Defining a First Lady: Michelle Obama [mih-SHELL O-bah-mah]

Pear Shaped /ˈpɛərˌʃeɪpt/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [pair-sheypt] adjective : having the shape of a pear; tapering near the top and swelling seductively toward the base or bottom.


An aware pear, Michelle Obama is most commonly found in a sheath dress [sheeth dress] noun: a close fitting, figure hugging, mid calf or shorter silhouette with a defined waist but no waistband. Like the closely fitting case of a dagger from which the sheath dress derives it's name, it's perfectly perilous when filled with the dangerous blade of a lower figure. Given Michelle's 5 feet 10 and three-quarter inches she executes of a long, strong profile.


When not in her uniform sheeth, Michelle Obama is often draped in elegant, billowy sleeve. These puffy sleeves [puhf-ee slēvs] noun are suited to counteract the strong line of a full hip. Their diaphanous refinement is not in any way appropriate for pirates or Renaissance Fair freaks. These are fully sophisticated signatures, Michelle's pill box hat.



Tra⋅di⋅tion⋅al [truh-dish-uh-nl] adjective: of, pertaining to, characteristic or being a style or mode of classic American dress, clean, established, preppy. Michelle takes iconic classics like the white dress shirt and infuses it with hope and change. Far more than a row of neat buttons and a pointed collar, this crisp rendition is far from the cliche, fresh and ready for action.


Sig⋅na⋅ture [sig-nuh-cher, -choor] noun: serving to identify or distinguish a person. Some of her Dorothy Quincey Hancocks include simple strands of pearls, colorful statement brooches, and figure accentuating waist belts.



Shop⋅ping /ˈʃɒpɪŋ/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [shop-ing] noun: of, for, or pertaining to examining and buying merchandise at available facilities or merchandise locations. Democratic enough to buy off the rack, this woman buys what she wears from establishments such as H&M, Black House White Market, J.Crew, Maria Pinto, Narciso Rodriguez

Return promptly for some comparative historical perspectives with antecedent political fashionistas.

Michelle Obama is such a pear

A tall voluptuous riviera pear that you could eat with a spoon. And with the inauguration ceremony, ball, parade, etc. coming up in 8 little days, Cardigan Empire will be highlighting the incoming first lady of fashion: her body type, signature style, shopping strategies, and more.

So fine Americans click on back here soon.

Fitting Room Friday - Closet Analysis

The 5 Piles

1. Keep: When you walk by the mirror in these items, it should compel a brief pause, during which a smile flutters across your face. It doesn't have to be fancy, but it does have to flatter.

2. Archive: Are your winter boots currently residing in company with your flip flops? For shame, keeping seasonally distinct items in a single closet (even in Arizona) not only makes for fashion overwhelm, but it also makes your clothes very sad. It's like serving tuna with peanut butter, it just isn't right. Now for those items that you loved upon purchased, proceeded to wear for a straight fortnight, and in consequence is now prematurely jaded, I suggest archival. Archive all that is tired, seasonally inappropriate, or just inconclusive. Then reassess in 3-6 months, and ditch anything you're still not ready to wear immediately. Don't underestimate the thrill of fashion reunion.

This is not however a dumping ground for fashion memorabilia. If you don't plan to wear it within the calendar year, take a picture of it and donate it.

3. Repair: You have exactly five days to go to the dry cleaner, cobbler, or tailor with these items. If it's not urgent, it's not important enough to fix.

4. Give-Away: Donate items that don't fit your body or style but are in good condition. If you are having a difficult time parting with an item that no longer flatters your figure, find a specific friend to give it to. Or better yet, organize a clothing exchange, in which friends can bring all their items that are in good condition, but no longer employed by their closets.

5. Throw-Away: Items that are stained, torn, or otherwise beyond repair. Enough said.


Still overwhelmed? Reserve a 90 minute one-on-one session to review your entire closet. Items will be evaluated based on color compatibility, fit, flattery, and condition. By the end of the session you will have a wearable wardrobe plus a shopping list for key items to purchase. During this session suggestions will also be made on how to mix and match existing pieces to break away from clothing “uniforms” and get more wear through creative ensemble pairings.

Closet Cleansing Orientation

Closet cleanses should be undertaken somberly and consistently. As a new season is budding, as a new life calling is dawning, as you find yourself glazing over at the threshold of your wardrobe's abyss, all of these indicate optimal conditions for a purging.

