here) year. If I’m honest, I have given over lots of my year to help my husband get to the finish line with the sale of his business after 22 years of building it from his Kitchen table. This has included moving to two different cities this year for blocks of time - I am writing this to you from Amsterdam! But he got there, only 3 weeks ago now and…. we can breathe again. We move back to Dublin in January and I cannot wait.
In the middle of it all, it has been my lovely clients who have kept me feeling like ME. Helping you has kept me rooted in the things that are really important to me.
And so, I wanted to finish off my writing to you pre-Christmas with a text I got this week from a gorgeous client I had this year. The beautiful Nele. This year, with my help, Nele has been working on her own Style Evolution, taking back control of what she buys and how she wants to feel in her clothes.
Nele kindly sent me a picture of her in her Christmas party outfit, an outfit we had picked for her Lookbook back in September.
Options in Lookbook:
To Christmas Party:
Be still my heart.
It nearly exploded when I got this.
Where to start with my feelings.
Yes, the clothes are great. Monsoon can be great for party pieces. Abercrombie is a left-of-field shop that few consider for dressy pieces but it’s been working so well for Nele’s style and wardrobe for both casual and dressier items. The cool colour tones complement Nele so beautifully. We had been working on a cooler colour palette with mainly lighter/ cooler tones for daytime. But that’s the thing with colour and indeed style exploration. Playing around with tones and depths and contrasts is part of your journey to connecting with your own feelings on these things and how far it feels good to push it and play.
But this picture Nele sent goes so much deeper.
Nele text me to tell me how much she loved being dressed up AND still feeling like herself. I should caveat this with the fact that Nele isn’t overly into fashion or clothes, but she was sick of not feeling good in what she was wearing and buying. In this look, she felt like herself while wearing a look she never in a million years would have thought she could feel like herself in - something dressy ♡
She ended up picking up the shoes and bag herself rather than the exact matches from the lookbook but followed the outfit colour combos. LOVE THIS FOR HER.
If there’s one thing our clothes (and taking ourselves on a journey with our clothes) can bring us, it’s back to ourselves. But more importantly, clothes can help to take us away from those assumptions we make about ourselves. What we think we can or cannot wear or what we think we could never wear and expect to feel good. Also, a big one I see with clients is who we think we need to be in our clothes, to make others feel comfortable around us.
When you get to put those things down for a bit, a real version of what good looks like for you will emerge in all categories of looks, because it has the space to do so. Space and time matter as does prioritising you.
Finally, Nele’s text reminded me that you don’t have to be into fashion or think about it every minute of every day in order for it to be important enough to feel good in your clothes. You just need a good plan and it really is possible and it really does matter in your life.
Just ask Nele.
Way to go Nele - (and thank you for allowing me to share this little snippet of your story).
I want to wish you all the happiest of holidays. Thank you for sticking with me here this year and for reading. I’m looking forward to lots more in 2025!
And remember, there’s no time like the present to make a little space for yourself - even at Christmas. I’m about to do the same, too.
See you on the other side,
Julie x