Style notes from Maria
Styling tips, capsule wardrobe ideas and notes from my work as a Personal Shopper & Stylist in London.
Fashion · 6 min read
The winter school run is its own kind of test: dark when you leave, wet when you arrive, and a cold playground before your own day begins. Here are the school run outfits for winter I would put together: warm, quick and comfortable, but still you.
Read the postFashion · 6 min read
Open a mum's wardrobe and you will usually find the same thing: plenty of clothes, and nothing to wear. Some pieces don't fit the way they used to, some don't suit the days you have now, and the rest are waiting for a life with more time in it. A capsule wardrobe is the simplest fix I know. It is a small set of pieces that all work together, so getting dressed takes a minute rather than a crisis. Here is how I would build a **capsule wardrobe for mums**, the same way I would if we were doing it together.
Read the postFashion · 4 min read
Buying a Christmas present for a man is hard. Ask him what he wants and you'll hear "nothing, honestly", and the usual answers (another jumper, another bottle of aftershave) are forgotten by February. Here is a gift that isn't: a personal shopping experience with a Personal Shopper & Stylist, who helps him find clothes and colours that suit him and shows him how to wear them.
Read the postFashion · 7 min read
If you're thinking about a personal shopping day in Oxford, Westgate is usually where I start. It's right in the city centre, it brings most of the high street and mid-range names together in one place, and with a little planning it's one of the easiest places in Oxford to shop well.
Read the postFashion · 6 min read
Bicester Village can be a brilliant day out, or a very expensive one. I've seen both. The difference is almost never the budget. It's whether you arrive knowing what you need, what suits you and when to walk away.
Read the postFashion · 9 min read
A few months after having a baby, a lot of women tell me the same thing: "I open my wardrobe and I just don't know what to wear any more." The old favourites don't sit the way they used to, the things that do fit feel shapeless, and getting dressed has become one more decision on a day already full of them. If that sounds familiar, you are in very good company. Your body has changed, your days have changed, and your clothes haven't caught up yet. That isn't a failing. It's simply a wardrobe that was built for a different life.
Read the postFashion · 8 min read
Going back to work after maternity leave is a big moment, and for a lot of women the wardrobe is where it suddenly feels real. You open the doors, pull out the trousers you wore before the baby, and nothing sits the way it used to. Or it fits, but it feels like it belongs to someone else. If that's where you are, please hear this first: nothing is wrong with you. Your body and your days have changed, and your clothes simply haven't caught up yet. That's a wardrobe problem, and wardrobe problems can be solved.
Read the postFashion · 8 min read
You've been invited to a garden party this summer, and suddenly your wardrobe feels completely useless. Everything is either too smart, too casual, or that dress you love but have never actually worn anywhere. Sound familiar?Here's the thing: a garden party is one of those occasions that sounds simple but asks a lot. You need to look lovely, stay comfortable on grass for three or four hours, and somehow account for the fact that British weather will do exactly what it wants regardless of what th
Read the postExperiences · 11 min read
The first thing I notice when I walk into a client's wardrobe is the smell of fabric. Cotton mostly, sometimes wool, occasionally the faint chemical sweetness of something that's been in a dry-cleaning bag for two years and never come out.Then I start looking. And what I see is almost never what she sees.She sees a problem. I see a story. The jeans at the front that she pulls on every Monday. The dress with the tag still on, four rails back. The cardigan she wore in her old job in a city she doe
Read the postFashion · 7 min read
Before we go anywhere, I want to say one thing: this is not a finger-wagging post. I am not here to make you feel silly about what's hanging in your wardrobe. The common fashion mistakes women make are not character flaws — they are completely reasonable patterns that come from busy lives, well-meaning advice, dressing rooms with terrible lighting, and a clothing industry that doesn't make any of this easy.I've made every single one of these myself. I see them every week with clients who walk in
Read the postFashion · 6 min read
Here's something I say to almost every new client: most people don't actually have a personal style. What they have is a wardrobe full of things they bought on impulse, under pressure, or because something was on sale and it seemed like it might work. That's not a style. That's a collection. And I say that with nothing but kindness, because it is completely not your fault.We live in a world that throws thousands of trends at us every single week. Fast fashion wants you confused, because confused
Read the postFashion · 11 min read
You open the invite, read "smart casual" at the bottom, and your stomach does a little flip. What does that even mean? Are jeans okay? Is a blazer too much? Will you be the only one who turned up looking like she's about to chair a board meeting — or worse, the only one in trainers?I cannot tell you how often this exact panic lands in my inbox. Hundreds of clients, all asking the same question. Smart casual is, hands down, the most confusing dress code in the modern wardrobe, and I think it's be
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