Tania says ... part 1

People that knows me, knows about my obsession with fashion. I study, i preach, I live and i wear fashion. Of coz, fashion to me used to be about what is in, what is out. But now, i know fashion is about you and you only. fashion is about what you wear, not what wear you. Its about how it represent you, not about what you represent. Fashion is you. Below will be some of my tips on fashion, from colour, to fabric, to clothes, to shoes, to accessories... Everything i know, i tell... not to tell you what to wear, but to help u to find your own style :) like what coco chanel said, 'in order to be irreplaceable, one must always be different'

Ok.. let's get to business... Let's do colours first.

1. Its black, its white...

Ok, black and white, both being the basic colour where you just cant go wrong, or so you thought? The things is there is nothing wrong in wearing an all black or an all white assemble, provided you accessorises it properly. I mean you don't want to look like you are attending someones funeral or a nurse from the eighties... Be bold, if you are wearing an all black cocktail dress, match it with a coloured shoe, be it red, yellow or even green! its ok, as long as that is the only other colour u have. the rule is, never have more then 3 colours in one assemble!!.

All white is fine too for the ladies. I mean you can wear an all white suite provided you wear a coloured shirt inside. White is the best colour to match with almost anything. Even better then black! Oh ya, try not to mix black with grey. It not to say that its wrong, but it just a bit too dull, especially if you have a darker skin tone.

Another thing to note that, a black coloured fabric tends to look more 'expensive' then white ones. I mean, you can buy a black shirt for 29.90 yet pull its off as 299.99, but its almost impossible to do that with white shirt. Therefore, i will invest in a more expensive white cloth, as it is worth it anyway. And maybe can go a bit more budget with black ones :)

By the way, black does not necessary make you look slimmer, but a right cut will! FYI, people with a darker skin tone looks the best with white :)

I wont talk to much here about black and white as i will elaborate more later in the "white shirt" and "little black dress" topic later on. Just remember if nothing else match, just go black!!!

2. the RED faces



Red. Somehow it reminds of a guilty pleasure, a sinful right... I adore red and i think only a true woman can bring out the passion and life of the colour red. Therefore, red is a tricky colour to wear, u need to do it just right! The truth is red doesn't go well with most of the colours, except your basic black, white and maybe beige.

And as you can see from above, pink is part of red too. But i think i shall blog about pink separately... let's talk about a red shirt, a red shirt is best to go with a black skirt. You just cant go wrong with that. And when u are wearing something as bold as red, you have to minimize on the accessories and only wear one tone colour accessories. preferably something more basic, like black or even gold.

The thing with red is, you have to find one shade that fit your skin tone, if you are fair, or even slightly tanned, be bold and go with really striking chili red. It will look fabulous! but if you are more tanned and even darker skin tone, a more subtle red will suit you better. But again, nothing to stop you from trying a red hot dress... just remember the essential rule, keep it simple!

I mean, who can forget Nicole Kidman in the beautiful red number by Balenciaga in 2007 Academy Awards. Its bold and its simple. Its Perfect!



If you wearing an all red dress, make sure that is all you wear. No accessories needed, and if u absolutely have to, then the least the better! and Please... PLEASE dont paired it with a red shoe.. it just wrong! go with a gold stripe shoe instead. It will look a million bucks!

And although red and pink is the same categories, but never mixed them together. its just so wrong!

3. Purple rain.. oh.. purple rain...



Purple is another colour that i adore... but also, it is one the hardest colour to match. It almost goes with nothing!! almost :p Of coz, u can always mixed it with white or black. But somehow i dont feel like it brings out the beautiful shade of purple. This is the problem you face with spectral colours, they are must harder to match, and purple is not even spectral colour, its extraspectral colors, which only means that it is much harder to match.



Then i realize, there is another colour that will do the job, baby blue, a very light, almost pale blue. Purple being the spectral colour of red and blue, pairing it with a shade of light blue can really bring out the tone of purple. But of coz, this only applicable to darker shade of purple. If you talking about a much lighter shade of purple, then you can try to pair it up with a really dark shade of blue.

Of coz, in purple itself, we have violet, plum and others. Violet its a beautiful colour, especially when its on satin or silk.. but again, a very tricky colour to match. My advise? back to basic. But some how, i do think that Violet goes better with white rather then black... And Violet also goes better with silver rather then gold! ;)



Another about purple is that, you can match the shade, like you can wear a dark purple cardigan over a violet dress, provided that there is no print on the dress.



Ok... we covered 3 colours now... next we will back to talk about more primary colours then spectral colours. we talk about blue, yellow and green ( although green is actually spectral :p).