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Worried about dressing frumpy? Fear no more! Today you’re going to learn Claudine Broussard’s top 5 tips on how to not dress frumpy. 

As a teen, I wanted to look cute, but I wasn’t sure how to do that and still dress modestly. Some of my outfits had a serious frump factor!

However, over the years, I was inspired by modest fashion bloggers and other Christian women who modeled modest fashion and how to not dress frumpy.

And I learned some simple tips to keep my wardrobe game on point. Like Cleo Madison, I believe that a Christian girl’s wardrobe doesn’t have to shout “frumpy” or old lady.

With a little time and effort, we can honor God with our wardrobes.

How To Not Dress Frumpy Tip #1 Wear Clothes That Fit & Flatter

What comes to mind when you think “frumpy”? Personally, I picture out-of-date garments that are baggy and ill-fitting.

It could be an A-line skirt that hits mid-calf and makes your calves look huge. Or it might be a faded t-shirt that’s two sizes too big. 

Somehow, I can’t picture the Old Testament priests wearing garments that didn’t fit them. Rather, I think each garment was tailored to fit the individual priest.

That way, the garments would honor God and reflect His excellence.

To be honest, it’s hard to find a balance between baggy clothes and clothes that are too tight. But I try to stick to this rule of thumb:

“Your dresses should be tight enough to show you’re a woman and loose enough to show you’re a lady.” Edith Head

Here are some tips for finding properly fitting clothes.

• Research what types of garments/colors/fabrics will work for your body type. Wear them! Reachel Bagley does an excellent job of teaching women how to do this.
• For knee-length skirts and dresses, choose hems that hit right below the knee.
• For maxi skirts and dresses, choose hems that actually hit the narrowest part of your ankle.
• Ensure that the shoulder seams on shirts line up with your shoulders.
• Never buy a long-sleeved shirt with sleeves that are too short.
• If you’re a tall girl (5’7” and up), size up in skirts so that the skirt hangs properly. Also try tall sizes in major brands.
• Choose clothes that play up your best features (a small waist, long legs, etc.)
• Choose fitted instead of baggy t-shirts.
• Learn the art of the half-tuck for shirts.

If you have more tips for finding flattering clothes, I’d love to hear them in the comments!

Tip #2 – Keep An Eye On Style Trends

Each season, designers present the modern woman with an astonishing array of new trends.

While researching a post about fall 2019 trends, I read about feathers, Renaissance blouses, puffer jackets, long coats, and more. However, it’s important to keep this simple principle in mind…

Not every fashion trend can be worn modestly or femininely.

For example, fashion designers have been pushing women to wear masculine business suits, complete with dress shirt, blazer, and pants. Some designers even include menswear ties.

Personally, I wouldn’t feel comfortable wearing these suits/ties because I think they don’t look feminine. These outfits might cover my body modestly, but they wouldn’t embrace my God-given role as a woman.

In addition, some trends are designed to look edgy, rebellious, or overtly sexual. As Christian women, we want to avoid such trends.

However, many trends can be worn modestly. Often, certain colors or patterns take center stage for a season. Fall 2019 has a lot of golds, yellows, plaid, and dark florals.

These trends can easily be worn in a modest way. Because modest fashion brands watch trends, too, they often have on-point pieces as well.

If your budget is tight, you can even find new pieces at your local thrift store.

Tip #3 – Wear Cute Shoes

Details matter, darling. An adorable, flattering outfit paired with worn out flip-flops is just not good enough.

And don’t get me started on the homeschooler jean-skirt-with-sneakers look.

Two words- NO WAY. (I was a homeschooler, so I can say that!) Sneakers are for the gym. End of story. 

If you watch shoe trends, you’ll notice that there are 2 main categories of shoes—classic and trendy.

Some examples of classic shoes are basic pumps, riding style boots, and ballet flats.

More trendy options would include mules, Toms, Birkenstocks, ankle booties, etc. 

When you are shoe shopping, ask yourself, “How long do I want to wear this shoe for?” If you just want shoes for one or two seasons, buy cheap, on-trend ones.

But, if you want shoes for 2+ years, choose a classic shape and color that won’t scream, “Made in 2017!” 

Shockingly, my mom and sister and I have found a lot of cute, affordable shoes at Walmart.

A few summers ago, we bought multiple pairs of cloth black lace-up flats and wore them to death. (There might still be a pair kicking around). They were $3-7 and worth every penny.

This summer, I splurged and spent about $60 on Lucky Brand leather sandals (50% off) in a classic shape.

