PERSONAL STYLIST TIPS: HOW TO STYLE A COLOURFUL SUIT

When you want to feel formal, business/casual, comfortable, or even sexy, you may not instantly gravitate towards a suit if you a more of a feminine dresser. However, if you play with the styling, colours, and shapes, you may be surprised to hear how versatile a suit can be.

With so many beautiful suit styles out there, aimed at more feminine shapes, now may be the perfect time to try out a suit, one with colour or pattern, to transform your day to day dressing.

How to find the perfect shape of suit

It’s all about the shape. When your suit is fitting in a certain way, this can change how it is viewed as an outfit. For example, a less form-fitting blazer with wide leg trousers oozes modern-style with casual comfort at its core, without removing the professional edge that a suit can provide. The baggy blazer and wide leg style is best for those who are more rectangular or an apple shape, and quite tall as well; but if you look for blazers with shoulder pads you can work them for a pear shape, and whether you are a pear or an hourglass, tuck in your shirt within your high rise trousers and your waist will come back on full force.

For a more professional look, a tailored suit is the right option – perfect for work, meetings, or special events where you just don’t feel like wearing a dress. A tailored suit will work for all body shapes, depending on the bottoms you choose – for example, a pear shape will want to wear a more flared style, whereas an upside down triangle shape will want cigarette trousers, and an apple shape will look fabulous in a wide leg (just make sure to match it with a flowy blouse).

With a whole world of suit shapes out there, I highly recommend trying on different styles and forms to see which one/s you feel best in.

Finding a colourful suit

Now we know the shapes that we want to play with, you can inject personality to your suit! This all starts with colours and patterns.

The high street and high end fashion retailers are filled with amazing varieties of colours and patterns. When you have your colour palette, you can then pick and choose the suits that fall within your season to maximise the way it will make you look and feel. Some of my favourite suit makers for colourful options right now are Marella, Theory, Veronica Beard, Asos, and Max Mara.

You may want to look for a few options in your palette – try bringing some of the bolder colours and more neutral colours into your wardrobe with the suits you invest in, to make them more versatile.

How to style your colourful suit

With your colour palette in hand, and the shapes you want to wear, you’ll now be thinking about how to style them, right?

A few of my favourite ways to style your colourful suit are below, and remember – this is your style, you can play with fashion to make it work for you.

Colour blocking your suit

One of the easiest and boldest ways to make your suit work for you is to colour block it. This means to take one colour, and utilise different shades of it throughout the whole outfit. Let’s say purple is your favourite colour and you find a gorgeous lilac blazer. You can pair this with a pair of purple wide-legged trousers in a lighter or deeper hue of purple, and bring in a blouse that is also in a shade of purple. Top it off with a purple briefcase or shoulder bag, purple heels and a purple belt at the waist – and your suit is ready for showing off to the world.

For many, colour blocking feels a little daunting – it’s a lot of the same colour, but with a suit you’ve already got two items in your “colour block”. So, if the selecting of all the items feels a little much, start with the two items within your suit – the blazer and the trousers, shorts or skirt. You can then complement the suit with the accessories in the hues that work within the suit’s shade and voila – you’ve colour blocked your suit!

You can try to match the shade if you prefer to keep within the one shade for your entire outfit – while this can be trickier to do as different designers may make different hues, if you look into purchasing from one store, you may be able to colour match the items exactly.

Play with analogue colours

Analogue colours are the colours that are next to each other on a colour wheel (something we use in our colour clinic). For example – red falls within red-orange and orange; blue is between blue-violet and violet; while yellow is between yellow green and green. You can pick your main base colour for your suit, for example blue, and then add one of the analogue colours from the wheel such as blue-violet. This makes a more subtle and approachable outfit with a variety of ways to style it.

Picking your main colour as your suit already checks off most of your look, you can then pick an analogue colour as your shirt, accessories, shoes, or even jewellery, and keep the rest of the look in a neutral tone.

Go bold with complementary colours

One of the boldest ways to make your colourful suit pop is by adding a complementary colour to the look with your accessories. Complementary colours are those which are on opposite sides of the colour wheel such as fuchsia and chartreuse, or burgundy and forest green. This makes the colours stand out and pop in your outfit – and can be complemented beautifully when you select them from your seasons.

For example, go really bold and pick up a fuchsia suit and add on a chartreuse shoulder bag to pull the look together. Keep the rest of the look neutral with whites or creams to really make the complementary colours shine.

How to style your suit

Now you understand the ways in which to utilise the colours of your suit and make them shine, you can have a play with the styling. A suit can, in fact, be an incredibly versatile outfit. The blazer alone can have a multitude of outfit options.

1. Go fully professional – this is best for meetings or office work where you need to feel the most professional. Add a classic blouse under your blazer, your heels or brogues, and a work-bag and you’re ready to go.

2. Smart-casual suit styling – simply changing the shoes or the blouse will transform your suit to a more casual look. You will still want high quality professional pieces to fall into the smart-casual style, but you can be a bit more comfortable. A pair of comfortable yet work-appropriate shoes such as platform sneakers; or a high quality cotton tee can be another way to do this.

3. Comfortable suiting – this is where the form of the suit and the accessories can work to your advantage. A looser fit is usually more casual looking, so a wide or flared leg or shorts can work for day to day suit styles. Add a cotton tee, your favourite sneakers (or why not try sandals during the summer), and roll up the sleeves of your blazer to feel pulled together yet comfortable.

There are so many ways to make your colourful suit work for your style, body shape, and colours. Let the suit be the base of your outfit and then swap in and out accessories, colours, tops, and even cross over your suits to really make a statement, to make your investment work for you. If you have wanted to try a colourful suit but you’re not sure where to start, please get in touch about my Colour & Style Clinic.