Below are specifics to ensure a safe, successful procedure:

1. Dedicate a large portion of ante meridian to it, mornings with the blinds drawn provide ample natural light, but if you must use post meridian, ensure you have sharp, clean, distributed lighting. Either way, find a thicket of uninterrupted hours.

Although closet cleanings can be done in intervals, an uninterrupted push actually aids your ability to purge. First seeing all the clothes in one day allows you to quickly rank the best and worst. Second, seeing all your clothes in a single day may induce a little emotional nausea. Hopefully this disgust is stronger than any emotional attachment, allowing you to purge what is poisoning your closet.

2. As this is a somewhat intense procedure, let's do what we can to make it as lovely as possible. Wash and style your hair, but leave off the makeup. That way it won't induce unnecessary dry cleaning and you'll be able to see how different chromatics affect your complexion. Finally slip your best dainties, including any shapers that you regularly wear, under some loungers.

Once you're ready, prepare your environment. Allow the melodies of a dewy fresh anthem to twinkle around you. Fix yourself a refreshing tonic: sparkling water, ginger lemonade, minted honeydew juice. Personally I prefer listening to Madeleine Peyroux with a dainty cup of herbal egyptian licorice.


3. While you pour your beverage, fill a second glass, because you'll need a friend. Not that really nice friend who praises everything you do. No, we want the chronically honest friend, the teenage daughter, or the opinionated mother. Spouses can be good with the honesty, but they lack patience. And occasionally the process can result in temporary marital malaise. If friends are not readily available, make sure you have, at the least, a full length mirror positioned adjacent to your closet, capable of capturing anterior, profile, and posterior views.

4. Make a list of all the roles in your life: mrs. mother, madame wife, dr. professional, and how you would ideally like to feel in each of these roles. When I enter my workplace, I want everyone to assume I spellcheck my e-mails. Or I want my children to perceive that my household is not the kind of place where clearing your nose on the furniture is proper. Or I want to feel pretty enough for passé civilities like opened doors, extracted chairs, gloves, and handkerchiefs.

5. Get five bins, trashbags, or wheelbarrows, tomorrow we will show live footage of the actual dissection, analysis, and cleansing of a closet.



Still overwhelmed? Reserve a 90 minute one-on-one session to review your entire closet. Items will be evaluated based on color compatibility, fit, flattery, and condition. By the end of the session you will have a wearable wardrobe plus a shopping list for key items to purchase. During this session suggestions will also be made on how to mix and match existing pieces to break away from clothing “uniforms” and get more wear through creative ensemble pairings.

More Better Video

All the Fitting Room Friday videos are now available in higher resolution, with easy to follow steps, easier to hear sound, they are overall more better ;). Check out their improved newness using the Fitting Room Friday label.

Cleaning Your Closet

2009: A freshy, new year, time for an exceptionally good start. All commendable propensities will be integrated into new life and all bad habits will be properly discarded with grace and ease. Before persuing perfection in the rest of your existence, might I recommend starting with your closet? For "what is your closet but the different personas we have auditioned and discarded? Hanging there in our closets are reminders, both good and bad, of who we are, who we've been, and who we've hoped to be." Tim Gunn

Clothes are in fact only a shell, but shells are not entirely worthless. Shells can introduce us, identify us, and protect us. This week we shall focus on our shell storage and how it can be organized and optimized. However, before we can pursue the solution, let us address the problem. Below are some stereotypical closets which require immediate intervention.

The torture chamber: Inside this ambry lies items endowed with the powers of self flagellation and holy glorification. Items are distinguished primarily by size: smallish, mediumish, and largish. If the body is enrobed in smallish clothes with minimal wrestling, the day is deemed good and the wearer is deemed good. Her closet exists to punish and reward her.

The archive: Inside this cold storage lies a rich, tangible history. The frock worn when eyes were first laid on Romeo hangs next to her cheerleader's glory guise, her wedding ensemble is pressed beside the blouse donned during the debut of her most favorite episode of Gilmore Girls. Her closet is sentimental rather than functional.

The rubbish bin: This rumpled receptacle vomits when opened. In the refuse there may be well-made trousers in need of hemming, scuffed leather boots, a favorite silk shell stained with soy sauce, a cashmere sweater dined on by moths. This closet lacks discipline and sanitation.

