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Personal Stylist Leeds - Personal Shopper Leeds - Image Consultant - Arash Mazinani

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Who made my clothes?

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I occasionally attend a minimalist meet up in Leeds. A monthly get together where people with a shared interest in minimalism can meet likeminded souls and have a bit of a natter about all things ‘minimalist’. During a recent meet someone mentioned their goal for 2017 was to not buy any clothes throughout the entire year. This, in part, had been motivated by their recent viewing of the documentary ‘The True Cost’. In this post I want to share a little critique of the documentary, raise awareness on the topics covered in it, and hopefully encourage you to be more conscious about your own approach to buying clothes.

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When is A Personal Shopper Not A Personal Shopper?

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What’s the point in paying an independent personal shopper when you can get one from your local department store, right? After all they do the same thing and they’re free, so why would I bother paying someone? These are the questions as an independent personal shopper I typically come across when explaining to people what I do. They’re valid questions and they’d be right if all personal shoppers were equal, but as you’ll find out that’s not really the case.

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The Secret To Boosting Your Style IQ: Shopping Slumps

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Go on admit it! You suffer from shopping envy don’t you?

If it’s not advertising it’s magazine editors or bloggers telling us about their latest purchase, what we should or shouldn’t be buying. It’s everywhere, on our social media feeds, on our televisions, in the magazines we read. The most covetable items, what’s hot for summer, ‘lusting lately’. All phrases to get our sartorial juices flowing and whet our fashionable appetites.

Our eyes widen and stomachs flutter at the alluring thought of ‘the experience’. Bloggers tease us in a peepshow like manner, slowly revealing their latest ‘haul’s through a seductive collection of instagrams, tweets and pins. The desire of the shopping experience in everyone of us piqued.

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How You Can Easily Dress Designer For High Street Prices

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Have you ever coveted a designer piece, but had to settle for the high street alternative?

Today I’ll explain to you how to think like a really savvy shopper. One that opens their closet and is greeted by all their fave, luxe labels. They’ve traded in their Topshop and now their rails wouldn’t look out of place on the international floor of a Harvey Nichols. A real life Carrie Bradshaw.

Ready to trade in that Primark for Prada?

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5 Myths About Personal Stylists

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I just got back from a trip to Nottigham to see some of my fabulous, fellow stylists; Cleo Lacey and Keeley Stone. That’s the reason this post is a little behind my usual Saturday posting schedule. Don’t blame me, blame them, ha ha, joking ladies. Today I wanted to talk about myths surround personal stylists and image consultants. When I explain to people what I do it’s often met with intrigue followed by a stream of questions. Everyone seems to be familiar with the terms, but for most there is an air of ambiguity around what we do. You see, their only reference point is what they see on TV or read about in magazines. This is usually a far cry from the reality of what we do with our clients. So what I wanted to do was shed a bit of light on the world of a personal stylist and dispel some common myths about us.

#1. We Get You Dressed Every Morning

I don’t know where this concept comes from, but whenever I do a search for the term ‘personal stylist’ on twitter the results are full of the above. Some people think we act as their maids and dress them every day before work or school, usually school. I’m very confident that no one really needs to be shown how to physically put on their clothes.

#2. We’re Expensive

I want you to do a little experiment for me. Open your wardrobe and go through anything you haven’t worn in the last year, anything that you bought, took home then realised it didn’t look ‘right’ but kept because you may change your mind or lose that extra 10lbs. Have a look for clothes that you’ve fallen out of love with since buying. Any clothes that have been damaged but you’ve not had the heart to throw away. This includes accessories and shoes as well. Once you’ve got all your bits together lay them on the bed and add up how much this little stash originally cost you. You’ve got a figure right? Well, whatever that figure is I can assure it’s much more than what we cost and with us you can kiss goodbye to expensive mistakes.

You don’t need that Hollywood money

#3. You Need A Lot of Money For New Clothes

I often get asked “but won’t I need a lot of money for new clothes?” The answer is no, not really. While I can’t comment for most personal stylists, the philosophy I stand behind emphasises working with what you already have first. Many people think the answer lies in more, more clothes, more money, instead of assessing what they already have. If there is a need to buy new clothes a good personal stylist should be able to work with whatever budget you give them.

