How fashion blogging helped me find my style

how fashion blogging helped me find my style

UNTIL I DECIDED TO START A FASHION BLOG, I WAS PRETTY MUCH LOST, STYLE WISE.

That might sound like a bit of an exaggeration, but it’s true. Oh, I had tons of clothes – I’ve always had shopaholic tendencies – but none of them really worked with each other, and some of them didn’t even work by themselves, because I was one of those people (and still can be, if I’m perfectly honest) who doesn’t always stop to think before buying something. Because of that, my closet was full of impulse purchases, and clothes that looked good on other people, but which weren’t even remotely practical for my life or style.

Actually, scratch that last bit: I can’t really claim my clothes weren’t right for my style, because the problem was, I didn’t actually HAVE a style: I just bought what everyone else was wearing, assuming – and then couldn’t understand why they didn’t look nearly as good on me.

It wasn’t until I started to get into blogging – and fashion blogging in particular – that I really started to develop a style of my own: here’s how it happened…

how fashion blogging helped me find my style

// EXPOSURE TO DIFFERENT STYLES

It might sound silly to those of you who live in a big, cosmopolitan kind of city, but where I come from, people tend to dress alike, for the most part. It’s not like I wasn’t aware that other styles existed, obviously – it’s just that, being surrounded by the same kind of looks for my entire life meant that it didn’t really occur to me to want to stand out. What’s more, any kind of “dressing up” is looked down on around here, so for years I found it easier to just wear the same kinds of things everyone else was wearing, even although they weren’t always really “me”.

When I discovered the wonderful world of fashion blogging, it was a real eye-opener. This was back in the days when blogs were more like style diaries than magazine spreads, of course: people were documenting what they were ACTUALLY wearing in their day-to-day lives, and what some of them were wearing wasn’t even remotely like the styles I was used to seeing every day. Realising there was a whole world of style outside of what I was seeing around me gave me the confidence to start trying new looks myself – why not, after all?

// UNDERSTANDING MY SHAPE

If you’d asked me what shape I was before I started fashion blogging, I wouldn’t have known how to answer you. Honestly, I’d look at all of those magazine articles talking about apples, pears and rectangles, and although I understood the general principles, I had a really hard time looking at my own figure objectively, and knowing what kind of styles would suit me. Enter the camera, and it’s cruel, cruel lens! It’s not always seeing photos of myself – I just focus on the flaws, and end up fixating on them – but I can’t deny how helpful it’s been in understanding my shape. Now I have a much better idea of what I ACTUALLY look like in clothes, and that makes shopping a whole lot easier.

// KNOWING WHAT DOESN’T WORK

Just as taking photos of your outfits helps you understand what works for your body, it also helps you see what DOESN’T work. There have been quite a few times in my blogging career when I’ve taken a set of outfit photos, then come home and binned, not only the photos, but whatever it was I was wearing in them. (Well, OK, I don’t actually bin clothing, I donate it – you know what I mean, though…)  As with the point above, it’s not easy to look at unflattering photos of yourself, but it really helps you see things that aren’t always apparent in the mirror: I mean, how often do you REALLY check what your outfit looks like from the back, for instance? Or how it looks when you’re moving around, rather than standing perfectly still? Exactly.

//  THE URGE TO EXPERIMENT

I’ve never been an experimental dresser: I’ve always stuck to outfits that most people would deem “safe” or even “boring”, and I’m totally OK with that. Scrolling through all those fashion blogs, however, does sometimes give me the urge to experiment with something I wouldn’t otherwise have thought to try: sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t, but trying it out is all part of the fun, isn’t it?

Would I have developed the style I have now WITHOUT fashion blogging? I mean, it’s possible, sure: I somehow doubt it, though!

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