Need an easy formula for how to find my style? Here are five key steps to help you on your way to dressing more authentically!
It can be so difficult to determine how to find your style these days. The inpouring of fast fashion, celebrities, influencers, and savvy marketing tactics haven’t made things any easier.
Life often gets in the way of one’s own wardrobe and our current style may take a back seat for a while. Other times, it’s building the confidence in stepping out of your comfort zone with key pieces that show off your best features.
Finding your personal fashion style is a lifelong journey because it goes hand-in-hand with finding your true self. We all go through changes that affect the way we see ourselves and in turn, affect the way we want to dress. Personal style takes time, as does developing your signature look.
As a fashion blogger and obsessed style maven, I know this all too well. Through my journey of self discovery, I’ve cultivated the best strategies that will lead you to finding your personal style. And thankfully, it’s not another fashion style quiz that’ll give you a different result every time!
This simple guide will give you thoughtful advice and tips on how to find your own personal style so you can live a life that’s more authentic and beautiful in your self expression. It’s way more than choosing quality pieces–it provides a framework for understanding your style profile.
This post is all about how to find my style.
Find your fashion inspiration or style muse by identifying those individuals, characters, or personas that resonate within you. If you had to choose a group of individuals as your style tribe, who would they be? Spend time identifying these people, real or imaginary, whose style you see yourself aligning with.
Find style muses through the following:
If you’re a visual person create a Pinterest fashion mood board and add your style inspiration, muses, colors, clothes, outfits, seasons, and anything that artistically resonates with you. Revisit the mood board often and edit it as necessary.
The above social media tip was a game-changer for me and I know it will be for you as well. People say that social media can be so negative, but we each have control over what content we choose to view and engage with. Don’t be afraid of what others will think as you unfollow (or even block) them. If you can’t be authentic with curating your social media content, how do you expect to be authentic in creating your own style?
Next, take each piece and try styling it with basic items or by itself. Your focus should be on that individual item, so don’t add too many details that may distract you.
Stare at yourself in the mirror and allow yourself to feel how you feel about that piece. Does it look good on you? Does it feel good on you? Most importantly, does it feel like you? The most important thing to identify is if the clothes make your feel confident about yourself. If your overall mindset about the item is positive and happy, take note and move it to a separate pile.
Continue this exercise with the rest of your inspired pieces.
Take notes of what you don’t like in an outfit and why.
Alternately, record all the positives you experience in terms of style, feel, fit, color, print, and even adjectives (e.g. happy, sensual, smart, warm). This process is about taking visuals (what you see) and expanding them to your other senses, including feelings and intuition. Do these ideas align with your muses and Pinterest board? Edit as necessary.
Keep these notes handy for future reference and going deeper into your personal style.
You might find that something you thought inspired you didn’t translate well into clothing or accessories. Be mindful of this and pare your inspirational Pinterest board and list of muses back. Stay true to yourself and stick items that resonate with your personality.
The end goal is for your entire outfit to embody your own style, your signature look.
A wardrobe audit takes you through the following actions:
If you’re interested in a full breakdown of how to perform a wardrobe audit, check out this post: How To Shop Your Closet The Right Way.
A capsule wardrobe is a great way to curate classic pieces that style with any outfit. Neutral colors are make a great base for creating a unique look with trendy items and unique pieces that add personality.
Shopping becomes more of an enjoyable experience as you make less impulse purchases and more conscious ones, learning a little more about yourself with each one. Each day is another step towards mastering your personal style.
Slowly, you’ll turn your wardrobe into something uniquely beautiful. Avoid going on unplanned shopping sprees and choose accessories with caution. This process is meant to be a slow burn, like anything worthwhile in life.
Part of discovering your personal style is casting off everyone else’s idea of how you should dress, so you have the freedom to decide for yourself. Similar to self-censoring your social media intake, it’s about pressing the mute button on distractions and different styles that pull you in the wrong direction.
Are you afraid to wear white after Labor Day? Do you avoid wearing black and brown together? What do you do when you don’t have a belt to match your new pair of shoes? And how about Wednesdays…do you always wear pink?
All jokes aside, these are just a few of what I consider to be unhealthy fashion rules that have stolen joy and creativity from myself and many others throughout the last century (and possibly longer). Hasn’t every notable fashion breakthrough been from someone who’s decided to ditch those rules? For example, black used to be associated with servants and widows until Coco Chanel introduced the “little black dress“. Thank you Coco!
Unless you have a moral or ethical conviction for specific fashion rules, it’s time to let them go. What freedom you’ll feel without a silly fashion rule telling you to basically, “don’t be yourself”.