I’m planning to wear them for 2-3 years, and they are holding up well so far!

And they pair beautifully with almost any outfit- casual or dressy.

Tip #4 – Don’t Spend Too Much On One-Season Items

For both on-point shoes and clothes, keep your budget in mind. Ask yourself these questions… How long are you going to wear this item for?

How long is this item going to be in style? Try to shop sales and clearance as much as possible for trendy items. Then, enjoy those items to the fullest.

Wear them every chance you get, because next year is going to be too late. 

Related Content: Trendy Modest Clothing For Back To School: Our Top 6 Shopping Tips

If you don’t spend too much on trendy pieces, you won’t feel so bad next year when you have to say goodbye to those items. 

Tip #5 Curate Your Closet Periodically

Maybe it’s because I’m a type A personality or something, but I LOVE curating my closet. Periodically, I go through my closet and ask some of the following questions:

• Is this getting ratty or faded?
• Does this actually look good on me? (I know, this relates to point #1)
• Is this out of style yet?
• Have I worn this or been able to figure out an outfit with it? 

If alarm bells go off for 1 or more of these questions, I will most likely toss it in a pile for donation. Life is too short to wear clothes you don’t like.

And it’s definitely too short to keep clothes that don’t go with anything else in your wardrobe!

Let’s Chat

How do you avoid looking frumpy in your everyday fashion? And which of these tips was your favorite? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments!

Summer is in full swing and the temperatures are up! It can be really challenging to stay cool and still be modest. Aqeelah from Fashion Breed has a new video with some really valuable tips for how to dress modestly in the summer.

Video Transcription

Hey guys welcome back to my channel. Yay! So today is the first official video for Cover Girl, but before I get started I just wanted to say thank you so much for your amazing response to the first video.

So for today’s video, I actually had something else planned at first, but then one of my amazing readers requested that I do a video on how to dress modestly in the summer heat without perspiring too much and you know without wearing too many layers and all that.

I have mentioned in my previous video that I am someone that does perspire a lot and that’s probably the toughest part about starting to cover up and dress modestly is that I just felt so claustrophobic.

I would put on clothing and would want to like take everything off and it would just be way too much. So, over the years I have mastered ways to kind of get myself around that.

If you want to know how to beat the heat, keep watching. Okay, so before I go into the must have items that you need in your wardrobe for summer or for heat, I want to share the two main principles of personal styling.

The first one is proportion. Proportion has everything from understanding the proportions of the garments you’re wearing to understanding the proportions of your body.

It’s very important when you’re choosing any outfits to know your body and know what’s flattering for you. So, when I talk about the proportions of the clothing what I’m essentially saying is you want to balance skinnier items with more loose and flowing items.

This all depends on the part of your body that you want to cover. When I say skinny items, I don’t necessarily mean that it needs to be super slim fitting.

It just needs to be more fitted that the other part, if that makes sense. If you’re going to be going for like a kimono or a loose and flowing top then I would say you go for skinny legged jeans.

It seems obvious, but so many people still get this wrong. The fit is everything.

So we’re going to be discussing proportions a little bit later while I’m going to show you how I like to mix and match some of my outfits and then I’ll share some of my other outfit posts as well as examples to show you how I’ve incorporated that into my looks on my blog and my daily life.

Principle number two – wear the correct under garments. A lot of women think that if they’re covering up, nobody is going to see my undies – I’m covering up.

But it actually does make a huge difference because essentially covering up in the heat has everything to do with smart and convenient layering. So you need to get the bottom layer on before you can build up on top.

Another thing you want to factor in when you are picking out your undergarments, is to try and opt for breathable fabrics like cotton and natural fibers because that’s going to keep that bottom layer as breathable and airy and flowy as possible.

The way that we’re going to do this is I’m going to take you through different levels of heat or temperature that you would have on a summer’s day. So for example, the same way that Nandos has extra hot, mild, and then lemon and herb, we’re going to have extra hot, mild, and lemon and herb day.

I’m going to show you how I would style for each of those days. We’re gonna start from the hottest and end off with the coolest. So, we’re going to start off with the warmest weather because that’s the toughest to dress for and then we’re going to end off with the cooler weather.

When the weather is scorching hot there is only one way to go. Dresses, dresses, dresses and more dresses. This is something you need to invest in for summer because the best part of wearing a dress is that when you put it on you’re already dressed.

You literally just need to add accessories if that’s your vibe, put on your shoes and you’re out the door. So, not only is it going to keep you cool, but it’s also going to save you time.

