The New Year brings opportunity to start afresh and this year I have one style-related resolution. I tend to buy too many Summer sandals. In Seattle, our Springs are chilly and our Summers are short which makes my need for breezy open shoes minimal. I’m therefore putting the brakes on Summer sandal purchases this year.

Do you have any fashion and style resolutions for 2008 that you’d like to share? We’d love to hear them.

We at youlookfab wish you a happy, healthy and stylish New Year.

As it turns out, Christmas colours are all the rage right now. Red continues to hold its own and green is Spring 2008’s hottest new colour. We at youlookfab wish you happy holidays, or as they say where we come from, “compliments of the season”. Travel safely and enjoy the festivities.

Today is Thanksgiving Day in the United States and here at youlookfab it is becoming a tradition to reflect on the things we enjoyed over the past year. This year I was thankful for the following trends:

• We saw an Autumn and Winter season full of colourful clothing that was not bohemian inspired.
• Dresses continued to be a fashion focus.
• Flats are just as fab as heels.
• Tunics and longer length knitted tops are all the rage.
• Skinny, straight, bootcut and wide-leg pants are equally trendy.
• Rises are rising.
• There is an abundance of wool-free warm handle knitwear available (I’m allergic to wool).
• The A-line silhouette is forever fashionable and generally flattering.

But most of all, I’m thankful for my youlookfab friends. It gives me great pleasure to work with my clients and occasionally help them to experience a wonderful “fashion moment” (when that foreign and unfamiliar item of clothing or footwear suddenly makes perfect sense). I’m grateful for the trust they put in me when it comes to their personal style. And then there is you – the youlookfab.com reader. I’m constantly impressed with the thoughtful comments you write on this blog. They really add to the value of our site, and they inspire me to continue.

Thank you youlookfab supporters and Happy Thanksgiving!

It is one thing to do a style transformation with the perfect dress, heels, make-up, haircut and a limitless budget of time and money. It’s much harder to maintain a sense of style daily when you’ve had 5 hours sleep and 15 minutes to get ready. Most of us need an assortment of affordable throw-it-on-in-2-minutes outfits that make us feel stylish, fabulous and comfortable.

This is where I come in, because I have the same needs as you. I’m a fashion stylist and every day I deal with real people with real bodies who lead real lives. I studied Psychology and Fashion Design and have 16 years of international mileage in the fashion industry. I love to use that experience to help people feel good about how they look and what they wear. I firmly believe that style is not a size, age or designer label. It’s about dressing well for the life, body and budget that you have with conviction and confidence.

Along with my style consulting business and my work at Dress for Success, youlookfab is big part of how I like to spread the word that looking fab is not hard to do. Like wardrobes, websites need updates too, so we’ve updated the design of our site and added a few new features to make it a more effective resource. Here are the changes in a nutshell:

• My blog: the formula stays the same, with a few tweaks that make the header more useful by giving quick access to the most sought after information. I’ll continue to blog daily on how we can all achieve and maintain a tangible sense of style affordably and practically.
• Other blogs: There are many great fashion and style blogs out there in the blogosphere – too many to list in the already-cramped sidebar. So we’re maintaining a selection of blogs on a seperate page. If you have a blog and would like to see it in this list, just hit the “Add Your Blog” button and fill out the form. If you fit one of the categories, we’ll link to you – no strings attached.
• Cheat sheets: Blog entries are our bread and butter, but from time to time I’ve wished that I could go into more detail, or cover a topic more comprehensively. Cheat Sheets will allow me to do this. Each one will help you to dress for a special occasion, put together a certain look, or adapt one of the new trends to your lifestyle and body type. I’ve made a start with the Summer Day Wedding and will grow the list over time. Help me to pick good topics by suggesting one or two with the “Topic Idea” form.

The designer/developer bloke behind the site assures me that things are ready for prime time, but no doubt we’ll experience a few hiccups after the transition. If you see something odd or broken, or if you just have a suggestion, please leave us a comment. Thanks for visiting our site and remember to keep those fashion feet moving… there isn’t a style or fashion challenge we can’t solve together!

