Dress Slim Tips
Did you know your clothes can make your look 10-20 pounds slimmer?   Who wants or needs to look heavier than they are?  Try some of the following tricks to create illusions that you are thinner than you really are. 

Down Play Body Silhouettes – Use Clothing to Create Illusions
When you notice someone for the first time you notice the outline of their body.  This outline forms a silhouette.  Tight garments, ones that cling or conform to the body, place the emphasis on the body’s silhouette and make the body under it appear larger no matter what size that body is.  Most of us don’t have the perfect hour glass proportions or great looking physiques so we need a little help balancing our proportions. 

Structured tailored clothing styles can give our body a more balanced appearance and direct the viewer’s attention to the shape of the garment away from the body.  Try wearing a tailored jacket or a classic collared dress shirt instead of figure conforming t-shirts.  Layering several garments on top of one another can also be used to balance out a not so perfect figure. Clothing can create the illusion that your body is well proportioned, 20 pounds thinner, taller, and leaner.

When the clothing being worn gets "hung up" on body curves or bulges it creates a contrast in lines and shapes calling attention to that area of the figure. Horizontal lines form when a garment is too tight around indicating one needs a larger size.  Vertical lines form when something is too large and diagonal lines form when something just doesn’t fit correctly. 

To look our best we want to make sure that our garments flow smoothly over our body fitting perfectly to allow for normal body activities and comfort.  With today’s close fitting clothing styles we don’t have a lot of extra ease (space) built into our garments for those extra pounds.  Those extra pounds can’t be hidden in anything but, a larger size with more ease.  

Advertising one’s body curves is not always a pleasant experience for others.   Recently I noticed a lady dressed in a light tight pair of slacks that revealed her heavy legs and their imperfections through her pants.  If she had chosen slacks that were a larger size in a darker color I’d have never noticed her proportions.  Take charge of where you focus a person’s attention and use the elements of art to focus attention on your best features, not your worst. 

Contrasting Color in Jacket	Collared Shirt and Scarf	Long Tunic Vest Lengthens Look	Collared Shirts

Focus Attention Up – Use the Elements of art
Communicate more effectively by focusing attention up toward your face with the use of color, line, shape, texture, and pattern.  You will become more interesting to look at and a better communicator.   A simple tool men use is the tie.  It is linear, colorful and interesting to look at while directing our attention to their face.  Wearing a tie is a great dress slim tip for men especially when coupled with a collared shirt.  It takes the attention away from the mid section.

Women can use collared shirts and contrasting colors to lift our attention to their face..  Linda Linenfelser is wearing a dark skirt and shirt with a contrasting patterned scarf.  The colors and pattern in the scarf draw our attention up to her face just like a tie does for a man.  Another slimming technique we suggested was to wear dark hosiery with a one inch heeled low vamp shoe.

To learn more about how you can counter or camouflage your figure irregularities contact Kathy about a Fabulous Fit Image Consultation.

Thank you to the Granite Bank Gallery for permission to photograph in their facility and to Linda Linenfelser for posing in her new clothes.

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