For example, one of my rules is that I don’t wear shift dresses. I’ve mentioned this in other posts, but I used to have a problem where I kept buying shift dresses because they looked so cute on the model. I would force myself into thinking I could make them work, but no matter what, I just couldn’t feel confident because of how they looked on me. I began shaming myself thinking there was something wrong with my body shape and weight, which was completely off-base.
You can imagine how this could spiral out of control to an amount of dieting and exercise that will never bring the desired results. Thankfully, I finally realized shift dresses don’t work for my body type and a healthy, new fashion rule was born for me, and me alone. I do not wear shift dresses. And I’m okay with that. I’m now free to feel good and focus on dress styles more aligned with my true, happy self and my personal style. Though I still enjoy shift dresses on others from afar!
Your own fashion rules should guide you to make healthy choices that are aligned with your authentic self.
Your own fashion rules should guide you to make healthy choices that are aligned with your authentic self.
That’s it for this one, fashionistas! Best of luck in your journey to find your personal style.
It can be so difficult to determine how to find your style these days. The inpouring of fast fashion, celebrities, influencers, and savvy marketing tactics haven’t made things any easier.
Life often gets in the way of one’s own wardrobe and our current style may take a back seat for a while. Other times, it’s building the confidence in stepping out of your comfort zone with key pieces that show off your best features.
Finding your personal fashion style is a lifelong journey because it goes hand-in-hand with finding your true self. We all go through changes that affect the way we see ourselves and in turn, affect the way we want to dress. Personal style takes time, as does developing your signature look.
As a fashion blogger and obsessed style maven, I know this all too well. Through my journey of self discovery, I’ve cultivated the best strategies that will lead you to finding your personal style. And thankfully, it’s not another fashion style quiz that’ll give you a different result every time!
This simple guide will give you thoughtful advice and tips on how to find your own personal style so you can live a life that’s more authentic and beautiful in your self expression. It’s way more than choosing quality pieces–it provides a framework for understanding your style profile.
This post is all about how to find my style.
Best Tips For How To Find My Style
Find Your Style Muse
The process of ‘how to find my style’ is reminds me of an artist painting a masterpiece. There’s something driving that artist to create. Oxford Languages defines a muse as “a person or personified force who is the source of inspiration for a creative artist.” Like all great artists, we each have different styles that require a different form of inspiration.Find your fashion inspiration or style muse by identifying those individuals, characters, or personas that resonate within you. If you had to choose a group of individuals as your style tribe, who would they be? Spend time identifying these people, real or imaginary, whose style you see yourself aligning with.
Find style muses through the following:
- Celebrities and public figures
- TV and film characters
- Social media influencers and personas
- Fashion bloggers
- Literary characters from novels and poems
- Individuals in song lyrics
- Family, friends, colleagues, anyone you know
- Historical figures
- Styles from your imagination (i.e. you have a style or persona in your mind and you put those thoughts down on paper)
If you’re a visual person create a Pinterest fashion mood board and add your style inspiration, muses, colors, clothes, outfits, seasons, and anything that artistically resonates with you. Revisit the mood board often and edit it as necessary.
Use social media as your muse
Use social media content as a source of inspiration. If you’re an Instagram, TikTok, or YouTube follower, pay attention to the accounts you follow and why. Any content or accounts that stir up negative thoughts and emotions you should unfollow immediately. Negativity kills creativity, so focus on curating your dream world on your social media and transcend the noise.The above social media tip was a game-changer for me and I know it will be for you as well. People say that social media can be so negative, but we each have control over what content we choose to view and engage with. Don’t be afraid of what others will think as you unfollow (or even block) them. If you can’t be authentic with curating your social media content, how do you expect to be authentic in creating your own style?
Shop Your Closet For Pieces That Embody Your Muses
The next step of finding your style personality begins in your own closet with the right pieces. With your inspirational list or fashion mood board handy, go through your closet to identify clothing and accessories that align with your inspiration. Set these pieces aside.Next, take each piece and try styling it with basic items or by itself. Your focus should be on that individual item, so don’t add too many details that may distract you.
Stare at yourself in the mirror and allow yourself to feel how you feel about that piece. Does it look good on you? Does it feel good on you? Most importantly, does it feel like you? The most important thing to identify is if the clothes make your feel confident about yourself. If your overall mindset about the item is positive and happy, take note and move it to a separate pile.
Continue this exercise with the rest of your inspired pieces.
Record your experience as you go
Items that spark negative thoughts and emotions are important to write down and include the reason why. For example, you may resonate with the style of a fitted knit top but felt negative about it due to the itchiness of the fabric. Or a pair of pants might elongate your legs, but you can’t stand the color. Separate these items from the ‘positive’ group of clothing and accessories.Take notes of what you don’t like in an outfit and why.
