I’ve been looking back through old photos.
It’s amazing how many photos you take and then you hardly ever look at them again. Digital or real film they get filed away or put in boxes and you never see them again.
Looking back through several years of photos in one go it occurred to me how much I’ve changed over the years. I’ve seen these style evolution posts on other peoples blogs and I always find them fascinating, so I thought I’d try and cobble together one of my own.
I’ve gone back over the last 5 years. Pictures from any earlier are thin on the ground. Some are hanging around in photo albums but there are very few on the computer!
2006
There aren’t actually that many full length photos of me in 2006. This was the year after I got married and I’d put on a lot of weight on my honeymoon, then Christmas. I’d moved to a place where I worked just 5 minutes away and couldn’t walk to the shops so I got very little exercise. I gained 2 stone in total in about 6 months after I got married. I had no idea what size clothes I wore so hardly ever shopped as I found it so depressing.
I had a couple of 50s style dresses I liked, but mostly I lived in jeans and vests. I worked on an industrial estate so business attire was not required and I very rarely dressed up. My favourite dress is the pink floral one. If I had that now 2 sizes smaller I’d be happy! It’s a 50s style off the shoulder dress from Warehouse that I used to wear to every smart occasion I went to with clip on hair as mine is too fine to even make a decent pony tail and a pair of pearl earrings.
At the end of that year we moved back to Norwich. The far right picture is at Christmas in a sequin skirt I bought for my new jobs Christmas party which was just a week after I started.
2007
I spent the first part of the year wearing the same stretch wrap dress and one pair of black trousers that fit. Then in February I joined Weight Watchers. As I started losing weight I mostly bought clothes for work, but also bought a few pretty dresses that Summer as by then I’d lost a stone and a half and nothing else fit. I didn’t want to buy too much, so a lot of the clothes I wore, like the little black dress and belt in the picture, were actually things I’d bought as a student some 5 years earlier! The styles don’t always work, but I was just playing around with what I had now I finally had some choice!
I cut my hair and went even blonder. I don’t think I had my hair cut at all for most of 2006!
By Christmas that year I’d lost 2 stone, and I got a new full sequin skirt off eBay. I’m wearing the same top in the 2006 Christmas photo as I am in 2 photos below, I think it was about the only one I had. I also walked out on my job at the end of November, which was a massive relief!
2008
2008 was the year I started blogging and really rediscovered clothes and fashion and the year I hit my Weight Watchers goal weight. I dyed my hair red at the end of 2007 and in early 2008 I got a fringe cut in. I was so short of money without a “proper” job and a regular income. I bought barely any new clothes, living mostly in the blue shirt dress and black jersey dress in the pictures below! The burgundy trench coat is vintage and I’d bought it off eBay in 2005, but I’d only just been able to fit into it.
I still wasn’t sure of my style really. I was experimenting a lot now things actually FIT me, but I definitely had a taste for 40s style dresses and fuller 50s skirts. I think I did my first outfit post around September this year?
2009
This year I was definitely getting a lot more confident in my style! Looking at pictures it appears to be the year I re-discovered red lipstick!
I was a lot more flamboyant this year. The white dress and the black dress are vintage, both sadly in need of repairs at the moment.
By Christmas I’d started to grow out the fringe and my hair was a lot longer. 2009 was the year I went to hair styling session with Flamingo Amy and finally started to experiment with doing something with my hair other than just wearing it in a french pleat with a fringe! This was a massive turning point as I really think that hair can make or break a look. Mine is so fine that I gave up doing anything with it years ago. If you want proof my hair doesn’t hold a curl then I’ll tell you that Christmas picture of this collage was taken about 20 minutes after I’d curled my hair with tongs. By the end of 2009 I was experimenting with mass amounts of back combing and hair spray to create little fringe rolls and piling my hair on top of my head.
I also bought my first pair of stockings and a girdle this year!
2010
Only last year! This is the year that I found setting lotion and around March time I started experimenting with pin curls occasionally. I definitely started to move in a far more vintagey direction during 2010. Mostly hair led!
I had slightly more money last year and I also asked some advertisers to pay me in product rather than cash which I would only squander on bills. This meant my wardrobe was more varied and I had some nice things which might have previously been out of my price range, like the cherry fascinator from Abilu Creations I’m wearing with the green dress. I still get most of my clothes from Charity Shops and eBay. Everything in this collage is either from a charity shop, eBay, a gift, or swapped for advertising. The only thing I bought from new is the beige Topshop jumper, and that was in 2001!
I also had my hair cut into a middy last year by Flint hair, so that by the Christmas picture my hair is considerably shorter than I started with.
Phew, and that’s it. 5 years of style history from me.
I’ve been an indie kid, mixed with hippies, went through a brief phase of wearing large hoop earrings, halter necks and leather skirts when I had a job at River Island and a 70s phase of wearing flares and too much orange. When I was at college in 1997 I went through my first 40s influenced phase teaming red lipstick and pencil skirts with heeled loafers and a double breasted coat. I’ve always liked to play around with my clothes, but somewhere in the early mid 00’s I lost my way, mostly, it seems amid a big pile of biscuits and pizza!
I can practically feel my increased confidence screaming at me from the screen as these collages move through the years. Hopefully the next 5 years will be even better. By 2016 I’ll be ready to take over the world!