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26: Personal Designing & Shopping

Laurel H
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Ever wonder how designers organize a line of clothing?
Ever wish you could do that for yourself?  August 28, 2013 I gave a free seminar, at the Wadsworth Public Library, 1500 Wadsworth Avenue, Philadelphia. This post summarizes that seminar.
It’s obvious that Fati looks really good in green.

Here is how you can efficiently produce an exquisite wardrobe utilizing the same procedures as the industry pros! These techniques from the fashion industry make organizing your and your family members’ wardrobes much easier. You will find that analyzing individual color and wardrobe styles are not all that difficult to understand. Combined with personal wardrobing, dressing becomes just so much easier.

Here are tips on how to better organize your closet and how to successfully shop for even the pickiest family member.

Because the most important aspect of anyone’s clothing is color, color analysis, done correctly brings out the very best of a person’s looks. The difference wearing one’s best colors make in one’s appearance is almost unbelievable.

In the picture on the right Fati is being color analyzed. It’s obvious, just by looking at the picture that one of Fati’s best colors is dark green. Not surprising if you have some knowledge of Johannes Itten’s seasonal color theory. You would therefore be aware that her best season is winter and her second best, autumn. I’ve always found Itten’s seasonal color theory the easiest to understand and use. But no matter what color theory one uses, an individual’s best colors are always the same.

In my classes students drape each other and discuss which colors look best. Having a group determine its members’ color palettes works well, enabling the members to become more knowledgeable about color theory.

I always start private lessons with color analysis.

 

 

 

Once one is aware of one’s best colors and style shopping becomes much easier. It is important to first analyze one’s wardrobe, eliminating the clothing that doesn’t work, determining what is needed to complete clothing that does work. A swatch book in one’s palette is helpful with selecting what works, with organizing, and when shopping.

 

After eliminating what doesn’t work, one should organize what is left. Piling up fabrics that work together spark ideas of what to make that will look good and be enjoyable to wear.

 

If you sew, organizing a swatch book of fabrics already owned to take with you to the fabric store is a very good idea. The swatch book enables buying fabrics that coordinate with what one already has. It also prevents buying fabric just like that already owned.  Writing the yardages of favorite patterns on the front cover prevents over buying. 

 

 Colors vary in different lighting. Those that match in fluorescent light may not match in incandescent light. Natural light is almost always the best lightening to use when checking color coordination. This is why it is important to check the colors of purchases with each other and with swatches and clothing brought from home.
                   
Organizing solves the problem of what to wear, creating a wardrobe that not only works, but provides clothing ready for use whatever the occasion. When one looks in a closet of a color-coordinated wardrobe, one sees the owner’s color palette. That’s when you know you have done it right.
Here are some links to color and wardrobing information and materials on the net that my students and I have found helpful:
For information about personal color and wardrobing I’ve always found Carole Jackson’s books, Color Me Beautiful and Color for Men to be outstanding. Each presents a practical application of seasonal color palette system, combined with a realistic approach to individualistic wardrobing .  
In her book Always in Style with Color Me Beautiful Doris Pooser proposes Color Flow, which she discovered and developed into 12 seasonal color palettes. Her book includes her color charts which explain exactly how this color theory works. Her discovery takes the seasonal color theory one step further, making it much easier to understand and use.
Determining one’s best colors is not always easy. Of all the disciplines involved with designing and making clothing the most difficult is color. Help with this can be found on the net at Stylemakeovers. http://www.stylemakeovers.com/swatchbooks.html They offer free, on-line color makeover. They will color analyze from a photo for a very reasonable fee. They also sell excellent color swatch books.

 

Style and the Man by Alan Flusser, noted NYC expert on men’s high-end tailoring. Excellent information on impeccable dressing, plus global sourcing of men’s clothing stores.

The Triumph of Individual Style by Carla Mason Mathis and Helen Villa Connor. Through some of the world’s greatest artists this book shows the beauty of all figure types and aspects, and how to conceal or highlight them.

Women of Color by Darlene Mathis. Excellent book on determining personal color palettes for women of color.

 

Laurel

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