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Style Series is a new installment on YBC to help get me out of my leggings & lipstick go-to look. I've always liked the idea of looking put together, but I really never took the time to try to figure out what looks good on my body type, so this series is all about trying to figure that out.
A few weeks back, I went shopping with a friend for a dress for a wedding. Normally, I'm not a dress girl. Or rather, I like to get dressed up, but I just have zero idea what looks good on my body type. I am pretty short, somewhat muscular, and feel like a bull in a China shop when I'm in the dress section of stores. Especially if the sales associates follow me around and try to "help" me. Then, I hightail it outta there, but that's another post for another time.
Anyway, I picked a bunch of dresses off the rack, but nothing was really working for me. And there's nothing like wiggling and squiggling into a dress in a poorly lit changing room to make your self-confidence soar, am I right or am I right? But again, that's another post for another day.
Just when I was starting to give up hope, she came to the room with a few more dresses, and said, "Here, try these."
This dress (now sold out in red, but available in other colors) was the first one of the bunch and it is not something I ever would have picked for myself off the rack.
Usually when necklines are cut like this, I get this weird side boob overhang, and not in the effortlessly sexy side boob way that so many can do, but in the ouch-ouch, that's definitely cutting into my skin kind of way. So, pretty much the opposite of the sexy side boob thing. PS, typing side boob so many times in this blog post is probably going to attract some interesting traffic - thanks, SEO!
Anyway, aside from the neckline, I was under the impression that the midi-dress was a length that wouldn't work on my petite (read: short AF) frame, but the minute I put it on, both the neckline and length seemed irrelevant because it just felt good, and I guess that's the ultimate test of a good piece, no? I felt like the red dress emoji girl, and really, don't we all want to feel like that?
I was also a huge fan of the lace cut out through the chest and waist, which felt just sexy enough, but still covered everything. A few others in a similar style that I really like:
The back of the dress felt great as well. I liked that the slit was high enough so I could walk comfortably (and wouldn't cramp my dancin' at the wedding).
Now, I was initially apprehensive about the style of the dress because I am a body con girl through and through. For some reason I just feel more, I don't know, me in a body con dress. I feel more secure. Part of it is that I feel like my body gets lost in loose dresses and I look like a small child playing dress up. The other insecurity about billowy dresses I think goes back to the time in college when I was wearing the ca-utest skirt made of sweatshirt material. I know it sounds awful but I promise it was great. Anyway, I had my arms full of books as I left the library. It was finals week, and everyone and their mother was at the library, so there was a huge crowd at the exit, which is where our library's cafe was. Anyone who went to UCONN can tell you the entire campus is pretty much a wind tunnel, but yours truly didn't take that into sartorial consideration and of course my skirt flew up inside out umbrella style, and my arms were full of books, so it was awful. Anyway, to this day I hate wearing a skirt or a dress that isn't either a) body con or b) a maxi dress, and therefore would be nearly impossible to let me down with a fly-up.
With sheaths, I feel borderline blah in. Like, I'd categorize how I feel in a sheath with a resounding: MEH. (God, who knew one could write at such lengths about one's dress insecurities?!) But when a sheath has carefully designed cut outs with a lace overlay, one has to reconsider their MEH and just get outside their sartorial comfort zone.
The shoes are pretty much my go-to comfortable nude heels. I have another pair that are simple and would probably go better with this (I don't even know if this pair goes, does it? Someone help me!) but they are so damn uncomfortable and I just can't make the sacrifice. Or rather, I can, but I don't wanna. Plus a blister-fueled limp just isn't a good look on anyone. A few others I like for this look below:
So, there it is. I'm pretty psyched, actually, to be getting out of my comfort zone. I used to always go with black, but I actually wore another red dress to a different wedding a few weeks ago, so I think the little red dress might be the new little black dress. At least in my book.