Express Yourself

>Body + Soul Magazine | May 2008 | By Terri Trespicio

Break loose from what’s trendy and create your own style

We’re confronted daily with messages dictating what’s stylish: what we should love, hate, buy or banish. It would seem that style is determined by the arbiters and tastemakers, and has more to do with “brand” than with individual expression (need we invoke Jan Rivers’s red-carpet mantra, “Who are you wearing?”). In Style Statement: Live By Your Own Design, (Little, Brown), Carrie McCarthy and Danielle LaPorte redefine the concept of style with what they call a discover-it-yourself approach. True style, after all, isn’t cobbled together from fly-by-night trends; it’s honed and shaped through a lifetime of choices. The authors argue that style is at the intersection of spirit and expression, that palce between who you’ve been and who you’re becoming.

Style Statement is part profile, featuring quirky yet very real people with their own take on style, and part self-style guide, walking readers through approached to uncovering their most authentic expression of self. The authors approach the topic from and inquisitive role – a happy departure from the “wear –this!” dictase we often get from the fashion industry.