Oh No She Didn't: The Top 100 Style Mistakes Women Make and How to Avoid Them

This book is the exact opposite of Lloyd Boston's "The Style Checklist". "The Style Checklist" contains the items that are a must have, while "Oh no she didn't" contains the list of faux pas. I had a good laugh looking throught the book and I should say, this book would make an excellent gift for some people I happen to know. Clinton Kelly takes all the things he finds appalling and disects them one by one brutally but not without humor. My personal favorite nightmares are counterfit items, cropped pants, stripper shoes, flip-flops, tattoes and evening wear and wearing all black. These are the things I absolutely cannot stand but see around nearly every day.

Don't get me wrong, I love black. But I do agree with Clinton Kelly, it gets to be too much when people just start abusing it, and sadly so many do.

In addition to some tendencies listed above, the book includes things like mustaches, hairy legs, camel toes, baggy jeans, exposing midriff covered with stretchmarks, wearing bubblegum pink tracksuits over the age of 15, boca shoes, flashy acrylic nails, wearing sweatsuit to places other than the gym, scruffy shoes, just to name a few.

This book will make a perfect gift, telling people things you can't :)

How to wear a turtleneck

Turtlenecks are considered a staple in woman's wardrobe, but they can be deadly since they visually shorten even a long neck and they are just brutal on shorter necks.

There are a few things though one can do to get away with wearing a turtleneck:

- wear a long necklace to visually elongate your shape
- avoid horizontal patterns on any other items
- wear it with vertical stripes
- wear it with heels
- just wear anything that has lengthening and slimming effect
- high waisted pants to elongate the legs

The Pocket Stylist

One of the most useful books on dressing yourself. It talks about 3 body types: apple, pear, and hourglass, helps you determine which one do you belong to, gives you an idea of what type of clothes would look good on you, emphasize your best features and conceal your worst... Also it will teach you how to take your measurements correctly, where to buy clothes and accessories while staying within your budget, organizing your closet and much more.

In addition to 3 body types, the book takes into consideration not only skinny women of these types, but also those who are bigger than average. Therefore, there are 6 types listed in the book: A,B,C,D, E, F. Where A is pear shape regular, B - hourglass, C - apple, and D - pear ample, E - ample hourglass, and F - ample apple shape.

The book is pretty compact in size and can be easily carried with you

Nothing to Wear? A 5-step cure for the common closet

A pretty useful book for those who wants to clean up their closet a bit and actually ending up having more to wear. Personally, I got rid of half the things in my closet and as a result I have a lot more to wear and also I stopped buying impulsively and filling up my closet with items I never wear.

Mistake number one for most women is that we do not always stick to our style when shopping for clothes. Some times we just like something, other times we cannot walk past a real bargain. Either way, we end up buying things that are not a part of our "signature" look.

This book helps you define your style, if you already haven't and encourages you to get rid of all the clothing that does not constitute your style "uniform".

The book presents you with 5 steps to improving your wardrobe:

1. Define your style

Five different styles are presented in the book:
Classic
Chic
Bohemian
Whimsical
Avant-garde
















There is a style type quiz you can take to determine which style do you fit in with. One can belong to more than one type. For example one's style can be Chic-Classical, etc.

2. Edit your wardrobe - discard everything that is not your "uniform"

3. Fill in the gaps - build a backbone of your closet, the basics, and then add the "frosting", items beyond the basics

4. Put it all together - get out your digital camera and take pictures of outfits, build wardrobe capsules, photograph them etc.

5. Nurture the new you - instructions on how to care for your wardrobe, how to store clothes and such

Here is a sample inspirational board from the book:

Steps to organized closet

1) First go over every single item in your closet and pull out items you have not work in the past year. This often include very nice pieces that are hard to part with but face it, if you haven't worn it for that long, what are the chances you will in the next year?

