making it :: tonight!

Good morning, lovely friends! 

First order of business: I'm so excited to announce that our engagement session is up on Style Me Pretty today! You can find it here. We had such a blast during this shoot with Ashley; even though it was absolutely frigid outside, we're so happy with the results. Enjoy!!

Second order of business: TONIGHT! 7pm! MAKING IT! 

Okay, so, if you're not following Courtney (@courtneyromano), please go do so NOW. She's an author (her book The First Ten Years is life changing) started a new workshop series called Making It about the creative process. She interviews small business owners about their journeys and tonight she's interviewing ME! We will talk style, we will talk fashion, we will absolutely have wine. I really hope you'll tune in, tonight at 7pm!

Link to the Google hangout is here, and if you can't make it, it'll be up on Youtube soon after we finish! Yay technology! 

And that's all I've got for you today.

xoxo,

aok

what to wear instead of yoga pants

Friends, this is an important post. I normally don't like to enforce rules on my clients/friends who read on the regular, but recently I feel like I must say something:

Stop wearing yoga pants.

A few weeks ago, I received a puzzled text from my sister. I don't get it, she said, every high-school aged girl wears the same thing: a North Face jacket, yoga pants, and bedroom slippers.

I laughed aloud, but then I realized that girls that age were wearing the same uniform when I was in high school, almost 15 years ago. And when I was in college, too, 10 years ago.

Come to think of it, half the women I see on the streets of New York wear almost the same thing. Swap the Uggs for Nike's and the North Face for a Lululemon jacket and...that's a good portion of the female population. 

I realize how potentially alienating my pointing this out can be. We can draw a feminist parallel here and argue that women have been forced to wear uncomfortable things for centuries, and let's own our wardrobe...and I am ALL for that. But this is not that. This is a mindless, doing it because we've seen it done before, following the pack, activity. 

You've heard me say countless times that it's not what you wear but the arrival of your mind on the pieces that make up your outfit that count. It's the choice and the creativity, to me, that matter when you throw on clothes. How wonderful is it that instead of spending 2 minutes of your life getting dressed every morning, you can spend two minutes of your life deciding how the world receives you visually?

Can you tell I get so fired up about this? I do. Because it's so easy and so fun. We may not be saving lives here but we're having a better morning, in all likelihood. 

So, this morning, instead of yoga pants, let's wear:

sturdy but sleek boots

sturdy but sleek boots

chic, cheap and cheeky loafers

chic, cheap and cheeky loafers

pretty sneaks

pretty sneaks

 

paired with:

subtle 70's

subtle 70's

 

and on bottom, a great pair of jeans: 

The thing about jeans, here, is that you want to make certain that they are your fit. I suggest bringing a friend (or a stylist ;) to a department store and trying on a bunch of different brands. Take a pair or two home and try them on again in your mirror at home. I swear, sometimes the fit is different at home rather than in the department store. 

And all of these pieces can and should be reached for instead of workout pants, Uggs and a sweatshirt. I promise. You can do it. We can do it!!

And that's all I've got for you today.

xoxo,

aok