The disjointed den: Trends from all different directions exist here. There are many items lying dormant and disturbed, brooding with the irritation of their unremoved price tags. Sometimes this disorder is caused by a simple split personality: work is straight forward and boring, personal life is over the top to make up for the difference. Whatever the cause, this schizophrenic wardrobe is unable to communicate a cohesive outfit.

The repeat: This sideboard encloses one style of twin set in five different colors, the only visible pattern is vertical stripes, and the floor is veiled with a colony of sensible black shoes. This area acts as a mechanical uniform dispenser.

Whether you wardrobe represents one or many of these examples, we will be purging them, psychological dispositions and all. In the end you'll have a wardrobe you can actually wear.


Still overwhelmed? Reserve a 90 minute one-on-one session to review your entire closet. Items will be evaluated based on color compatibility, fit, flattery, and condition. By the end of the session you will have a wearable wardrobe plus a shopping list for key items to purchase. During this session suggestions will also be made on how to mix and match existing pieces to break away from clothing “uniforms” and get more wear through creative ensemble pairings.

Fitting Room Friday: Countup to Formalwear

Happy New Year. It isn't actually Friday, but in honor of the first day of 2009, please enjoy this special edition. And consider how spectacular you are going to look next New Year's Eve.

Roll out the crimson carpet. Special you is going to a special event: a wedding, a gala to protect inner city garden gnomes, the premier of your personal made for TV movie. Your handshake is firm, your step is jaunty, but what my lovely friend will you use to robe your intimacies? Come and we will count up the formality spectrum, examining the prim & propriety of formalwear.

Dress to the Sevens - You've never dipped below a five in your existence. (Except maybe right after they extracted your wisdom teeth and you couldn't help from dribbling masticated debris while powering White Snake monster ballads.) Therefore, it really isn't unreasonable to rise to a fully, fabulous seven on a daily basis. Beauty and confidence should not be reserved for special occasions. Your clothing should fit and flatter diurnally.

Dress to the Eights - Cocktail
There is a dimension beyond Sunday Best, preceding Black Tie. It is the middle ground between casual and formal. It lies between the pit of social faux pas and the summit of elegance and grace. It is an area which we call the Cocktail Zone.* What was once considered merely a little black dress has now expanded into a diverse habitat for abbreviated dresses and smart separates. One can reach the Cocktail Zone through the artful application of accessories and a tendency towards dapper. Many a social invitation (weddings, fundraisers, work festivities) speaks openly of this fashion Brigadoon, but below is live footage of the illusive locale.



A rundown of Jill's suiting follows:

All the jewerly in Jill's ensemble was crafted by her own skilled phalanges, as a stand-in for her one-of-a-kind creations, might I suggest the quixotic Six Wing Hoops & Autumn Everlasting Necklace

The Looking Back Cardigan punctuates both your entrance and exit while keeping you cozy and covered. Pray believe us, there is nothing worse than seeing your great auntie's decolage. Modesty keeps everyone comfortable.Buttonblossom Dress inky elegance transcends into a smoky scattering of abstract floral. For evening events keep your garb dark perchance even sparkly; daytime gives place for lighter hues and heavier fabric weight. The length and sheen of this selection abides evening tradition, but a special occasion is certainly not an invitation to abandon your signature style. Skip the pretentious uniform, and dress to your own personal prime.
La Regale Satin Pleated Bow Clutch because the prettiest frocks rarely have pockets.

Jumbled Crochet Tights & Steve Madden Imperial Ruffled T-Strap are prepared to curtsey, swagger, and fox trot. While bare legs and stilletos may trump this option on the sultry continuum, a thicker heel triumphs in versatility.

Dress to the Nines - Black Tie
Should the illustriousisses betrothe you the opportunity to take vestment to the nines, canter in without abandon. Adopt diamonds, fur, opera gloves should it suits you. Allow the rest of your circle to live vicariously through your glamorous exploits.

Below is a special bonus Fitting Room Friday. This clip showcases the bleeding edge of formalwear.

Unfortunately, Jason's Jump Suit is an original vintage piece that dares not be replicated.

1 hundred 98 cents = your own mix & match fashion look book cheat sheet.

Procure your own empire constitution. Your personalized fashion look book includes your own mix and match rules of conduct and much more.

*I personally do not drink cocktails**, but I like this name much better than semi-formal, which is a drab, frumpy term.

**Okay, there was that one time with the unlabeled punch bowl when I was really thirsty. But beyond those three mistaken ounces, true abstinenence.