With countless dress designs flooding the market every fashion season, it’s easy to get swept up in the sheer mass of selection. This can make finding those classically chic and stylish dress designs you’ve come to love for their everyday wearability tough to pick out. Tough, but not impossible. After all, you have this guide to help.
Here are the most street-chic dress styles for day-to-day fashion:
1) The Sweater Dress
From delicate knits to thick, chunky cable knit styles, the sweater dress is — in essence — a long sweater. While it can be worn as a sweater with pants, what differentiates it from regular sweaters is its length, but also, its cut. There are exceptions to this rule, but sweater dresses tend to be a little more fitted. While sweaters can be super big and baggy, big and baggy sweater dresses have more length (and therefore more material), so it can make you look frumpy.
One of the best things about the sweater dress is that it can be styled in multiple, stunning ways. Wear it with sneakers, or heels or ballet flats or boots: it can pull off just about any type of footwear. Same with jewellery: accessorize with a leather choker and a messy bun for a beautifully bohemian look, or with gold shoulder-dusting earrings and bangles for a more refined, dressy look.
2) The Shift Dress
Shift dresses are classically uncomplicated. With a noticeable lack of fit around the waist and hips, the shift dress is a styling dream. Think of it as the blank canvas to your look. A basic shift dress should be part of every woman’s street style. Sleeveless, or with cap sleeves or longer sleeves; turtle neck or V-neck or crew neck, you can have a lot of fun with fundamental fashion staple. Throw in some perfectly appointed statement jewellery, and you’ve got a dazzling look from this simple dress design.
Word to the wise: choose a shorter shift: one that’s just above the knee. Because of the relatively shapelessness of this style, anything too long will make your body look boxy. Showcasing your slim stems, on the other hand, is the perfect complement to the shift.
3) The Shirt Dress
Here’s another dress style that’s inspired by a top. Shirt dresses are in this year — and will be for years to come. This is because the dress is as timeless as the shirt itself, but this doesn’t mean you can’t have fun with this spectacular style.
Shirt dresses look like long dress shirts, but other than this defining characteristic, there’s a lot of wiggle room in terms of design or fit (just like dress shirts themselves). From relaxed fits to slim fits, the shirt dress can be accessorised to look formal enough for a bridal shower, or casual enough to wear to lunch with your friends. (Just check out the womens dresses from Sundays the Label to see the design diversity we’re talking about.)
4) The LBD
The little black dress (LDB) is a must-have, and while it can come in a variety of styles, it is also a style unto itself. The perfect LBD should be able to transition from casual wear to work wear to at least cocktail attire — all with the help of a few accessories. It should make you feel like a veritable vixen when you slip it on, and this is why there is no exact ‘style’ for the LBD: it can be whatever style makes you feel best. If you don’t have this style staple in your closet, you need to get one, now.
