What’s More Important: Style or Color?

In an ideal world, of course we’d only buy clothes that are in both our season and our Kibbe type. Unfortunately, fashion hasn’t yet aligned its manufacturing decisions along Kibbe and Sci\ART lines, and for many combinations, finding clothes in both your season AND type can feel like a quest for the Holy Grail. I’m planning on finally getting draped soon, and I fear that I’ll end up as a Soft Autumn, which is one of the seasons that is practically impossible to find FG clothes for.

So what do you do? You have to get dressed every day, after all. Obviously, if you’re looking for an investment piece, it’s wise to wait until you DO find things that are in both your season and your type. Otherwise, it just wouldn’t be a wise investment. But what do you do in the meantime? You still have to wear clothes seven days a week, and you have to change it up somewhat or people will start to look at you funny.

I think the answer as to what is more important, and where you’re willing to compromise, varies. For me, I can’t compromise on type. Or if I do compromise, I have to add something to bring the outfit more or less into FlamGam land, like throw a crop top with some geometrics over it or add a leather jacket. But even then, I feel like now that I know my Kibbe and am comfortable with its rules, I’m less inclined to fudge them a little, because I know it’s the FG things that I’m going to reach for every day.

Perhaps it’s because I don’t know my season yet, but I’m much more likely to break color rules. I’m pretty sure I’m not in a season that can wear black successfully, and yet trying to ban black from my wardrobe was a dismal failure. I feel like that the FG type is so strong, both in how it presents itself and its presence, that FGs are generally going to be less sensitive to the colors we wear, since we will overpower them. My instinct is that this is probably true for most types with some kind of D influence. Also, FG clothes at my price point are generally in the winter palettes, so sometimes that’s just all there is to choose from.

Naturals and Classics, I think, don’t have this problem, since from my observations (and I could be wrong about this–C and N types let me know in the comments), clothes in these types tend to be much more easy to find, and come in a wider variety of colors. So I would say that for these types, it’s probably not worth buying clothes if they’re not in your season, because you could probably go to the store next door and find something that is. I also think that SCs could potentially be very sensitive to wearing the wrong colors, since they are so well-balanced and are more delicate than DCs, so I think a wrong color choice could very jarring to their otherwise symmetrical and delicate ways.

How do you deal with this issue? Are you perfectly coordinated to your palette, or does your wardrobe contain a mishmash of seasons that perfectly correspond to Kibbe’s recommendations?

4 Comments on What’s More Important: Style or Color?

  1. Nouveau
    October 5, 2014 at 8:08 pm

    If your season turns out to be difficult for finding FlamGam pieces, you may have to curate your ideal wardrobe more slowly as you find the pieces here and there that work both color-wise and style-wise.

    Or you may want to try re-fashioning some mainstream pieces that are in your colors, to give them your FlamGam style.

    I’m a Yin Natural (Soft Natural) style and True Spring season. I do find pieces fairly easily, but not always with my particular twist on SoftNat.

    So I tend to build a flexible wardrobe of solidi-color basic pieces in my colors, and then use jackets / belts / jewelry / shoes / other accessories to express my unique spin on SoftNat.

    I don’t know if that might work for you as well, especially if you can re-fashion some basic items into FlamGlam style?

    Thanks for your insightful blog – I enjoy reading your posts! 🙂

    Reply
    • stylesyntax
      October 6, 2014 at 11:58 am

      Thanks! Good points–I think it’s about finding those key pieces that will make an outfit FG, and then adding things like tank tops or ls shirts in your colors, which will be easier to find. I feel like that’s especially helpful because I can buy those basics in the colors that absolutely have to be by my face, and maybe fudge it a little or just buy things in my neutrals with the rest.

      Reply
  2. Alexandra
    October 6, 2014 at 7:24 am

    I think your best bet is to learn to sew. From scratch so you can pick your fabric (color, texture, weight) and your shape (line, detail, proportions). Or at least learn to alter garments. If the color is a problem, there’s always the option to dye or overdye.

    On the importance of color and style – I don’t think either one is more important than the other. For FGs or anyone else. Either you have both correct or there’s an issue. If black washes you out, it will still do that even if it’s the right shape for you. If a shape is wrong for you, it’s still wrong for you even if it’s in one of your best colors. The effect is better than wrong shape in wrong color, but not nearly as good as the right shape in the right color. Of course, that’s just my $0.02.

    Reply
    • stylesyntax
      October 6, 2014 at 12:03 pm

      I enjoyed sewing when I was a kid, but to be honest, I have so little free time and I know that I’d enjoy spending that time reading and writing so much more. Plus shopping for me is a stress reliever. 🙂

      They are definitely both required to make an outfit work 100%. I do find, however, that my FG essence is SO key and that my body is kind of hard to fit, so it is really, really important for me to get that right above anything else. I usually end up buying a lot in black and gray–I’m much more picky about my non-neutrals–and while I know black’s not the best for me, I don’t think it overpowers me. For me the effect is akin to this, where my eyes seem gray instead of turquoise and I just don’t sparkle: http://www.12blueprints.com/the-brown-eyed-spring/ But I do feel like black works with my style and my essence in a way that, say, brown wouldn’t. I have seen FGs rock brown, but it’s never been my thing. Once I do get my colors done, I think I will do things like keep something between it and my face, but I don’t want to invest in actual colors before I know which ones to get. Nothing really overpowers me color-wise, which I do think is a FG thing since I have very strong facial features.

      Reply

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