There’s this unspoken idea that to look stylish and chic, you have to spend a lot of money and always be buying new things. I want to toss the idea out of having to break the bank to look stylish. You can look good on a budget, and you can look good for free with the clothes you have in your closet right now.
In this blog post, I’m going to share my five best tips on how to improve your style for free.
Edit Your Closet Regularly
The first thing you can do to improve your style for free is to regularly edit your closet. Essentially editing your closet means going through your closet regularly and decluttering.
I personally go through my closet once a month and I take out pieces that I have not been wearing. If the clothes I edit are off-season, meaning fall or winter clothes and it’s spring or summer, I put those in storage and that gets them out of the way.
The reason why it’s so important to edit your closet regularly is that if you have too many items in your wardrobe, it’s going to overwhelm you and you’re not going to branch out with your style or get creative with your outfits and try different things. When you have too many options, you’re going to stick to a couple of outfits you know work.
By having fewer options in your wardrobe, it’s going to make it easier to reach for the things that you want to try. I would recommend whittling your closet down to the pieces you know you love and some pieces you really want to try wearing.
When editing your closet, check out Poshmark and ThreadUp; you can sell your unwanted clothing items and use credits from the sales to buy new clothes or cash out and use the money on new pieces in the store.
Look Up New Ways to Style Your Favorites
The second thing you can do to improve your style is look up new ways to style your favorite pieces. Oftentimes, we get fall into wearing the same outfits or pieces over and over again cause it’s what is comfortable for us.
For example, my go-to is a pair of black motorcycle leggings and a black t-shirt. But there are so many different ways to style that base outfit, whether with jewelry, adding a flannel, putting on a hat, changing up my shoes, or throwing on a jacket or hoodie.
There are infinite ways to style a basic outfit, such as motorcycle leggings, a black t-shirt or jeans, and a white t-shirt. When I’ve run out of ideas on how to style an outfit, I’ll hop on Pinterest, my favorite place, and get some inspiration. You could type in “white t-shirt outfit ideas,” and I promise you Pinterest will deliver.
Whether it’s jeans, miniskirts, boots, or sneakers, there are so many different ways to style things out of the box. Check out my Pinterest here for some style inspiration.
Shop Your Friend’s Closet
If you have a friend who has a similar size to you and is willing to share, you can find many gems. Ask them if you can borrow an accessory, or a jacket, or shoes, etc. I don’t do this frequently, but if we’re getting ready to go out on the town and I’m helping my friend get ready, if I spot something that will finish off my outfit, I ask their permission to borrow it with a promise to return it the next time we see each other.
Alternatively, you could shop a family’s member closet. If you have a sister or mom a similar size to you, you could shop their closet. If you shop an older member of your family’s closet, you might find some hidden vintage gems.
Alter Your Clothes
The next thing you can do to majorly improve your style for free is to alter your pieces. Altering your clothes is essentially adjusting your clothes, so they fit and flatter you more. Now altering your clothes may sound a bit intimidating if you’ve never done it before, but I promise it is so easy.
You can either do it yourself with a few sewing basics and some YouTube videos, or you can ask a friend or family member that knows how to make alterations. Or, if you have the money, you can go to a tailor and get them to do it. It’s not as expensive as you think to get a tailor to make your alterations.
Create a Few “No-Fail” Outfits
My final style-improving tip is to create a couple of no-fail outfits. No fail outfits are outfits that you put together that are kind of like uniforms. Basically, they are outfits from pieces in your closet that you know work and are stylish. You don’t even have to think twice about them because you’ve already made them almost like a uniform.
Having these no-fail outfits will save you when it comes to times when you’re in a rush or a pinch, and you need to put together an outfit. You can create five or six no-fail outfits that you can reach for and still look cute in.
You can even create no-fail outfits for various occasions such as date nights, friends’ night out, concerts, job interviews, etc.
My last little note is that if you have trouble remembering things, then definitely take a picture and either save it to a folder on your phone or you can even print the photos out and then tape them to the back of your closet door or wall, so when you get stuck, you can just refer to one of those and boom you have a great outfit that you look beautiful and feel confident in.
I hope you got some great styling tips and tricks that you can apply to your own life and improve your style for free because I really want to break that stigma that you have to spend a lot of money to look good.
If you have any tips of your own on how to improve your style or look for free, make sure you share those in the comments below!
