The Everyday Icon Style Podcast

Episode 153: Becoming the Iconic You with Effective Style Tips

• Tiffany Howard

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Can the right outfit transform your career and boost your confidence? In this episode of the Everyday Icon Style Podcast, I'll unravel the secrets behind achieving flawless corporate chic. She explains why prioritizing your style is crucial, not just for aesthetic reasons, but for the profound impact it has on your confidence, first impressions, and overall presence. 

 From small changes like adding statement earrings to ensuring a perfect fit, this episode is packed with actionable steps to help you express your true self and become the everyday icon you’re meant to be. Tune in and start your journey to impeccable style today.

Speaker 1:

Ignite your style with the Everyday Icon Style Podcast. I'm Tiffany, your style navigator and confidant here to lead women in corporate America on the quest to discover their timeless style. Let's revolutionize your wardrobe, empower your confidence and embrace your inner icon. Are you ready to redefine your corporate chic? Then let's get started. Hey everyone, real quick, before we go into today's episode, I wanted to talk to you about my free guide, the Mastering your Color Palette. With this guide, I have made it simple and easy for you to create your color combinations to build a chic, classic and timeless wardrobe. This you will be able to pick everything from your primary colors, your neutral colors and your accent colors that you'll be able to add together, create a mix and match wardrobe that you love. So be sure to click the link in the description box of this episode to access your guide today. Now let's get into today's episode. Hi everyone, and welcome back to the Everyday Icon Style Podcast.

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I am your host, tiffany, and today I'm going to dip my toe in a little more, a little more than what I did last week, because last week we talked about the term polished and put together, and today I'm going to talk to you about why, or reasons why your style sucks, but I'm also going to give you ways to fix it as well. So I'm not going to leave you hanging. I'm not just going to say, okay, so your style sucks because of this. No, I'm going to tell you why, and then I'm going to tell you how to fix it. And the reasons why I'm going to tell you how to fix it, and the reasons why I'm going to tell you that it sucks may not be what you're thinking that they are, so let's just dive right in.

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So first, let's talk about the mentality around style. Many people think you probably think. Even for part of time, I thought style isn't important or I'll get to it one day. I'm more of the I'll get to it one day person as opposed to it doesn't matter. But the truth is, how you present yourself impacts. First impressions can impact your goals, it can impact your lifestyle. It can impact a whole lot of things your confidence, your mood and it's more than just clothes. It's about self-expression. It's about showing up as who you are. It's about allowing your, as you enter a room, for your style to speak for you and before you. So if you've been putting off finding your style now, I think it's time for us to prioritize it, because I'm even prioritizing it myself just a little bit more. But one of the biggest hurdles in the mindset is the style. It's actually trivial and it's not. Your style is an extension of who you are. So I want you to think about how much more confident you feel when you're wearing something that you love and that fits well. That confidence can translate into every aspect of your life. So, instead of thinking I'll get to it one day, start today. Even if it's small it could be something as simple as adding a pair of earrings that you might not wear all the time Something that small and these small, consistent efforts can lead to significant changes over time. Remember, this is a marathon, not a sprint.

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So next, the importance of how our clothes fit. No matter how cute an item is on a rack, if it doesn't fit right, it's not going to look cute at all and it won't make you feel good and you'll actually become self-conscious of it because you're going to wonder is it too short, is it too long, is it too big? Can they see the gaps? Can they see that it's too long, too short? You'll be so worried and preoccupied with that and people will look at you to be like well, what's wrong with her? Why is she? Because you're self-conscious of what it is. Your clothes, the fit should be comfortable. Your clothes, the fit should be comfortable.

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Even if you have to get something tailored to fit your body style and your body type, it would actually do wonders. So when you go in and you look for sizes, know what your sizes are. It's a simple step that you can actually make a huge difference. If something doesn't fit perfectly off the rack, consider getting it tailored. It's not going to take much. Take it in here, take it out here, lengthen it here, shorten it here. Those little changes can take an outfit or clothing item and take it up literally two or three notches. And don't be afraid of different brands and styles to see what works best for your body type.

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This kind of goes to something I talked about in episode 151, about. Maybe you've outgrown where you currently shop. So begin to broaden your horizon and think of things like I never thought I would like Banana Republic outlet. I like Banana Republic, but for me it still was. It was like I'm not sure I can tell you now it's one of my favorite stores, so try going outside of your comfort zone when it comes to fit, because jeans over here and I always use jeans because they're an easy example but the jeans at store A might not fit you right, but jeans at store B a store you might never have even thought of might fit you perfectly. So always keep that in mind and have fun with it to see what works. So the importance of how items fit.