Some of my favorites include this blue and white one over here that I got in Thailand. Then, I’ve also got a just little orange gypsy. Then, of course, super on trend right now is to wear your strappy dress with a cute little tee underneath.

Then finally, what I would say is my signature dress in summer is the caftan. It’s got this like bad connotation with it of women cleaning their house in it, being pregnant and barefoot in the kitchen, frying the samosas.

It’s just not always had a cute action or association with it. Personally, I find it so beautiful. I think it’s incredibly regal.

Related Content: How To Style Bermuda Shorts: 14 Outfit Ideas You’ll Love

My mom goes to Micker at least once or twice a year and she always brings me at least 2 every single time. I style my caftan really with purpose.

I make sure my hair is down, my make-up is done, my accessories are on point, wearing great flat shoes. Then I really just feel like I cheated the system compared to most other people who have layered whatever else on there and shaved their legs cause y’all don’t know what is going on underneath that thing.

Moving along to temperature number 2, which is sort of moderate heat maybe with a bit of breeze. For that level of heat I really love to pair slim fit tops with looser bottoms.

So those looser bottoms can be a pair of boyfriend jeans, a pair of culottes, and of course my very voluminous Jindal skirts that’s kind of my signature. I think I have about seven of them. I also get my mom to make them for me in every single color.

I even got married in one because it’s just my favorite favorite favorite look of all time. I wear them with sneakers I wear it formally with heels to weddings or whatever else.

I just wear it whenever I want to, however I want to. I just feel so elegant and so vintage and classy whenever I wear it. So, it’s really my favorite look and it’s just always such a hit.

Okay, moving along, I will actually wear a crop top believe it or not with my culottes, with my jindal skirt and then I’ll put a body suit underneath it – like one of those little tank body suits.

They have like this sliver of skin, but not skin because your body suit or even your base is sticking out underneath it and then it gives that little divide. You can even wear very boxy top and boxy bottoms or loose bottoms so that little sliver where your body is “showing” but not showing really gives an interesting proportion to that overall look.

This particular heat level I like to keep it loose and flowing at the bottom and then a little bit more fitted on top. So then the last level of heat which is going to be your cooler weather that’s not quite cold, but it’s a nice refreshing temperature, this is the one where you really have free reign and probably a lot more to play around with because of course you can wear more layers.

So in this particular kind of weather I like to opt for my skinny jeans and then a longer length top or statement kimono. It sounds like the simplest thing to do, you know, you just throw on some jeans and something that’s going to go over it and cover your butt.

Related Content: 4 Cute Outfits For Hot Weather To Copy This Summer

But there is actually more to it. So again I’m going to go back to proportion. In my opinion if you are wearing some skinny jeans and you want to cover up for the top, you’re either going to wear a shorter top that’s just going to cover your butt or you’re going to wear something longer from the knee down.

The second you hit that level between where your butt ends and your knee begins, and you’re kind of in the middle that’s when you’re going to be Frumpy McFrump Pants, and nobody wants to be her.

So if you want to cover more than just your back, by all means do it, but then cover with purpose. Which means cover all the way down to your knee and then have your skinny jeans showing from the knee down.

Lastly, my favorite look to pull off in cooler weather, but still moderately warm weather is to wear a super long statement kimono with my skinny jeans and what I like to call the conservative vest.

So what I mean by conservative vest is one like this where it is sleeveless, the neck is quite high, and it’s not too tight fitting. I love that the sleeves are sort of cut over here so when I wear my kimono over it, it’s like even if it flies open a bit it doesn’t show too much skin.

I love longer length kimonos. I get so many compliments, I get so many Instagram likes when I wear them. I think when it’s longer length, it also just gives a super striking finish overall to your look, which is very different to your regular just over the bum kimono.

So if you can get one of these custom made I highly recommend it. It is so amazing. It keeps you cool, you look great. What I did last summer was I actually took one of the caftans that I have, they come from Micker, and I split it down the middle, then just had my mom hem it down the center.

Right now it’s the kimono I love the most. Everyone always asks me about it and it’s literally the easiest thing ever. So that’s it from me for today guys, I hope you enjoyed this video and I really hope that you learned something.

If you guys can think of any modest dressing babes who would love and appreciate this video, please do share this with them. Also if you haven’t subscribed, don’t forget to hit that subscribe and like button.

Once again, if you have any suggestions for the Cover Girl series or any other videos you’d like to see, please don’t hesitate to leave it in the comment box below, pop me an email and I will see what I can do for you. Thanks so much for watching and I will see you next time.