How to be annoyingly stylish

In the same way “smile more” isn’t good styling advice, “dress for your body type” or “invest in good basics” won’t help you become more stylish.

We all wanna be stylish, we wanna be casually stylish on a rainy busy Tuesday, we wanna be annoyingly stylish going for a date on a Friday night. But have you ever wondered what actually IS stylish?

Your neighbor wearing yet another dress you would have never picked up for yourself and making you wonder if you need it immediately?? Your older coworker rocking the same floor-length coat and still looking better than the entire office?? Or that quiet girl in the metro wearing an evening bag with silk pants at 11am??

Living in Paris, capital de la mode, I’ve been thinking quite a lot about what stylish people do differently, and I must say I don’t think they just own “better” or “more expensive” clothes. BUT they have better habits!!

Here are mine:

DO: interesting > flattering

You DO NOT, I repeat, you DO NOT need to look the tallest, the thinnest, the most long-legged hourglass-shaped creature at all time!! Please…

Also in this world of AI and enhanced faces and generated bodies, I feel like we’re starting to crave more imperfection, more rawness. So sometimes, a slighly awkward pants is better, or even the shoes making your legs 4cm shorter. I promise you, “flattering” keeps ruining outfits.

DON’T: automatically fix every proportion

Your top is a tiny bit longer than what you’re used to wear? Maybe leave it like this. You wanna wear your aunt huge straight coat? I promise you don’t need a belt to “create a waist”. Not every outfit is supposed to show what shape the body underneath is.

DO: let one thing be slightly wrong

Something really stylish I keep seeing is a formal piece during the day, disproportional large glasses at 10am or some ballet flats with an evening dress. Unexpected is HOT, it catches the eye and creates so much tension in an outfit. If everything looks immediately correct, it’s probably because you made all the easy obvious choices.

DON’T: you don’t need every single piece you were to be beautiful on its own

This one is so important!!! Listen, an outfit built out of individually gorgeous pieces can be soooo…………………………………………….oops sorry I feel asleep. BORING. It can be sooooo boring.

You don’t wanna look like a NET-A-PORTER “select the total look” right? So please, have fun and incorporate fun/weird/dated/inherited/unexpected pieces.

DO: overdressing

What’s the worst that can happen?? Making a great impression?? Starting a conversation?? Doing something out of your comfort zone??

DON’T: save your clothes for special occasions

It’s the glitter stickers theory all over again!! There’s a theory online saying that when we were kids, we kept our most beautiful stickers for such special occasions, we ended up never using them because we kept waiting and waiting and waiting..

Well, it’s the same with your clothes. I won’t bore you with the cheesy pinterest “the occasion is to be alive” but… it might just be true. Stop buying gorgeous things and only showing them the back of your closet, please.