There’s a holiday coming up or a special occasion, a special event and the dreaded question comes up: ‘What do I wear?’. Today I’ll share with you the process and how I’ve helped my clients get ready for a special occasion or a big event.

Hello and welcome back to Ada Style Minute! For those of you who know me, welcome back! For those of you who don’t, my name is Ada Deferrari and I empower women to elevate themselves through style.

And today I’m gonna be sharing with you the process of how I help my clients get ready for big events like maybe holiday parties or special events, special occasions and this is the same exact process that I use on all of my clients and although it might seem like ‘Hey, this is like common sense’, I promisse you I get text messages all the time and these are the questions that I’m asking.

And if you have your own personal stylist that you’re working with, have it be somebody that you’re working with on a regular basis or somebody maybe even in a store, these are the questions that either he/she should be asking you or maybe things that you might be telling them. So, here it is!

Recently, Miss Mindy was getting ready for a big event and she texted me ‘Hey Ada, I’m getting ready for this party. What do I wear? Can you help me pick out an outfit?’ So, the first question I asked her was ‘Well, where is this party at? Is it a house party, is it outside?’. So the first thing that you wanna do is research. You want to know, again, where are you going, who is going there and how to dress for the occasion. Again, that sounds like super common sense but it isn’t always common sense! So, you might go to a party where it is super casual and you’re the only one wearing a glamorous dress and heels, and then you’re not gonna feel very stylish even though is a very stylish outfit because you’re kind of out of place. Or vice versa, maybe you’re gonna go to a very kind of stylish glamorous party or event and you’re maybe the most casual one there.

So, you wanna kind of feel out the temperature, where are you going, what everyone else is going to be wearing, just so you can figure out this next step.

Okay, before reaching into your closet, and then putting on your go-to little black dress, you wanna maybe think about how you want to feel during the event and also how you want others to see you. Do you want people to look at you and feel ‘Oh gosh, that is a very classy and elegant woman!’, or do you wanna add a little bit of sexy to your look, a little bit of edgy? How is it that you want to feel and how is it that you want others to see you. So that’s something to consider, I mean, there’re many parties where I just want to maybe blend in and I don’t wanna stand out, maybe I’m just a little bit nervous because I don’t know the people attending. So I wanna just maybe kind of blend in. And then there are other parties where I’m like ‘I’m gonna go, understated elegance but with a twist and a touch of edgy’. There’re other parties where I want to be maybe super feminine and I kind of just figure out ahead of time how I want to look and feel, how I want others to make me feel.

I’ve told this story before, but a few years ago I went to a holiday party, a Christmas party and I wore my grandmother’s dress and my idea there was to make my mum feel super good like grandma was with us. And I put on one of her dresses, I belted it with one of my belts, and it made for a really cool kind of feeling that my mum was going to receive. And so I just wanna think about how I’m gonna make others feel and how I want to be seen.

Number three: color. Color has so much power. So, figure out what color you want to wear. Very often we kind of go for black as our color of choice which is definitely very often my color of choice as well. But just think about, again, you wanna feel and how you wanna make others feel and then choose the color accordingly. So if you want to look and feel glamorous and elegant, then yes, maybe choose black. But if you want others to feel super happy, maybe you wanna go with more of like a yellow, or an orange color. If you want to just be maybe neutral, perhaps you’re gonna choose grey. If you want others to trust you because it’s maybe for, I don’t know, a business meeting or a special occasion maybe you wanna go with blues. Color has tremendous power. So definitely choose your outfit thinking about color and what color do you want to wear.

Okay, once you’ve figured out, again, you’ve done your research, you know where you’re going, you know how you want to feel, how you want others to see you, you’ve chosen the color, now you start shopping your closet. Again, super very common, I say this cause it sounds like common sense but it’s not a common practice, is the first thing we wanna do when we have a special event is we wanna hit the stores or you wanna go online and start shopping to pick up something new, right? So instead, go shop your closet first! You might have maybe that little red dress or that red top or a yellow top, whatever it might be that you haven’t worn in a while and maybe this is the perfect time to wear it!

So what we haven’t worn in quite some time might be new to you, especially if you pair it in a different way. So again, let’s take the red top, perhaps you typically wear it with a black pencil skirt. Or how about a pair of grey jeans this time and maybe some pink heels. Think about how you can re-purpose and what you already have in your closet and recreate outfits based on, again, what you have.

The next step is: hit Pinterest! So, once you’ve done a good inventory of what you have in your closet, hop on Pinterest, and look for ideas on how to recreate outfits. Let’s go with that red top that you found in your closet that you really like, makes you look good and makes you feel good, but you’re not quite sure how to pair it maybe with jewelry, what bottoms because you have like this one go-to outfit but now you want to recreate it. So you will go on Pinterest and you’re going to type in ‘red top’ or ‘red shirt outfits for…’ I don’t know, whatever occasion it might be. Maybe a season, for winter, or for a holiday party or for a business party. And look to see what Pinterest offers you. I think is a great search engine and offers lots of great ideas, so take advantage.

Maybe you also have a few bloggers that you’re following for outfit inspiration. The reason that this video I’m not giving you outfit inspiration necessarily because I want to be true to you, true to your body type and shape, so I’m just giving you the process first. So next, would be Pinterest.

So, once you go to Pinterest, you go back to your closet, try to see what outfit you can create with the ideas you’ve gathered. If you can’t think of anything new, then maybe just kind of envision what you would want to wear, maybe some of that Pinterest search gives you new ideas. So once you’ve got a good idea, then you hit the stores, or then you can start shopping online. I think that one of the most frustrating things is like ‘I have an event to attend but I don’t really know what to wear’. And then you start shopping and buying random things. So, I also ask my clients like ‘Okay, what color do you want to wear, what style do you wanna wear? Is it a dress?’ Typically I’ll know their body shapes of course, so I’ll know what to recommend. However, you just want to get kind of that image or idea before you hit the stores or start shopping away.

So, those are my ideas for you on how to pick out an outfit, again, whether it be for a special occasion or a special event but this is the same process that I use for my clients, that I use for myself so I hope it’s helpful to you as well.

And if you’ve liked this video give it the thumbs up, if you find it valuable, maybe you can share it with your sister, your friend, your mom, a colleague. But this is the process that I think most stylists go with, and if you want to be your own best personal stylist, then this is a great process for you to follow as well.

And if you’re looking for a stylist, stay tuned because I have a special something coming up next month where you can join me along with some other ladies in creating our best capsule collections in the new year so stay tuned for that!

As always, thank you so much for watching and I’ll see you next time on Ada Style Minute.

Useful links:

Free Online Body Shape Class
Download the Determine Your Shape Guide 
Essentials for your closet
Body Shape Calculator (please use it from your desktop