Style: It’s not something you can buy. Yes, anyone with a credit card can stroll into Barneys and emerge looking like Fashion with a capital F—but that’s not necessarily what truly stylish people do. Very few people—credit cards or not—can be considered humans of genuine style, but if you’re working on developing your own sense of style, we’ve rounded up the top seven habits of highly stylish people for you to keep in mind.
True style takes something else, something less tangible than the right label at the right time. While piling on “It” items might give you a boost of instant sartorial gratification, in six months those pieces will be obsolete, you’ll be out a month’s rent, and you’ll feel compelled to keep up with the cycle of buying the next round of coveted pieces. It’s exhausting. Still, so many people seem to fall victim to that exact cycle.
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Blame it on today’s street style-obsessed world, but all we have to do today is take a quick peek at Pinterest, give Instagram a quick scroll, or visit any one of the gazillion personal style blogs that exist, and we’ll be inundated with up-to-the-minute images of Céline, Proenza Schouler, Givenchy, Chanel, and other top-level labels, which can often create a bit of FOMO. And that, in turn, can result in scores of people looking, well, exactly like everyone else and going broke in the process.
Then, however, there are those images you’ll see on blogs or street style sites of women who look so amazingly chic, cool, or interesting who aren’t covered in head-to-toe labels, but rather know how to take nondescript pieces and style them in such a way that their whole look is completely enviable and covetable.
These, friends, are the truly stylish women from whom we should aim to take our fashion inspiration. To that end, we’ve compiled the seven habits of highly stylish people to get you started. Read on and take notes.
They Don’t Surf Street Style Blogs and CopyExactlyWhat They See
In this day and age, street style photos are a bona fide source of fashion inspiration. In fact, we spend a pretty hefty portion of our day stalking Pinterest and culling various galleries to offer our readers (and ourselves) great ideas when it comes to seasonal outfits.
However, just because you sawTaylor Tomasi Hill,Miroslava Duma, orAnya Zirhouvadraped inKenzo,Chanel, orCéline—or because you’ll be in New York during Fashion Week and want to get snapped byPhil Oh—isn’t a great reason to go out and splurge on the same stuff.
Don’t forget: Several big street-fashion players,editors, and bloggers getsentdesigner stuff for free to entice folks like us to go out and buy it. Others are, well, richer than us and it’s their day job to flitaroundthe world in thelatestdesigner clothes, which is fun to admire but notnecessarily healthy to emulate.
That’s why truly stylish girls will see a look they’re drawn to and seek out lesser-priced pieces that have the same vibe.Plenty of affordable stores and sites offer items that feature similar aspects to designer pieces.
They Aren’t Afraid of AnyStore—And Can Find Something Almost Anywhere
Legitimately stylish women will troll any—and we mean any—store with zero snob factor, yet they manage to stay true to their aesthetic.
For example, she won’t be afraid to pop into a cheesy-seeming teen store at the mall, but that doesn’t mean she’ll leave with the same things her 12-year-old cousin would.Same goes for fast-fashion haunts like Forever 21, dusty old thrift stores, and off-price havens like TJ Maxx, Marshalls, and Century 21, which are consistently packed with great stuff at non-sucker prices.
They Know How to Style Themselves According to Their Own Taste
Isn’t it always the case that the most stylish girls will say “This blouse? It’s from Goodwill, like, 100 years ago” and actually mean it?
Yeah, the blouse itself is probably pretty cool, but it’s really the way she styled it—maybe she tucked into great-fitting jeans, unbuttoned one extra button, rolled up the sleeves, and added a killer pair of boots and a micro bag—that made everyone comment on it.
They Always Look a Little Less “Done” Than Everyone Else
Highly stylish people are often in the habit of always appearing a teeny tiny bit too cool for every scenario they’re in.
This might mean wearing a pair of slip-on sneakers when every other girl is teetering on sky-high heels, wearing a chic skinny pantsuit when every other woman is rocking glittery party dresses, or chopping her hair into a messy bob when everyone else has long beachy waves. Small things that always make them look a little less “done.”
They Understand Labels Don’t Make Them Cooler
It sounds cliché, but the most stylish women—and men, for that matter—in the world are ones who have confidence, and who know they don’t need the $700 sweatshirt or $2,000 handbag to make themselves appear cool.
These folks can step out in a faded gray tee and jeans and still look like the coolest person in the room all because they have confidence (okay fine, and probably a killer haircut, too).
They Aren’t Slaves to Fashion
Some of the most stylish people are able to have fun with fashion and follow trends without looking like a slave. If you don’t like a trend—even if every blogger under the sunis wearingit—don’t buy into it. It’s that simple.
They Don’t Dress to be Considered Stylish
Before blogs, before street style, and before Fashion Week became a three-ring circus that only mattersfor those who havethe most attention-grabbing clothing, young women dressed for themselves, their lifestyle, and what looked good on them.
Believe us: It doesn’t matter if those heels are Alexander Wang—if you can’t walk in them, you won’t be considered stylish. Throw on a pair of comfortable ankle boots with that mini dress, you’ll look much cooler.
A version of this article was originally published in January 2014.
