Latest / Project Emerald Collective / The role of personal style in self-acceptance and confidence
Transcript
- Eve: we're going to have a chat today around the bigger and more important topics that I feel are on everyone's minds and lips at the moment, Intentional dressing, self-expression, community, and behavior change, particularly for women that lost have lost their connection to themselves somewhere along the way. And I think we can both you know equally resonate with that because there are so many changes that happen throughout our lives as women. So it's about recognizing them and honouring them as opposed to trying to forget about them. So May, I'd love for you to give us a little intro as to, you know, who you are a not just as a stylist, or in your professional life, but, you know, who you are as a person so we can get to know you May Flaming: Yeah, great. Thanks Eve. So yeah, my name's May Fleming. I'm a personal stylist. I am supporting women through their life to transition as they evolve and helping them evolve their style to reflect who they really are. So that's what I'm passionate about is to be able to serve women in that way and how I spend my time and energy. Yeah, and I think a lot of it comes through your own personal lived experience and I think that's where a lot of stylists enter into this space. It's not just about fashion, but it's actually through what we've actually gone through, our style rights, you know, as we've gone through these different life changes and I think that's what we kind of bring into what we do and I think that's no better way than, you know, having that empathy of that lived experience with your clients. So, yeah. Eve: Yeah, absolutely. And that develops over time as well. May Flaming: Yeah, and I think it's easy to do because you know our lives are busier and women tend to... take on these caretaking roles. They're busy working, they're playing mother role. And now I think there's a generation of women that's also taking care of their elders as well, their aging parents. So it's a lot that women carry. I think sometimes they tend to lose themselves through those different processes of giving first to everyone else rather than themselves. And then I think there's points in time where it's significant life changes, whether they've you've started a family, your body shape has changed, your whole lifestyle has changed. You might have moved from a corporate to a more entrepreneurial setting, which I've also gone through. You know, so much of that identity can be wrapped up in that kind of corporate, you know, uniform and things like that. And so if you're transitioning to another career, that's also another significant phase in life that you kind of have to look through. Yeah. And I've worked a lot with clients in that postpartum phase, you know, how to dress for their new lifestyle, but also women in their fifties or that's gone through that that perimenopause menopause phase where they've had changes in their body and even if they knew how to dress their body before, they're faced with my body's completely changed and I feel foreign to myself, you know, but how do I dress this body? And when they've done that inner work and accepted that body change, it's just how do we support them to be able to embrace their new shape and dress to that rather than trying to fit into the old mold of who you were, you know, so it's really wonderful being able to support women through that. had clients doing a location change from one side of the world to another and needing that support to redefine what their wardrobe might look like to suit their new life and a new life chapter. So yeah, so I think those life transitions is what is usually what instigates that kind of personal style change or they've also involved and you change as a person and that wardrobe being to reflect that. I think that's where the styling comes in to help uncover that and help you and also give women permission. I think sometimes they kind of do know but they need that validation and permission to step into that change. the shops are showing you the same styles. So it's very hard to find your personal style when everyone's wearing the same thing and it's only what's available that's out there. So I think there's a lot of noise and I think trying to find that personal style is being able to really connect back in with yourself and trying to separate what you actually love and what what you kind of gravitate to, but also, yeah, what suits your lifestyle and what you actually wear. Because I think women are easily sold to all the time. yeah, and so be able to kind of step back and really reflect on what do you actually need that suits your lifestyle and not your fantasy self as well. Eve: in. May Flaming: Yeah. Yeah, and I think a lot of women are inspired by what other women are wearing, but we're all unique in our body shape, our style, stature, like so many things. And I think where they get really frustrated is that they see something that looks good on someone, but they don't know how to dress for their own body shape or that aligns with their own personal style. So sometimes I think it's nice to like appreciate what it looks like on others Eve: Mm-hmm. Mm. May Flaming: whether you're stay at home mom or I live a more relaxed wardrobe, then spending too much of your hard earned money on a wardrobe that's mostly for going out, it's just gonna be going against what you actually need in your wardrobe. So I think it's how you're investing in your wardrobe to make sure it's working hard for you, dressing with ease so that you can spend your time