#4. Only Celebrities Have Personal Stylists

I think this partly links in with #2 but even after dispelling that myth, yes some celebrities have personal stylists. But if you look at your regular average joe or jane they wouldn’t try and fix the plumbing in their house themselves, they would get a specialist to come and do it. The same is true of someone’s style. As in most cases there are exceptions, some people just have an almost innate sense of style and would probably never require our services. But for many, certain aspects of shopping or putting outfits together is an absolute minefield for them. That’s why most of the people I work with are normal just like you and I, no celebrity status, no excessive bank balance.

#5. We’re All About The Fashion

Yes we need to know what is happening on the catwalk and what is currently hot on the high street. But that doesn’t mean we’ll be forcing you to look like you’ve just touched down from Paris fashion week. It’s all about working with the individual and making sure their new style is reflective of their personality and life style. Not kitting you out, head to toe in the latest trends, after all… if it was that easy you’d just copy what you saw in the glossies.

Paris Fashion Week

I really wanted to put this out there and hopefully lay to bed some common misconceptions around personal styling. I hope I’ve done that in this short space of time and maybe it’s answered some questions that you may have had but never really sought to ask or find out.

As always I love hearing your thoughts, this article is no different…

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5 Ways To Get Designer Quality With Out The Price

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I go through stages where I love designer clothing and loathe the high street then it swings back the other way. I was recently checking out quite a few high end designer pieces and comparing them to mid price point high street and low end high street pieces. I tend to do this when doing a preselection for a personal shop to get a feel for the different pieces that are out there. I have to say that in some instances the high street trumps designers in terms of quality and price. Often you associate buying designer goods with automatic superior quality, but depending on what you’re buying it’s not always the case. There are still pieces where spending more does guarantee you quality, that tends to still be true when it comes to tailoring. But keeping your mind open can often lead to getting both great quality from the high street without paying designer prices. So if you want to make sure you’re getting the best quality for your money check out my tips below.

Designer Quality On A Budget

  • I wrote a post about fabrics last year which I really recommend you read. You see, one of the key ways you to compare quality is looking at the fabric. Certain fabrics usually come with a higher price, most notably knitwear. If you’re comparing cotton to cashmere then you know the latter is going to be expensive because it’s a more luxurious fabric. But if you look around you can easily get comparable lambs wool pieces that would normally cost £100+ with a designer name for around the £35-£60 price mark.
  • Another quality usually associate with designer pieces is the overall cut and fit of the garment. You pay more money because the fit is going to be better. But that’s not always the case, getting any piece of clothing in the correct size is always going to do wonders. So regardless of whether it’s from the high street or designer make sure you try on a few different sizes. Again, paying more does not guarantee a better fit. Take the results of my recent shopping trip for example; I was looking at white shirts comparing one from TM Lewin for about £35, Reiss for £80 and D&G for £135. In terms of quality there was no difference, in fact I actually thought the TM Lewin one was slightly better. In terms of fit the D&G shirt was slightly better than the others, but not enough to warrant £100.

  • Which brings me onto my next tip, don’t forget about alterations. If the level of quality is the same as the equivalent designer piece then paying for an alteration will still work out cheaper. Take the shirt example above, I could easily have paid an extra £15 for the body to be adjusted if I had felt like it and I’d have still paid less than the same item from Reiss and D&G.
  • Learn to thrift. I’m no expert myself but by simply following a few fashion blogs it’s taught me that if you put the time in you can easily find some amazingly great quality pieces from thrifting. I’ve never had the time to really get into thrifting, but I’ve heard that once you’ve had a few great finds it can become really addictive.
She knows good quality when she sees it, do you?
  • The final way to is consider all of the above and wait for sale time, and take advantage of the money that is slashed off the recommended retail prices. If you have a clear idea of what you want and again are happy to take your time hunting for it during the sales, then it’s a great way to get great quality at cheaper prices.

Well I hope you’ve found this useful, if you have any questions or care to share some of your own tips on how you ensure you get the best quality pieces, leave a comment after the break.

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