How to Dress Up or Dress Down a Look
Periodically, I’m inspired to pull things from my closet and think about how to style them in different ways and think about dressing an item up as well as dressing it down. In the past, I’ve shared how to style one pair of pants four different ways and get the most mileage out of an item. To read that post click here: One Pair of Pants Styled Four Ways. I decided to pull out an old but loved sweater from my closet. Introducing the SWEATER and how I dressed it up, down and changed my personal look!
Dress Up
This sweater has been in my closet for so long that I don’t even remember how long ago I purchased it. I do recall that it’s from Stein Mart when Stein Mart still had actual stores. It should have probably been donated by now along with other things that no longer fit me but I’ve hung on to it. It’s an extra large and now I’m usually a medium and can sometimes wear a small. The bright colors – red, pink and black and white along with the pattern mix – floral and zebra – is so fun that I just couldn’t part with it and after playing around and styling it, I’m so glad I kept it.
Since the sweater is too large on me, I opted to keep it unbuttoned and layer it over a cami. After taking the pictures, it crossed my mind that I could also have belted it.
White, black, pink or red would all be good matches underneath the sweater. While I paired it with my black jeans, which is casual to me, this look could also be worn with black dress pants or black leggings, white dress pants, red or even pink dress pants. I could switch out the black jeans for white jeans or red jeans. You get the idea. The options are pretty endless. As you can see, I wore the sweater over a white cami and wore my white booties. Red, black or pink booties would also work as well as a cami in black, red or pink. Would you wear any other colors with this look?
Don’t forget accessories! Accessories always elevate an outfit and really pull a look together! When I envision an outfit, I visually see it from head to toe and everything in between! To see a previous blog post on accessories click here: Accessories Make the Outfit.
Since I was wearing white booties and a white cami, I opted for my white purse and black and white sunnies. Black, pink and red accessories would also be a match…you know I like matchy matchy!
This look could be worn almost any where! If I had black dress pants on, I’d wear this look to work. With jeans, it’s a great look for a date night, lunch date or shopping with girlfriends.
Pink and Red Sweater – Option 1
Pink and Red Floral Sweater – Option 2
To dress this sweater down, I simply switched out the cami with a tank and the booties with some tennies! Voila, simple and easy! Wearing flats of any kind or even wearing tennies, unless I’m working out, is out of my comfort zone. I’m usually in heals. These sneakers caught my attention because of the fun patterns, colors and metallic silver!
Similar to the cami, a tank top in white, pink or red would work. A plain t-shirt would also work if you’d prefer a looser fit as the tank is slightly more clingy. Wearing the black tank and the black jeans portraits a longer, leaner look similar to column dressing (all one color top to bottom).
The P448s have a mix of animal print – zebra on the toes in white and silver, leopard print on the sides and how about those metallic bright pink shoe strings! So happy I splurged on these! These P448s so comfy and super cute! In the past, I would have never put these sneakers with this sweater! Stepping out of my comfort zone and loving it! Leopard and zebra and floral – oh my!
I opted to keep all of my accessories the same as in my dressed up look! A leopard purse and leopard print sunnies might add an additional element of fun to this look and play off of the P448s.
The dressed down version of this look would be great for almost anything. I could wear this to work on Fridays. It would be great for running errands, lunch or shopping dates or even a casual dinner date.
Sneakers – Option 1
Sneakers – Option 2
Sneakers – Option 3
What do you think? Should I grow my hair out?
It’s a lot of hair and it was a super windy day! Trying to keep the hair out of my eyes, face and lipstick…LOL!
When you have lots of hair, you can do hair flips and tosses, which is fun!
Are you trying to style your wardrobe differently? Do you have any tips or styling tricks? Leave us a comment! We always love to hear from you and appreciate your ideas!
Let’s get social! Follow us on Instagram ( HERE) and Facebook ( HERE)
Subscribe to YouTube ( HERE)
This post contains affiliate links, meaning when you click on an item or purchase an item, I may receive a very small commission for the click or purchase. These picks are NOT sponsored, are selected solely by me, and opinions are entirely my own.
The author may collect a small share of sales from the links on this page.
Comments
Join the conversation