and energy doing other parts that lights you up in life, right? what I don't want women to do is blame themselves and their bodies. It's Yeah. Yeah, definitely. And I think clothes are so powerful. You know, like we all have to dress every day. So, you know, it's like inside out and outside in. It's like how you're showing up in the world because we know that people judge like more visual and so they will judge you based on first impressions before you even open your mouth. Right. They're looking at how how you dress that communicates a lot of things, So you can use clothing and style as a way to how you're going to express yourself. How do you want to be received? you how do you want to show up in the world and how you want to move through your day. But then also, like, instead of dressing for how you feel, dress for how you want to feel. And that also has that, in turn, makes you feel there about yourself. You you step into the embodied version of who you want to become and more of, you know. So it's like a chicken and egg thing as well. But starting with, yeah, elevating your style and how you want to be perceived and how you want to Eve: Mm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. May Flaming: I think then has like ripple effect in terms of yeah your internal world and how you kind of grow and move through that. Eve: basing my decisions from that place May Flaming: Yeah, and we've all been there, you know, like when you've been in a rush, you haven't been prepared or you don't have a wardrobe that works for you and there's always a missing piece and you throw on this outfit and you move through the day and you just don't feel good about yourself. so it shows. It shows in how you feel, how you walk, how you, you know, communicate or interact with people. So, so I think, yeah, make that life easy for you and at least get that sorted so you can be able to mix and match and. Eve: I Yeah. May Flaming: yeah be able to put things together easily. Eve: Yeah, that's right. May Flaming: Yeah, I think you can't do like a think about doing like a whole complete transformation and you know, I'm just going to throw everything out and start again, even though that sometimes is the way we feel when we're frustrated with our wardrobes. I think it's important to carve out space to really reflect on, yeah, like what's your actual lifestyle and you know, how you can slowly explore your personal style and introduce and have some fun and have some like creativity, you know, like there's things that you can repurpose or, you know, try and work out what that is and I think taking those baby steps and I think also with some of my clients I give them advice that sometimes people are not, you know, people around us, they love us and you know they maybe are not also comfortable with you changing so being aware that as you step into a fuller version of yourself that may make other people uncomfortable I think is also good in terms of your own self-discovery So it is a process and it does take time but I think have a fun with it. I think we're too serious with I think we could do with just having a little bit more fun and play and it doesn't matter it's just clothes you know So and I think that's where we can get more individuality and expression It could just be little things, like different ways of how you might style something or repurpose something. Bye, Yeah, I have a kind of a styling process approach that's quite a little bit more deeper. And it is a very psychological approach, this whole personal styling, but also the way I kind of uncover and also with color analysis. It's we talk about seasons and things like that. But actually this process and methodology is actually about who you are on the inside. And so it's how cover that like what are the colors that actually lights you up? What are the styles that Eve: Yeah, right. Mm. May Flaming: actually gravitate to. So yeah, that's the beauty in that foundational piece of uncovering that, that helps serve you in terms of the decisions that you make and learning more about yourself and revealing more about yourself, that we've kind of forgotten ourselves. So yeah, so that's exploratory work that we kind of do and clients find that so enlightening as well. yeah, I would say probably about four to six weeks. It depends on the client availability. but we start with, yeah, first understanding the personal styles. We do a consultation, really getting to know a deep dive about, you know, what their needs are, what did they want to achieve? So really having that goal in mind, of where they want to get to. yeah, understanding personal style, color, what's their best colors. you know, understanding how to dress for their body and not But I kind of straddle both worlds and I can draw from both worlds depending on what the client you know what they gravitate to through that we do a wardrobe edit. So this is like the full styling transformational process We go through the wardrobe to work out. Okay, what's no longer aligned? You know, we can look at you know, what do you recycle what can be repaired? and helping them put new outfits together based on what they have. And give them some outfits that they can work with and working out what's the gaps. And it's all aligned back to the lifestyle and what they want to achieve. And then I'll go off and do some research and put, curate a collection of items that what are kind of missing in their wardrobe that that's going to help expand their wardrobe and help them, you know, get more wear out of it. And then we'll go on a one-on-one a shopping session. And that's really just