Dress Your Shape, Not Size, Shopping with Sarah

This is my friend Sarah. Love her!
A few weeks ago we got together.  Usually we craft together, but this time Sarah had some needs!  We went shopping and were looking for shoes and black pants.  I was happy to be her shopping partner!
We headed to Marshalls and found the shoes, found some pants, and as we were browsing found some dresses.
Sarah has kicked some booty and lost like 20lbs.  As I was telling Sarah what would look good on her shape, I asked her if we could do an experiment... on her... with my camera!
She is so easy going... she agreed, and I warned her this would be on my blog... and she still agreed!

So often we think we need to be a certain size to look good, when really no matter our size, if we dress for our shape, we can really enhance our best features and look fantastic!  All sizes are also different shapes, so knowing your body, and what to look for when you are out shopping, can help you look your best.

So, here is Sarah, ready to go!

 

 Sarah has a shorter torso.  With her shape I wanted to focus on finding a dress with a waistline that is dropped a bit.  We have dresses with no waistline, the empire waist and a mid waist.  The look I wanted to focus on for her was the mid waist.

Here is a cute dress with no waist.  Compare this dress to the next one and see what it does to her shape.  She looks shorter right?  Creating a mid waist gives her legs some length visually!

I love how this dress looks on her.  The mid waist is perfect!  It creates shape, add some torso to her and gives her long legs visually.  The pattern, although she doesn't love tiedie, works really well.  Diagonal lines would be good too.

This next dress is pretty good, it has the mid waist, which creates some shape, but the added fabric right in the front isn't so good, flat fabric is better.

This would be a better option.  It wouldn't be as flattering if the waist was empire, just a little higher, in fact a drop just a half inch, inch lower may even look a little better.  The neckline is totally flattering though.

This dress was the winner!  She wasn't even looking for a dress, but bought this one!

The tube top has enough length to it that it drops down to her mid waist, the lines stop then go in a diagonal driection, making her look taller, there is no poofy fabric adding any weight to her.  What do you think?  Like it?

We were having so much fun in the dressing room!  And while we caught up and she tried on dresses, 2 other women came out to ask me about what they were trying on!  I gave my honest opinion and offered what I thought would look best on their shapes!

Man, I could totally be a personal shopper, fashion consultant, dressing room advisor!  :)  It was good times!

I wanted to find one more example to show.

I was struggling to find a dress with an empire waist.

I wanted to show the difference in the two looks.

I couldn't find one, so Sarah just lifted the waist on this to show how different the two look on her...

 Can you see how the empire makes her look a little wider?  She has lost her waist, she has lost her shape and it's not the worst look in the world, but certainly not as flattering as the second look with the waist dropped a bit.  She looks more slender and taller!

We had so much fun!  Thanks Sarah for being my model!

For as much as we try to take good care of our bodies, knowing how to dress our shape, no matter what size it is, can help us look our best, which helps us feel really great right?