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Next thing, learning how to style. The easiest way to do that and what I mean by that is is you have two pieces of clothing but you don't know how to wear them or put them together, because you think they'll look good but you're not sure. Here's how you do this. Learn how to style by observing others. Look at how people put their outfits together. Notice the details, color coordination, layering, accessorizing. Great tools for this that I'm finding TikTok. They all have save buttons. Save the video that you like. That way, you can go back, you can rewatch it, see what it is. Slow it down if you have to. These are great tools, tiktok. You have YouTube. You have Instagram. Each of these platforms has a little save button. Find it and save it if you see something that interests you, so you can go back and try to recreate it or as a way to give you inspiration as you're creating outfits and developing your style. So this way you always have a plethora of ideas.

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You want to become a student of this not copy them, but a student of this. So this way you can see oh, I can see how she put that yellow and red together, or that blue and purple together, and I'm at this point I don't even know if those colors really go, but if you have the confidence to pull it off, guess what it will work. And that is what you need to do. You kind of have to become a student of observing others and how they dress and put things together. A next big one that you might not consider is overcoming style plateaus. So you know, when you work out, you might hit a plateau because everything you're still doing it's not working, so you have to kind of change it up a bit. It's the same thing when it comes to our style, and I think for me, I've actually kind of hit like a huge plateau, got stuck and now I'm trying to dig my way out of it.

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This will have to be done by stepping outside of your comfort zone, trying new trends, trying new stores. Now, it's definitely intimidating at first, but once you kind of get in there, try a few pieces on, you realize it's not that bad. I want you to challenge yourself to wear something different every week. Just pick a day and try something new, put something together. Week. Just pick a day and try something new, put something together. This doesn't mean you need to do a big overhaul your entire wardrobe. Sometimes it might just be a new single piece can make a big difference. It might just mean maybe buying a small capsule wardrobe that you may need to go into your greater wardrobe Things small such as that, because now you can really begin to interchange and mix and match. So to do this, you'll want to, as always, take inventory of your current wardrobe. You want to remove pieces and items that no longer inspire you, fit you or even fit your lifestyle, and we want to begin to make room for new possibilities.

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Sometimes, hitting a plateau is a sign that your style is evolving, and that's a good thing. We want to embrace the change and use it as an opportunity to redefine our looks. So evolving in the world of evolution of our style, it's definitely scary because we're used to a certain way and we might be afraid of what people will think and we might even be afraid of what we'll think of ourselves. But just start slowly and come out of it and evolve. It's sort of like a butterfly. You're evolving into this beautiful butterfly that's going to fly and when you walk into a room, people are going to be like, oh my god, who is that? That's part of breaking out of your style plateau, so give that a try. Now here are a few things and I mentioned it just a little bit ago of a practical tip to kind of help you elevate your style.

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I am not a fan of capsule wardrobes. I more so believe in building out your core wardrobe, but a capsule wardrobe within this is very helpful. So I'm going to kind of break this down really fast. You want 70% of your wardrobe to be core, 15% to be capsule and another 15% to be trends. The capsule wardrobe is key because, as part of a capsule wardrobe, everything in this capsule wardrobe is timeless, classic, effortless and will go with anything and everything that you currently have in your closet. You'll always be able to mix and match and come up with different outfit combinations that'll be able to help you along the way, even if you kind of hit a plateau, you're still able to go ahead and create new outfits to kind of break you out of that. We also want to maybe incorporate a few accessories watches, brooches, earrings, anything of that nature that might be able to kind of help you and just brighten up your style as you're going through this.

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Finally, personal grooming plays a huge role in our overall style. Hair, makeup, personal care should complement our looks. Finishing touches that's what this is. Fragrances you wear. What type of body wash do you want to wear? Because you know the girls are up here layering body washes, lotions and fragrances all in one, figuring out and finding things like your signature scent, things that would just give off this aura and this vibe that you know when you look good, you look good, smell good, you feel good. So all of that definitely plays a big part in it, and actually the personal grooming part is actually the easiest thing to really just start off with, and you'd be surprised how much difference you make, especially when you smell good. And then you start off with and you'd be surprised how much difference you make, especially when you smell good, and then you look good too and you bring all of that together, that's definitely a chef's kiss.

Speaker 1:

So, in conclusion, I want you to remember that style and developing your style is a journey. It's time to begin to take the small actionable steps towards improving it. Start first by changing your mindset, focusing on your fit, learning from others, breaking out of style ruts and paying attention to the details. Now, if you want to share with us your style journey, be sure to head on over to my LinkedIn page the link is in the description box and let me know what small actionable steps you are going to take, because I'm actually finally, after the last two years, will actually be sharing my journey on YouTube as I go through and change and do, update and get out of my style rut. So, as always, thank you for listening to the Everyday Style Icon podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, review and share with others, and you can also follow me over on YouTube for more tips and a little bit more of behind the scenes. So until next time, stay healthy, stay safe and, as always, be the everyday icon that you were meant to be.