such a luxurious thing to do for yourself because you don't have to navigate at all. It's all done for you. So my clients just basically walk into their own private styling suite or a change room, what have you, but it's already there. You just have to try things on and help you with styling and putting outfits and how you can wear things. sometimes things work, sometimes they don't work and that's all part of the process, but it's very much also educational piece because I'm also educating them as they go along so they're starting to be aware and train their eye because I think when clients sometimes shop they've just got their blinkers on and they just gravitate to buying the same thing in multiple colors because they think that style works or they gravitate to black so you're slowly opening themselves up to seeing themselves in a different way. Yeah and so after that process we do a wardrobe integration so showing them how Eve: Yeah. May Flaming: they integrate their old pieces with their new pieces and formulate their new outfits and then the process after that is they get a lookbook of outfits that they can have a go-to to refer to so when they're stuck in the morning and they don't know what to wear that's their go-to guide to refer to but my aim is over time they will start being able to do that for themselves without you know just just only referring to what's what's in a lookbook so yeah it's a process over time. Probably some of my favorite client experiences is when I see that shift in them is like I had a client that did a little shimmy and you can just see and that's my favorite moments in the whole client experience is when you just see them embrace themselves and you see them loving who they see in the mirror and that's this is the other thing that I found working with some of my midlife women for example I'm amazed how many don't own a mirror and they're not looking at themselves in the mirror Eve: Mm. May Flaming: themselves. They've just forgotten or they stop seeing themselves. And so them to truly like see themselves and take themselves in the mirror and love who they see. I love that. And that's that's that shift. I know that that's when that transformation kind of happens. Yeah, and our style changes, probably would say every five years to revisit that. it's a process because it takes time to to rebuild or re you know rejig your wardrobe right as you move across the seasons so but you know through that continual kind of investment and tweaking of your wardrobe then you'll start building a wardrobe that truly works and then you can get to a stage when you've got your kind of standard capsule wardrobe. It doesn't have to be boring but capsule wardrobes can look different for different people. It doesn't have to be just minimalist beige, black and navy or whatever. Then you can start introducing more of those fun, interesting pieces or how you can kind of have a bit more fun with style and yeah, different things that you can kind of try. But yeah, that investment in your wardrobe to have something of quality, timelessness that you can get more out of your wardrobe and it's better for your pocket and better for the environment. Eve: what role do you think secondhand fashion can play in individual individuality and confidence? May Flaming: You know, back to my point before about, you know, we're in such a digitally global world. So, you know, you see groups of girls or whatever, they're all dressed the same. It doesn't matter where you are. You might be traveling to another city and they're all dressed the same. So I think that's where a lot of the mainstream stores, you can only buy what's available. So, you know, when we've gone through this whole oversized trend, you know, that's all that's available. so you kind of have to really be selective of that. So I think that's where secondhand shopping works well is that you're not you've got so much more variety you know and you can truly tap into a secondhand pre-love boutique or a thrift shop or what have you and you can really see such a myriad of styles and colors and patterns and you know and just see what you Eve: Mm. May Flaming: kind of gravitate to and that you can try different things and you can't do that in like a mainstream store if you're really wanting to explore and if you want something different that not everyone else has as well. you know that to be able to find that unique you know outfit or expression that you know not everyone that walks down the street is going to have. So that's another great way to be able to find your style but also Eve: Mm. Yeah. May Flaming: be able to express yourself differently from others. Eve: Yeah, absolutely. May Flaming: Yeah, I think I just want women to be kind to themselves and don't look at the size, don't try and squeeze into the clothes that you fitted into like 10, 20 years ago. Really embrace who you are and I think focus on your whole self rather than just... you know, just the clothes that you put on. Yeah. And I think invest in yourself, like in that self care. I think it's really important. We need to take care of ourselves first and then let that have that kind of ripple effect in the rest of your life. And it can even impact on the relationships around you. So, yeah, I think take that time and invest in yourself. Eve: my name's Eve McIntyre. For those that don't know me, I'm the founder of Project Emerald and the Project Emerald Collective. And more into empowerment around fashion choices, but also living more intentionally in in general and taking our power back as women. So there'll be a series of these interviews.