Everyone thinks they are a stylist

Everyone thinks they are a stylist, because how hard can it be, right? Styling is just putting some clothes together on the body, something we do every single day with ourselves or with our partners or family members. Styling is considered such a undeserved trade, that when companies cut budget, everyone suddenly becomes a stylist.

As a stylist by trade, sometimes I do get shocked with what styling is defined as under organized depiction. Blatantly, it is considered just that: putting some pieces of clothing together. The products (with no life) thrown together with no care, and as if, then some magic would suddenly happen. And the people who do this, suddenly would turn into stylists themselves.

Product knowledge, is a part of styling, but it is not the whole. Product, I would say, is the least important part of styling, although it is essential that we have products to style. The physicality of products make styling tangible, therefore under organized depiction, it looks like it is the priority or even the be all and end all of styling, but that is not truth.

Styling is a training of observation and of relationship. A stylist cannot be a stylist, if they do not first have a relationship with space, their own body, with bodies in general, with clothing, with brands, with cutting of clothing. Styling is the holding of space, the moving of space, the inclusivity of space, whilst working with form (body and product). Space is the big daddy in styling, not clothes.

Next time, before anyone think they are a stylist, or think they can omit a stylist in a job, then you have just never truly worked with space and the possibilities that can happen when we do.

It’s time that we STOP giving styling a reduced rep and claim its full authority and grandness.