Fashion Mistakes that are making you look Older

I am a grandmother and there's nothing I cherish more in the world than the moments I get to spend with my grandkids. The chaos, the noise, the sticky hands, I wouldn’t trade any of it.

But you know what I don't love and cherish? LOOKING like MY grandmother.

And to be honest, it's very easy to do that. It sneaks up on you. One day you're getting dressed the same way you have for years and somewhere between the mirror and the door you catch yourself thinking, 

"hmm. When did that happen?"

That's exactly what was going on with Les when she tried on this new Dolcezza dress. It’s a stunning dress, but you can see… with the wrong styling it can go rather matronly. 

And you know what? She’s a grandmother too!

Doesn’t mean we’re ready to look it!

What you'll notice in the video was that the proportions were off. That one small thing was doing a lot of quiet damage to the whole look. Nothing, a good pair of cutting shears fixed it right up! But let’s make it a little easier:

Here are the fashion mistakes that are making you look older: 

Proportions. That’s number one.

After twenty years of dressing women in Ottawa I’ve picked up a thing or two. You want your hemline landing just above or below the knee, and you never, ever want a seam or a hemline cutting straight across the widest part of you. 

That mid-calf length that so many of us gravitate toward? It's particularly aging on us gals, especially now that we're in more comfortable shoes.

A sensible shoe and a mid-calf hem together just cuts you off in all the wrong places. Show a little more leg, I say! And I mean it sincerely when I tell you that you have great legs because they've gotten you this far in life, and that counts for something.

See how on even a younger model this length feels older? 

Of course, if you're more petite, this dress will be perfect for you! 

Let's move on to the second mistake, hiding. 

Now, I also know what we do when we don't love something about our bodies. We hide. Lord knows I've done it. 

We reach for the bigger size, the looser fit, the shapeless thing that we think is doing us a favour. But here's the honest truth that every woman over 50 needs to hear: oversized clothing doesn't hide anything. 

It actually adds bulk and makes the whole silhouette look heavier. We end up looking like we're wearing a potato sack and calling it “comfortable”.

You deserve better than that, and so does your figure. We have so many beautiful, flattering clothing options for mature women that move with you and still let you look like yourself, like a woman with a shape, without feeling like you're being squeezed into something.

The same idea applies to necklines. I know we want to cover things up near our necks, believe me, I understand the impulse. But a higher, closed neckline actually does the opposite of what we're hoping for. An open neckline, a V-neck, a scoop, a square cut, draws the eye up toward your face and creates this lovely sense of openness. If you want a little extra coverage, try a silk scarf loosely draped around your neck. You still get the open neckline doing its good work, and the scarf adds something pretty on top of it. It's one of those simple styling tricks for women over 50 that sounds too easy to be true but genuinely works every single time.

Style mistake 3? Well, you're not going to like this one. 

Can we talk about black? I love black. Half my wardrobe is probably black. But once we hit fifty, wearing a lot of black near our face starts to drain the warmth right out of our complexion.

It can make us look washed out and tired when we're neither of those things. Soft warm colours near your face, dusty rose, sage green, warm coral, a pretty periwinkle, do something genuinely lovely for a mature complexion. If you truly cannot let go of black, try breaking it up with a colourful scarf or a softer top near your face to bring the light back in. My vote is always for colour, and we carry plenty of it here at the shop. But I'm not standing in your closet, so you know yourself best.

The last thing I'll say, and this is the one I'm probably most guilty of myself, is overly safe styling. I am a matcher.

 
I love a coordinated moment. I love when pieces are from the same designer and they just go together perfectly. But I've had to be honest with myself that it ages me. There's something about being too perfectly put together, too predictably matched, that reads as dated instead of polished. Deb mixes her aesthetics, takes little risks, throws in something unexpected and it works beautifully on her every single time and she looks great. 

You don't have to chase every trend. That looks like you're trying too hard, and at this point in our lives we are well past trying too hard. But letting go of a few old habits, the mid-calf hem, the turtleneck, the perfectly matched everything, and replacing them with just a little bit of intention can make a remarkable difference in how current and confident you feel. That's what shopping at a women's boutique that actually knows its customers is all about.

And if something almost fits? Get it altered. It is not an indulgence. It is the single best thing you can do for your wardrobe.