Friday, January 14, 2011

Cheaply trying out fashion without the regrets.

Sometimes, I want to try out a style but don't want to spend a lot of money on the trying it out. When this happens, I look to stores like Forever 21 or H&M to give me a cheaper alternative in case the style doesn't work for me.

The following are a few things I would love to try out this spring but I am limited in cash flow so would not want to take huge risks in trying something new if it turned out that the clothes did not look good on me. So, I am considering using Forever 21 (and other sites like it) to try out different clothing styles that I have never worn before but captures my eye.

I have long wanted to try out a floral dress like this one:

Above: Parlor Music Floral Dress at Lulus.com

I have never worn a dress in this style and the shortness is a bit worrying to me since I hate sitting down and having my underwear clad butt directly on the seat. Ick!

I do love the print, the sheer overlay, the neckline, and the sleeves on this dress. It would be a dress I merely wanted to give a try-out to to see if it suited me and it is easier to just try it out when it costs $34.00.

Another thing I want to try out is flirty skirt like this one:

Above: Striped Chambray Skirt at Forever 21

It is another style I have never tried when it comes to skirts. My major worry is my legs are rather long and thin and I am not sure it would hang well on me. If short skirts flounce too much it gives me that "starved" look since I am slim in body but have women's hips. It is enough of a worry for me to not want to spend much on this style. Forever 21 is offering this skirt for $14.80 so I could take the chance and give it try.

I have wanted to try out tailored looking shorts for a while. They just look so good with long socks and chunky heels. This pair caught my eye:

Above: Chambray Trouser Shorts at Forever 21

Shorts like these give me the same worry as the skirt. They can make my legs look like sticks if not cut exactly right. I would try this pair out without the worry of overspending since they cost $17.80. I could decide if they worked well for me without the hit to my savings. It would also tell me how much use I would get out of them if they did suit me.

I really like the retro 1970's clothing because I can be sure they will work well on my tall, thin, body. Yet, I am not a huge wearer of dresses so when I want to rock a lace-y, white, 70s, retro dress, I would rather not spend much on it.

Above: Snowberry Lane Lace White Dress at Lulus.com
I have long wanted to wear a dress like this but I am not a person who wears a lot of white. White seems to attract every stain to me like a magnet. That is enough to almost make me avoid white clothing all together but I have a love for how crisp white looks.

I love the lace and the bell sleeves of this dress. I also like the length and how it is not too body hugging but defines the body at the same time. I wear a lot of tighter fitting clothing so this would be a nice addition. Plus it would expand my meager dress collection to 4 dresses. The best part? The dress is $38.00 so I would have little buyer's remorse is I ended up not wearing the dress very often.

I love the look of this top:

Above: Unique Kimono Sleeve Top at Forever 21

The style is perfect but in this case it is the colour that gives me pause. I am not into orange and it can make me look "yellowish" in complexion so I have to be careful in the shade of orange I wear. For this reason, I would buy this $19.80 version so that I would feel perfectly fine giving it away to a friend or charity if it turned out to really not look good on me or I didn't want to wear it because of the colour.

Yes, I know, it comes in blue but it doesn't appeal to me in the blue colour...only the orange. Orange is such a gamble when it comes to how it gets along with me so I would be happy not spending a lot of money on the top in case we just didn't get along.

I believe that if you are trying something out that you are not sure will work for you in fashion, you shouldn't have to pay an arm and a leg just to find out it just isn't going to be a good relationship between the two of you. I am sure a lot of us have clothes we bought because of "eye appeal" and disliked once we tried to wear them.

Yet we hang on to these pieces because of the money we have spent on them. They live in our closets, not being worn but not being given away because of the amount put into acquiring them. This shouldn't have to happen.

I have started to try and break that habit and buy the cheaper version of fashion "try outs" to seem if they work for me. Then if they do, I look for higher quality versions and spend the money. It saves my bank account from bad fashion risks piling up and taking up space in closets and drawers.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

That striped skirt is absolutely adorable! you should totally go for the trends you want to try. Life is too short not too. And since when have skinny legs been a bad thing? xx

SnapandPrint said...

Charles,

I tend to like form fitting clothing so a skirt making my legs look way too thin just doesn't suit my tastes. So any flouncy, short, skirt could do just that and make me not want to wear it.

I am going to try a few of these looks, maybe not with the exact piece of clothing in the blog but an equally inexpesive one just to see if I actually wear it. I tend to love looks and not wear them if I buy them if they don't suit my everyday life. Why going cheap is ideal for such a try out for me.