How to dress up your most casual style essences
In conducting research for this post, I had high ambitions—I was going to identify examples of very formal fashion for the two most stereotypically casual style essences, Natural and Gamine. I planned to find formalwear that was 100% Natural Gamine, from red carpet gowns to wedding dresses.
As my search progressed, I tempered my ambitions—because I realized it’s tough to find clothing that’s purely Natural and/or Gamine and that reads as extremely formal.
I also maybe cheated by including Ingenue in this post as a “casual” essence. Calling Ingenue “casual” is debatable, because Ingenues have tons of options for dresses, skirts, and clothes that easily read as at least semiformal.
But Ingenue fashion, in my view, does tend to read as more casual than Romantic, Ethereal, Dramatic, and (sometimes) Classic. So while it’s not the most informal essence, it (debatably) is one of the more casual.
Here are my current top tips for dressing more formally if you have largely casual style essences. Unfortunately no wedding dresses are included, but I haven’t totally given up hope for the future of that post.
Dress by your formal style essences (especially in silhouette and/or fabric)
Many people with Natural, Gamine, or Ingenue will have at least one other more formal essence. And you may consider Ingenue itself to be a formal or semiformal essence—again, it’s up for debate.
So if you have one or more formal essences, I’d recommend choosing silhouettes and/or fabrics that correspond to your more formal essence(s) for special occasions.
For example, if you’re a Romantic Natural Gamine attending a formal wedding, you could choose a velvet wrap dress with a sweetheart neckline (a Romantic fabric and silhouette) paired with chunky Natural heels, Natural jewelry, and/or a Natural hairstyle, and maybe do Gamine makeup or add a Gamine cropped blazer and small geometric Gamine bag.
If you think choosing both a formal silhouette and formal fabric will overwhelm you, because you have a high amount of the more casual essences, you could choose either a formal silhouette or fabric, not both. For example, you could wear a Romantic silhouette, but the fabric could be a Natural cotton. Or the fabric could be Romantic (like velvet or silk) but in a loose, wide Natural fit. This should still help inject a sufficient degree of formality into you look—unless it’s an extremely formal occasion, in which case, you may have to compromise and wear a look with a higher percentage of Romantic than what’s found in your face.
Additional ways to create visual harmony while dressing up your more informal essences:
Silhouette: find dressy clothes in essence-appropriate shapes
If you’re really trying to dress based on your essences, silhouette is one of the most critical aspects to maintain. So if you want to wear a Natural outfit that reads as somewhat formal, you’ll likely want to choose wide, long, and relatively unstructured pieces. In a Natural silhouette, the clothes’ shapes won’t be notably curving, but they also won’t be notably stiff or angular.
Here’s an example of a wholly Natural top and pants (assuming the pants end just below the ground and continue to be wide in silhouette) that have a somewhat dressy vibe. The clothes are loose and wide and not especially curving or sharp, and the top is elongated with subtly rolled sleeves. The twist at the neckline adds some interest and detail without bringing in notable curves or frill. The colors are neutral, solid, and stereotypically formal, but because the pieces themselves are so Natural in silhouette, the colors don’t bring in notable amounts of other essences.
Would you wear this to a wedding, maybe not, but it’s dressier than Natural’s stereotypically ultra-laidback vibe.
Gamine and Ingenue silhouettes lend themselves to formality a little more easily, because Ingenues get flared skirts, and Gamines get structured, tailored pieces.
Gamine Ingenue dress
Color/print: consider neutrals and solids
As discussed in the post on casual and comfortable looks for formal essences, neutral colors will, all other things being equal, tend to read as more dressy than colorful clothes. And solid clothes will, all other things being equal, tend to look more formal than prints.
That’s not to say that color and print are totally taboo when trying to formalize your casual essences—for example, blue can be such a conservative color that in the dress above, the color doesn’t compromise formality.
But if you are looking for a simple way to make very casual style fashion read as more formal, choosing neutrals can be one effective strategy.
This drop waist dress appears comfortable, with a long loose Natural fit, wide (a key Natural characteristic) straps, and a slit that isn’t high enough to bring in Romantic glamour. It’s kind of like a dress version of sweats and a tank top.
In the understated neutral color, it reads as a cool Natural dress. Here the styling is also Natural and casual, so if you wanted to appear more dressed up, you could swap out the accessories or add more jewelry.
Is it the most formal dress in existence, obviously not, but with the right styling, the dress could work for different types of special occasions.
Fabric: choose from your most formal options
Natural has some fabric options that can pretty easily read as dressy, including faux-leather and faux-suede. To make these leather and suede pieces read as Natural and not another essence, like Classic or Dramatic, make sure that they’re in roomy Natural silhouettes. Ensuring that the pieces are in stereotypically Natural colors—like earth tones such as browns and beiges—will also help to not bring in more formal essences.
Gamine fabric can read as dressy because it’s often tailored and stiff. To avoid other essences, you can actually ignore the guideline about using neutral colors to increase formality—instead you can choose short, sharply-tailored pieces in bright primary colors.
Here the jeans and Tee are informal, but if you ignore them, the bright Gamine blazer could work an office. You could swap out the Tee and jeans for a collared straight Gamine dress and tights to increase formality.
I love the below Natural Gamine skirt as a dressy option that still maintains relaxed Natural and playful Gamine vibes. The fabric might appear intimidating and Dramatic in a darker color or longer, narrower silhouette, but at midi-length in a burnt-orange (which to me reads as both a Natural earth-tone and bright Gamine hue), it doesn’t bring in notable Dramatic. The shirt is partly obscured but may also be Natural Gamine—you could increase the formality further by for example pairing this skirt with a cropped Gamine blazer and forgoing the shades. And the shoes do bring in Dramatic, so you could either compromise and wear them even if you don’t have Dramatic, or swap them out for a less intense style.
"Me encanta la combinación de esta falda midi de cuero con las increíbles sandalias Kattie de @JimmyChoo Parecen hechas la una para las otras I love the mix of this awesome leather midi skirt and these amazing #jimmychooheels Perfection www.withorwithoutsh" by WOWS_ is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.
Ingenues are great in soft fabrics like cotton and can harmoniously wear lace if the effect reads as pretty and sweet rather than conventionally sexy. I’ve referenced this dress before, but it’s so pretty and wholly Ingenue:
Jewelry/accessories: add an ample amount to dress up casual looks
Especially when in close proximity to your face, jewelry and accessories can be critical for visual harmony. Adding jewelry also tends to be an effective strategy for making a look appear more dressy, even when the jewelry itself is fairly casual.
Ingenues can do small bows, lockets, and dainty floral detail in jewelry. Naturals can do necklaces, earrings, and bracelets in wide or oversized, blunt-edged geometric shapes made of natural or natural-appearing materials like metal or stone. And Gamines can do small sharp-edged geometric accessories such as in earrings, pins, or purses.
Shoes: chunky Natural heels, sweet Ingenue heels, playful Gamine heels
Heeled shoes tend to look more formal than their ground-level counterparts, and the more casual essences actually do look harmonious in many different styles of heels.
Simplicity, width, and ease are key to the Natural essence—wide straps with blunt edges and a simple slip-on wedge flip-flop design works for a Natural heel.
"May 2013 Women's Wedges and Sandals with heels" by Thrifty Look is licensed under CC BY 2.0.
Other styles of wedge sandals and chunky heels can also be great for Naturals. Ingenues can be harmonious in kitten heels and Mary Janes. And Gamines can do many different styles of heeled ankle boots, especially if they have angular shapes and playful detail.
Break the rules
Importantly, if you have mostly casual style essences but enjoy wearing formal clothes outside your essences, that’s good! One of the things I try to stress about style essence analysis is that it should make your life better, not worse. So you should only rely on your essence guidelines to the extent that they make sense for you.
Maybe you mostly love following your essence guidelines but sometimes want to break them, like on special occasions. Or maybe you want to break them much more frequently. Style analysis isn’t meant to be a prison, and the guidelines aren’t meant to be something you feel compelled to follow 100% of the time.
Not to say that you can’t follow them 100% of the time. For many people, I do think frequently following their guidelines will enable them to perceive more beauty in their daily lives, to be less self-critical, and to feel that they’re presenting their most beautiful, authentic selves. But I also think that realistically, for a lot of us, our lifestyles will at times be at least somewhat incompatible with our essences.
One great thing about style essence analysis is that knowing your essences should actually help to make your more comfortable when you wear clothes that don’t harmonize with your face. Style analysis gives you the ability to recognize that at times when you don’t look harmonious, it’s not because of a fundamental flaw in your face but rather because your clothes simply don’t match your face.
Style essence analysis doesn’t just help us understand what looks best on us—in my view, it also helps us have greater acceptance over the fact that it’s not realistic to always look 100% harmonious, and that that’s ok. Style analysis may even help us to separate our faces from their context at times when we do wear outfits that aren’t ideal for essences, and so to perceive more of our true beauty even when we’re not following our guidelines.
