I waffled back and forth between a couple of different blogs this week, which is why this guy is late!! 

For this weeks blog I've rounded up a few of my go-to tips for styling the Short Stout body. For the purpose of the blog post I'm going to use 'SS' for "Short & Stout." 

To be clear, these tips will not work for everyone they are just little things I've picked up over time that are the holy grail of most of my outfits and are not meant as a "shame on you if you don't do this" - this is all just my personal opinion and experience. 

Also I'm 5' 1" in case you're wanting to compare yourself my me! 

And on that note, lets get started! 

1) Tucked in shirts save lives. 

All of my friends know how much I follow this rule. I'm pretty much a 50/50 split between torso and legs. Both are short... don't get it twisted. So I'd still consider myself to be short torso'd (Is that a word? Doesn't matter.) 

 

I am die hard for tucked in shirts. The worst thing for a short human is to be drowning in a shirt (unless we're taking about a purposely over-sized shirt, there IS a difference.) If you're drowning, your shirt is going to cut your legs off even more and you'll actually appear even shorter! The other reason I like the tucked shirt is because it adds some volume up top. I'm not one for super skin tight shirts, so tucking a shirt in can make all of the difference. You can just see by the pictures I've posted how much longer it makes my legs appear. If I had these shirts out and flowncing around, living their best lives... it wouldn't be cute for my SS legs. 

Sometimes I'll even do a half-tuck, where it's not a fully corporate tuck, some fabric is still left out for a more casual look. 

2) Arm conscious? 3/4 all day. 

This one isn't for just the SS of the world, but anyone that doesn't love their arms, OR has short arms (like yours truly.)

I'm not arm conscious. I'm not really anything conscious TBH. Depending on the day. But I live by 3/4 length sleeves. I hardly ever wear sleeves to their full length, and always always ALWAYS stay away from those awkward sleeve lengths that cut off at the elbow. They stop the fabric at the widest part of your arm, and to me that's just not a flattering look. I also never EVER use the buttons that are on a lot of flannels, or shirts like the one I've put below. Again, because they hit the widest part of your arm and it's not a great spot to show off when you're feeling arm-conscious. 

(Pictured here - this shows both of my no-thank you's. Plus size stores are notorious for this!!! And it kind of drives me crazy because I don't think they understand that this really isn't a flattering spot) 

 

 

Try this instead! A shirt that has sleeves hitting 3/4 of the way down. Carrying the fabric further down your arm just helps to elongate everything. 

3) Do not be afraid of cropped pants!!! (But be a liiiiitle afraid of cropped jackets) 

In the essence of spring approaching, I think talking about cropped pants is so appropriate! Everything thinks that short gals cannot wear crops, and I disagree! Cropped jeans in the summer are so freaking cute. The way I get over this is first of all, by rolling up the bottom of my hem. I don't know why, but adding that second colour dimension (since most pants have a slight colour variation on the inside) just adds a little va va voom. 

 

Second of all, I wear heels or fairly open shoes. Wearing sneakers or a more closed shoe option just cuts you off and makes your legs appear shorter than they already are. 

As for cropped jackets, on a SS girl, that is not a great help for trying to elongate yourself. Try to stick with jackets that sit at the hips or even a little lower! When my jacket is longer than my shirt, that's when you know you've won. 

 

I'm going to leave it at those few tips today and hopefully turn this into a series! There are so many things I do on a daily basis so I will absolutely be back with more tips. 

See you next Sunday! 

Ashleigh 

@shortstoutstyle