Red, white and blue colour combinations are often viewed as American, yet I perceive this combination to be French (perhaps because I lived in France before coming to the United States). In fact, red, white and blue hues are also representative of the British, Dutch and Australian flags.

Sometimes the colour I associate with a country is the national colour. I’m Dutch by nationality, and although the flag is red, white and blue, orange is the Dutch national colour. The Netherlands is a monarchy that is governed by members of the House of Oranje-Nassau (where Oranje is Dutch for orange). Of course, the fact that Dutch national sports teams wear orange is probably what keeps the association alive.

Sometimes the country-colour association is a combination of these factors, or something else completely. I associate Kelly green with Ireland, antique pink with England, earth tones with Africa and red with China.

In honour of Independence Day, I‘ll be wearing a red, white and blue ensemble, feeling sporty and American instead of classic and French. Enjoy the holiday!

The Peninsula Humane Society & SPCA is holding an exclusive fundraising fashion show on Sunday 29 April in Burlingame, CA. Furry and feisty four-legged friends will be strutting their stuff down the catwalk in clothing and accessories from Bow Wow Meow, San Francisco’s sassy pet boutique.

I won’t be there in person, but will be there in spirit because our Yorkshire Terriers, Rosie and Jasmine, are featured on the cover of the event programme and invitation. Lisa Henderling, the artist who created the fashion illustration for the event, did the original illustration for the youlookfab header and chose to re-use the picture of our Yorkies because she thought that ”that they might like to help”. Thank you Lisa. The illustration is magical and we are honoured.

All funds raised from the event will benefit the animals in the Peninsula Humane Society & SPCA’s Hope Program. In their words:

All funds raised from this event will benefit the animals in the Peninsula Humane Society & SPCA’s Hope Program. Many animals come to us ready for adoption; many more need extra medical care, behavior training or special love and attention. Our Hope Program allows us to provide this extra care, making well and ready for adoption approximately 150 more animals per month, giving them the second chance they deserve.

I hope that you’ll be able to attend what promises to be an eventful and stylish affair (all donations will be appreciated). For additional information, please contact Dawn Kelsey Fanara at 650.340.7022 (ext. 375) or dkelsey@peninsulahumanesociety.org.

Happy anniversary youlookfab! I can scarcely believe that it has been an entire year since my first post. I thought we could celebrate by reflecting on the posts and categories that have been the most popular.

Top 10 posts:

1. The pretty pear (winner by far!)
2. Perfect pants lengths please
3. What is your fashion persona
4. Smart casual for ladies
5. The racy rectangle
6. The androgynous look
7. The body type balancing act
8. Rethinking the skinny
9. The statuesque inverted triangle
10. Dressing your age

Top 10 categories:

1. Body type (winner by far!)
2. Casual wear
3. Winter 2006/2007
4. Instant style tips
5. Wedding wear
6. Event wear
7. European style
8. Men’s style
9. Accessories
10. Dress codes

Here are my favourite posts:

1. High style in Hong Kong (my home town!)
2. The pretty pear (so many people found this useful)
3. Gap’s decline (fascinating industry story)
4. Perfect pant lengths please (my pet peeve)
5. Rethinking the skinny (I warmed to skinnies… especially for riding boots)
6. The flop proof outfit (such an easy formula)
7. Look slimmer in your clothes (skinny is unhealthy, but slimming never hurts)
8. The power of accessories (the key to your fashion personality)
9. Perfect polish (the importance of grooming)
10. Wearing yellow (the “it” colour this season)

Perhaps you’d like to share some of your favourites?

A big thank you to all our subscribers, daily readers and occasional visitors for making our readership what it is today. It wouldn’t be the same without you.

“It is only shallow people who do not judge by appearances. The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible”
Oscar Wilde (1854 – 1900)

Hello world and welcome to my blog. Non-verbal communication is important: we live in a world in which we are constantly judged by how we dress and what we look like.

On the other hand, if you know what to do, it isn’t difficult to have a sense of style. As with most things in life – “it is the details that make the difference”.

My blog is about sharing the details that I’ve learned from my years of experience as a clothes designer, fashion buyer and personal dresser. It is my mission to encourage everyone to look their very best because they can and because they deserve it!

Angie