2) Go over "not worn in the past year pile" and pick out
  a) items that are torn or otherwise ruined and non-fixable
  b) items that are not your size
  c) items that are your size according to the label but do not fit you
  d) items that are "wrong" color, i.e. color that is not in your color palette (spring, summer, fall, or winter)
  e) items that are not your usual style. Maybe that's why you haven't worn them for a year

The remainders of that pile should be hang in a separate closet for another 6 months to a year to see if you will use them or not.

3) Look over the rest of the items in your clщset and see if there are any colors outside of your palette. If there are, you should remove them. You do not need anything that does not flatter you.

4) Go over the jackets in your closet and check the sleeves if they are ending somewhere below the wrist bone but before the first knuckle on your thumb. If they are shorter you should get rid of them, and if they are longer - shorten them. Next check is wearing each jacket and lifting your arms to see if jacket moves with you and whether you are comfortable.

5) Go over the sweaters and tops and ensure they are not baggy and make you loook like a scarecrow, then check the length to make sure they are reaching to either your high hip bone, or your lover hip. Anything shorter or longer than that might not flatter you or look tacky.

6) Check the pants to ensure each pair is the right length for the style:
  a) Skinny jeans or pants with tapered leg should reach to your ankles
  b) Straight leg pants should cover half of your shoe
  c) Wide-leg pants or bell-bottoms should cover your shoe almost completely

Then try on each pair and make sure the pants are not wrinkly at the lover hip level, that zipper is working, and that the crotch is not hanging
If any of these criteria are not met, see if you can have the pants tailored to fit you and if not - discard them.

7) Check each skirt to ensure they are the most flattering length - either right below the knee, right above the knee or up to the narrowest part of your ankle. The most flattering hemlines are the ones at the level of the most narrow parts of the leg.

8) Do the same for dresses

9) Review the remaining items in your closet to check for the following
  a) each item is "your style"
  b) each item can be worn with at least 3 other items in your closet
  c) the patterns are suitable for you (if your facial features are rather small, I'd recommend getting rid of all the large prints for they will make you look vulgar, and if your facial features are larger, then small prints will only emphasize them and that's not very flattering.

Style on a shoestring

It was just OK. Nothing extraordinary and nothing new. I'd recommend The Pocket Stylist instead. There is info some might useful but to most it should be common sense. For example on how to pick the right fit. Does one really needs a guide to be able to tell if an item fits well or whether you can see undergarments' lines on your clothing or not?

I also found that most recommendations on the styles did not take into account specific body types. I could be wrong, but I got an impression the author was using a particular body type as a model for this book.

The book starts out talking about undergarments and wearing correct undergarment for each outfit, how undergarments should fit etc. Then it talks about how other clothing items should fit and what to look for to get the right fit. Also there is a lot of info on thrift stores and when to shop for what to catch good sales, some on organizing your closet, picking the colors and what each color means. There is also a section on what not to wear.

What I found useful was some info on the pockets, pocket alignment and shape. Information on thrift store was also somewhat useful, as well as the section on what not to do. Overall the book isn't bad at all, just not as informative as one would expect from all the positive reviews.

Closet cleanup

With the issue of having nothing to wear coming up too often these days, I've decided to do a closet cleanup. I made two piles: one to consign, and another to donate. The pile to donate has been left in the wealth area of the house for about 4 weeks (I know that because I put it there when Alberto came from Buenos Aires and now, after 4 weeks he is going back there and thus I know the pile spent a little over 4 weeks in wealth area) and now I should donate it within next few days. Feng Shui thing...

Anyways, with most unused clothes out of the closet I finally got room to breathe and can make some serious changes.

I've made a list of criteria a piece of clothing has to meet in order to stay in the closet. Here they are:

1) Each bottom has to go with at least 5 tops

2) Any new purchase has to match with at least 3 items already owned



Also there is a list of general closet rules:

1) 75% of all clothes has to be worn on regular basis with the remaining 25% can consist of clothes worn on occasion

2) 75% of the closet should be in solid colors and only 25% can be prints

3) 60% of the clothes should be work clothes, 20% family time clothes, 20% sports and recreation clothes, and 5% evening wear

I feel bad because I kinda broke one of my rules the other day when I bought two adorable Nine West print dresses