Hi blog readers! I hope you’re all doing well and hope the New Year is being kind to you. Today I have a special guest blogger here on ACBlog. I am delighted to have her on and can’t wait for you to read all about her affordable style tips. She’s a designer, blogger, and a style expert from the U.K. who splits her time abroad and stateside. Her fashion sense is one I admire and her expertise is seriously amazing!  Niki and I met this past summer via Instagram and I was immediately was drawn to her style and we have been Insta friends ever since. I absolutely love her work and I am so excited for you to get to meet her and read her post on affordable style tips.

Glor xo

Hi! I’m Niki from Style Studs and Lace and I’m so excited to be this month’s guest blogger on Glor’s beautiful blog!  I’m a personal stylist from the UK and have been living in the US for nearly 3 years.  My blog enables me to share my knowledge and tips to guide my readers towards a more confident and style savvy existence.  I offer simple solutions to their everyday style problems and hope to inspire them to maximize their closet and budget.  What we wear has such a powerful impact on how we feel and what we think we’re capable of doing and I want to help my readers to harness that power and use it!

When Glor asked me what I wanted to write about I knew straight away that I wanted to share some of my favorite affordable style tips.  If you’re like me, you’re probably on a mission to save few pennies after the excesses of last month, but that doesn’t mean that our style should suffer!  There are a lot of things we can do to keep our look fresh and our wallets full whether we’re shopping, styling ourselves or simply storing our clothes and I’m sharing my top 10, right here. So here are my top 10 affordable style tips:

1. Be creative with what you have and shop your closet. Look at your items with fresh eyes, pull out your favorite pieces and see if you can identify any new outfit combinations using the clothes you don’t wear very much.  I guarantee you’ll find outfits that you never even knew you had.  Another way to get the creative juices flowing is to challenge yourself to pull together three different outfits with the same item.  While we’re about mixing and matching – If you’re someone who likes to hang their clothes in outfits in their closet, please split them up.  I know it makes for easy dressing but it stifles creativity as it makes it hard to picture those items with other clothes in the closet.
2. Don’t keep things for best. We all have a few items in our closet that make us feel fantastic, but we tend to keep for a special occasion.  Well don’t!  You deserve to feel special all the time not just a few times a year, so dust them down and style them up for every day.
3. Don’t underestimate the power of accessories! Belts are a fantastic way to tie a look together or to highlight your waist and shape, in fact, they are my number one item for showing off waists.  Jewelry is another accessory that doesn’t get worn enough.  How many of you have a box full of beautiful jewelry that never sees the light of day?  I would hazard a guess that it’s either ‘too special’ to wear every day or is stored in a way that makes it impossible to grab something quickly before running out the door. A simple piece of jewelry will do wonders for an outfit and is a great way to feel a little special on a mundane Monday morning, so make it accessible and try to wear it.
4. Experiment with different ways to wear your clothes. Knot or tie a top to add style and shape to your frame, or loosely tucked your top into the front of your skirt or pants to add style and a little definition to your shape.  Maybe even try wearing some of your tops and dresses back to front, this one is a fave of mine!
5. A tailored jacket is something that everyone should have in their repertoire. They are the easiest way to transform a nondescript jeans and t-shirt combination into a chic and stylish look.  Pair it with flats or sneakers in the day and heels for the night. Simple! 
6. Play around with the sleeve length. Sometimes turning the sleeve up can transform a top from looking too big to looking like it’s the perfect fit.  It’s also fun to layer different sleeve lengths, too.
7. Buy vintage clothing. It’s a great way to add uniqueness and personality to your look and is often far better made than fast fashion items that tend to look tired after a few washes.  Not only that but it’s often cheaper too!  Win, win!
8. Shop for next season trends in this season’s sales rather than buying pieces that you’ll only get a couple more months wear out of. It’s a great way to save money, and it feels great when you see something similar a couple of months later, for over twice the price.  Right now, I’m hunting down stripes, anything with shoulder cut outs, lame fabrics, and frills, all of which are set to big again next season!
9. It’s all in the details – Fringing, beading, and embellishment can make a budget item look expensive. If you pay attention to the details, you’ll achieve a high-end look for a fraction of the price.
10. And my last tip? Head to your local beauty store and find a bold lippy in your perfect shade.  If I’m feeling flat, I’ll pop on my favorite shade for an instant lift!

Niki Whittle, is an established British Personal Stylist with over 10 years’ experience, offering Closet Consultations, Personal Shopping and Online Styling (www.nikiwhittle.com). She’s the author of the blog Style Studs and Lace (www.stylestudsandlace) where she shares simple styling tips and down to earth shopping advice to inspire her readers to maximize their closet and budget and lead a more confident and style savvy existence. In 2014, she brought her Brit style to the US, expanding her business and client base to cover both the UK and the USA. In 2016, Niki combined her background in textile design and experience as a stylist with the inspiration she found whilst living and traveling across the world, to create her first collection of scarves that fuse traditional with modern, east with west (www.nikiwhittledesigns.com).
Visit her on Instagram to follow along! @nikiwhittleSave