Well, Sydney has finally given us our long-awaited cold weather.

I’m sitting in a café at the moment in jeans, a tucked in long-sleeve thermal and a thick woolly knit that has pom poms on it. I sound like a piñata, but if you saw me you would think there’s just the right amount of pom poms on this jumper to not want to whack me with a stick.

Myself and many of the lovely staff in Sydney City have all been waiting for the cold weather to arrive and as I write this, it’s a chilly 15 degrees. I am in heaven. Now, you may be on the other side of the world right now, reading this and thinking – that’s what cold is to you? Yes, this is cold for us, it does get colder too, but not by that much.

It did get me thinking about winter style though and how I hear from many of my clients that prefer to shop in winter that finding a winter style that doesn’t make them feel frumpy can be hard when they’re shopping alone.

As you’ve all heard me go on and on about it before, a good shop for the season starts with a knowing what your style is and cleaning out your wardrobe before you go so you don’t double up on anything. I realised, I’ve written about styling on here so much, but haven’t really gone into much detail about how I get my clients prepped for a session of shopping. Which is nuts! So today, that’s what we’re chatting about.

Pinterest is my favourite website ever, it’s like google images for fashion, food, lifestyle, small business and interiors. It’s the tool I use to create mood boards for my clients to base their style off before they shop. You can now create sub-boards too which is like folders inside folders and I love it. This means you can ‘pin’ (the term used to save images to your board) images to folders dedicated to particular parts of your wardrobe, like WINTER!

SIGNING UP TO PINTEREST

Now, if you don’t have Pinterest, I’ve got you. If you do, you can skip this part. There’s no cost involved in creating an account, you just need either a Facebook account or an e-mail address. Now, let me walk you through the step I took when I created an account on my phone. If you’re creating an account on a desktop computer, the steps are very similar, just more condensed.

1. Open up the Pinterest app, or on your computer in a new window/tab.

2. You’ll be instructed to choose which way you would like to create an account. Click on either ‘Continue with Facebook’ or ‘Sign Up With Email’

3. Follow the prompt to either sign in with Facebook or enter your email address. Just make sure that if you enter your email address, you actually have access to this email account.

4. Click next and then enter what you would like your password to be.

5. Click next and enter your name.

6. Click next and enter your age, you don’t need to provide your birthday.

7. Choose your gender and click done.

8. You’ll then be asked to pick at least five topics which will create what’s called a feed (a bit like a Facebook feed, but only of images) for when you visit the site’s homepage. Click next.

YAY!!!! You’re now the proud owner of a sparkly new Pinterest account and you can start pinning! I must warn you, it’s a time machine, once you start pinning on Pinterest, it’s hard to stop. Remember to catch some zzz’s in-between pinning.

LET’S CREATE A PERSONAL STYLE BOARD

Now that you’ve got an account, we’re going to start pinning images to a new Pinterest board. To create a board, start by finding an image of an outfit that excites you to save. Follow my steps on your phone if you get stuck.

The good thing about Pinterest is that it helps you articulate what style you’re looking for and then recommends related topics. For example, if I typed in ‘Winter Fashion’, as I’m typing it, similar topics will appear below the search bar. Once I’ve clicked search, similar topics will appear again. It could be anything from ‘Winter Outfit Ideas’, ‘Fall Fashion’ or ‘Winter Coats’.

I think it’s important to create a style that relates to your lifestyle. You don’t want to fill up a board with gorgeous corporate outfits, if you don’t work a corporate roll, even if they are your style. If you come across things that don’t fit your lifestyle but you love them, save them to a separate board called ‘One Day’. I have a ‘One Day’ board filled with formal gowns, snow village travel destinations and dreamy looking homes.

If your board relates to your lifestyle, you won’t refer to an unrealistic styling board when shopping, which is the whole reason for creating a personal styling board in the first place.  Create boards or sub-boards for each area of your life, if that means you have a work, weekend and going-out board, so be it. Creating these will give you a reference point when shopping so you can stay on track.

I recommend editing the board and curating your style over time because over time, your style will evolve. When it comes time for shopping, you should first shop your wardrobe. If you’ve cleaned out your wardrobe recently, you’re already going to have a good wardrobe shopping trip because your selection of clothing will be edited.

Look at your Pinterest board and the way the garments are styled. We often can replicate looks so easily with what we have at home, and those that we can’t replicate, we can put on our shopping lists.

BREAKING DOWN AND REPLICATING OUTFITS

Pick one of your images to break down. You’ll get bonus points if the outfit image you’ve selected contains one or two items you already have similar of in your wardrobe.

We’re going to look at how each aspect of the garment is styled because the styling is what makes outfits work. Buying clothing, slipping it on and expecting it to work without much further thought than that will just give you a plain outfit and will make you feel like you’ve got nothing to wear.

Look at the images finer details; where on the waist are the jeans sitting, where does the hem end on the wearer? Is the hem cuffed? Does she have a belt on? Is the belt completely visible because the wearer has a garment tucked into her pants? What colour is the belt, does the belt match any other parts of the outfit, if so, which parts?

Once you start deconstructing your outfits, you’ll probably find that you can replicate most of them with existing pieces. After that, you can look at your board as a whole and note down any common areas that keep popping up on your board. If you find that you’ve pinned lots of images of women in jeans and all those jeans look cropped, check if you’ve got cropped jeans, if you don’t write that on your shopping list to try.

If you notice a certain colour or print is repeated, you’re clearly drawn to it! Embrace it! Check if you’ve got anything like it and if you don’t write that on your shopping list.

WHEN YOUR PERSONAL STYLE BOARD IS READY

Once you’ve created your board and have practised breaking down outfits, access the board when you’re out shopping to help keep you on track. When you try on a top, ask yourself, is this the style you’re going for? Or have you picked up something you’ve always picked?

Try creating your board and develop your personal style, it will make the world of a difference to your wardrobe and you’ll start seeing outfits in a new light. Maybe this could be that fresh perspective you’ve needed when shopping to get your style back in action!