Alternately, record all the positives you experience in terms of style, feel, fit, color, print, and even adjectives (e.g. happy, sensual, smart, warm). This process is about taking visuals (what you see) and expanding them to your other senses, including feelings and intuition. Do these ideas align with your muses and Pinterest board? Edit as necessary.
Keep these notes handy for future reference and going deeper into your personal style.
You might find that something you thought inspired you didn’t translate well into clothing or accessories. Be mindful of this and pare your inspirational Pinterest board and list of muses back. Stay true to yourself and stick items that resonate with your personality.
Style with your true pieces
At this point, create a space in your wardrobe for the right pieces that sparked positive thoughts and emotions. We’ll call these your ‘true pieces’ going forward. Now, each day you get dressed, be sure to style with at least one of your true pieces. The more you develop your own personal style, the more true pieces in your outfits.The end goal is for your entire outfit to embody your own style, your signature look.
Perform a Wardrobe Audit
Now that you’re styling with your true pieces each day, it’s time to perform a full wardrobe audit. This exercise is where you literally take each item in your wardrobe and style it up to ensure it belongs there.A wardrobe audit takes you through the following actions:
- Determine what clothing and accessories to discard
- Create a wardrobe inventory
- Organize your closet to showcase the current season’s items
- Make new outfits from your closet
If you’re interested in a full breakdown of how to perform a wardrobe audit, check out this post: How To Shop Your Closet The Right Way.
Incorporate Trends And Timeless Pieces
At this point, you’ll have edited your closet down to a starting point for your newfound style to begin. Expand your research of inspiration and muses to fashion trends and timeless styles that interest you and resonate internally. You might not own any of these versatile pieces currently, but this is where the real fun begins.A capsule wardrobe is a great way to curate classic pieces that style with any outfit. Neutral colors are make a great base for creating a unique look with trendy items and unique pieces that add personality.
Shopping becomes more of an enjoyable experience as you make less impulse purchases and more conscious ones, learning a little more about yourself with each one. Each day is another step towards mastering your personal style.
Slowly, you’ll turn your wardrobe into something uniquely beautiful. Avoid going on unplanned shopping sprees and choose accessories with caution. This process is meant to be a slow burn, like anything worthwhile in life.
Ditch Unhealthy Fashion Rules
Healthy rules and boundaries exist to protect, guide and maintain order. Then, there are other ‘rules’ which simply exist to control and stifle others. Are we getting into the politics of fashion? A little bit you might say.Part of discovering your personal style is casting off everyone else’s idea of how you should dress, so you have the freedom to decide for yourself. Similar to self-censoring your social media intake, it’s about pressing the mute button on distractions and different styles that pull you in the wrong direction.
Are you afraid to wear white after Labor Day? Do you avoid wearing black and brown together? What do you do when you don’t have a belt to match your new pair of shoes? And how about Wednesdays…do you always wear pink?
All jokes aside, these are just a few of what I consider to be unhealthy fashion rules that have stolen joy and creativity from myself and many others throughout the last century (and possibly longer). Hasn’t every notable fashion breakthrough been from someone who’s decided to ditch those rules? For example, black used to be associated with servants and widows until Coco Chanel introduced the “little black dress“. Thank you Coco!
Unless you have a moral or ethical conviction for specific fashion rules, it’s time to let them go. What freedom you’ll feel without a silly fashion rule telling you to basically, “don’t be yourself”.
Create your own rules
On the flip side, you’re free to create your own fashion rules. After performing many of the exercises above, like the wardrobe audit, you may come up with a few personal style rules to follow when shopping or styling.For example, one of my rules is that I don’t wear shift dresses. I’ve mentioned this in other posts, but I used to have a problem where I kept buying shift dresses because they looked so cute on the model. I would force myself into thinking I could make them work, but no matter what, I just couldn’t feel confident because of how they looked on me. I began shaming myself thinking there was something wrong with my body shape and weight, which was completely off-base.
You can imagine how this could spiral out of control to an amount of dieting and exercise that will never bring the desired results. Thankfully, I finally realized shift dresses don’t work for my body type and a healthy, new fashion rule was born for me, and me alone. I do not wear shift dresses. And I’m okay with that. I’m now free to feel good and focus on dress styles more aligned with my true, happy self and my personal style. Though I still enjoy shift dresses on others from afar!
Your own fashion rules should guide you to make healthy choices that are aligned with your authentic self.
Your own fashion rules should guide you to make healthy choices that are aligned with your authentic self.
That’s it for this one, fashionistas! Best of luck in your journey to find your personal style.
This post was all about how to find my style
Last edited:
