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Where To Look For Affordable Designer Clothing

By Lila Bryant


If you're serious about fashion, you probably love paging through fashion magazines and poring over the designer outfits. You probably also know that feeling of disappointment when you look at the price of each item the model is wearing and realizing that her outfit costs the equivalent of a year's salary. However, you don't have to be a billionaire to look fashionable. You simply have to know where to find affordable designer clothing and then know how to wear it.

The people who can normally afford to spend thousands of dollars on a dress or a pair of jeans can be divided into two general categories. The first is the type of person who slavishly follows every trend and only wears the very latest ranges. This kind of person tends to be someone with no sense of style and can seem like someone with very little class who is desperate to impress. It's better to look as if you belong in the second category, which is the type of person who buys classic pieces that will last for many seasons and for whom the quality is more important than whether everyone can see the brand logo.

An important principle to remember is to choose classic, timeless designs. You can wear these for several seasons without them looking outdated. This means that you can easily pick up expensive labels at huge discounts during the January or end-of-season sales and wear these items next season or the one after that.

Choosing second-hand clothes is a good option too. Look in stores that sell pre-owned clothing, at flea markets and in charity shops. Alternatively, check online suppliers to see what they have in stock. It's possible to find an item that has been worn only once or twice and pay only a few dollars, where it would have cost hundreds or thousands of dollars if you bought it new.

Vintage designs are a great solution too. One of the most famous examples of how well this approach can work is the dress that Julia Roberts wore when she won her Academy Award in 2001. She didn't like the latest designs sent to her and eventually decided on a vintage design by Valentino. A tailor altered the gown to fit the actress and after all these years it's still one of the most memorable Oscar dresses. Other Oscar winners who went the vintage route were Reese Witherspoon in a Dior gown and Penelope Cruz in Balmain. Both these dresses dated from the Fifties.

A horrible fashion mistake is to buy counterfeit designer clothes. The people who make these items are breaking the law. Moreover, you'll only embarrass yourself when someone with real fashion knowledge spots that your bargain buy is a fake.

Supporting only the famous couture houses is the sign of an unimaginative dresser. Instead, keep an eye out for the work of young designers. Their designs are often more striking and much less expensive.

The way that the fashion world works is that a top fashion house will come up with a gorgeous design and then the cheaper retail stores copy and adjust this for their own lines. The result is that if you choose carefully, it's only the label at the back, where nobody can see it, that will indicate that you paid a couple of dollars rather than a couple of thousand dollars. If you really want to flash that logo, wear cheaper, classic clothes and spend your money on a good brand-name watch or sunglasses instead.




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