Taking Care of your Clothes

Adhering to fashion trends is not conclusive to being taken seriously. Brand, style, color and miscellaneous factors are not significant in creating a look or gaining confidence. Creating confidence occurs in conjunction to maintaining clothes and being comfortable in your clothing.

Make sure clothes fit or are slightly over-sized. Tight clothing makes the body unappealing and show a lack of confidence by overcompensating. People who are tall, large, or skinny have challenges when finding a good fit. Even a t-shirt and sweat pants look good when they are in good condition. Take advantage of sales to add additional flare to a wardrobe.

Ironing is not always important; however, clothes should fall freely from the body. Sometimes ironing is important for particular garments. An easy way to save time is shake out clothing immediately after taking it out of the drier. Fold it or put it on a hanger. Placing a bar for hanging up clean cloth next to the laundry room or in the laundry room helps. When clothes cool and crumple dry them for another few minutes before shaking out wrinkles. Always use a dryer sheet, so wrinkles shake away quickly.

If you don't like taking clothing to the dry cleaners, don't buy clothes must be dry cleaned. If you must have a suit, make it last. Wear it to the function and change out of it when getting home. Put it on a hanger and let it air out. It is possible to wear a suit several times before taking it to the dry cleaners.

Clothes with holes can be worn after work. Wear nicer clothing for work. Holes and lose threads look sloppy. However, having back up clothing that can be worn until worn out preserves nicer outfits. Even then there is a point in which clothes need to be thrown away or torn into oil rags. Get anything that makes you look bad out-of-reach. Even if it is in relatively good condition, yet looks awful on you, give it to charity or a friend.

When shopping for new clothing, place the shirt next to your face and look in a mirror. Different colors affect skin tones. Get colors that make you look vibrant. When picking out pants place the shirt on top of the pants to see if colors are complimentary. Selecting standard colors for outfits makes shopping easier when creating a look.

After clothes are home remember there is excess dye and treatments in cloth. Wash dark colors with dark colors the first few times. The dye will bleed onto the lighter colors dulling them or changing the color entirely. The same is true of light colored clothing. Do not wash light colored clothing with white clothing until excess dye is washed out. Regarding new clothes that are white, the treatment is susceptible to dyes; however, washing them with light colored clothing that is already thoroughly washed is not an issue. Any left over dye is completely gone by the third wash. Warm and hot water promotes deeper cleansing.

Four different colors of shoes: black, navy blue, brown and gray complete a wardrobe. If you prefer black or navy blue you only need black or navy blue shoes. Black and navy blue are considered to be in the same realm so putting black shoes with a navy blue outfit is tacky. Likewise putting navy blue shoes with a black outfit is tacky. Brown shoes go with warm colors. Gray shoes go with milky and cool colors. There is never a need to own white shoes; however, they are nice in the summer.

Accessories accent bland outfits. A basic suit in one color only needs a pin on the lapel. When wanting several accessories, be careful not to overdo it. Wearing several watches and bracelets draws attention to the hands. One or two items on each wrist, is fine; otherwise, attention is focused to hands. Wearing a turtle neck preempts needing additional attention toward the face and neck. A simple necklace is fine. No ties with ascots. No scarves and necklaces. Keep it nice and simple.

Wearing brightly colors pants and shoes draw attention down to the feet and legs unless everything matches. Wearing gray shoes with a black outfit emphasizes feet. It often looks out of balance. A woman wearing gray pants with a black shirt brings attention to the bottom half. Wonderful or awful, it is a style choice.

Clothing is a big part of a person's persona. When looking in the mirror, be happy with what you see. It isn't about the style as much as the presentation when producing confidence in yourself and others.

Related Article
Bottom Up: Shoe Guide
Conservative Undergarments
Illusionist Body Shapes
Pick a Season