Do you know your trapeze dress from your baby doll? Your mini from your maxi? With so many dress styles to choose from this season, find one that flatters your body type

Empire Line

• A very flattering dress for almost any figure as the waistline is raised above the natural waist, which also may fall right below the bust. Good for shorter, petite figures and those with big tums as the empire dress creates the illusion of length and skims the body, camouflaging wide hips or a thick waist.
• The baby doll and the empire-line dress are not mutually exclusive, but the empire had a more feminine/mature bust and can also be full-length.The high waist is usually complemented with a deep V-neckline, rather than the more babyish round-neck.

Flapper

• Spring and Summer fashion trends of 2008 sees a continued revival of this Great Gatsby classic. Beads, fringes and ruffles give a new twist to the vintage dresses of the 1920s. Figure-friendly for most, as they fall straight, skimming the body. Flapper dresses are sleeveless by tradition, often with drop-waists. Teem it with a flapper headband, red-hot this season.

Kaftan (or Caftan)

• The kaftan is the universal cover-up on the beach. Long or short sleeved it has re-emerged as a fashion icon, “swamping the sarong and overpowering the pareo to become the mainstay of the holiday wardrobe.” says fashionolic.blogspot.com. It can also be worn as a tunic top over skinny jeans or a full length glamorous gown for evening wear.

Mini

• This covers a wide range of styles but basically denotes a short dress, above the knee. 2008 sees a real contrast of styles are both the mini and the maxi vie for a place on the copy-catwalks of the high-street. Pair a mini dress with wedges or flats.
• More mature women should balance out the shortness of the dress by wearing it with leggings or pants. Younger ones can wear it with coloured opaque tights, one of the fashion must-haves this season.

Maxi

• A figure-friendly dress-style for all shapes and sizes. Floaty and feminine, covering hips, tums and bums. Avoid volumnous skirts if you are petite and wear a maxi with platform shoes or wedges to lengthen the silhouette.

Trapeze

• Also known as a tent or sack, this is a dress that’s shaped like a trapezoid with the cut jutting out and away from the body.
• To qualify as a trapeze dress the cut must be above the knee and have no waistline, with the skirt taking on an A-line shape. To carry off this style you need to be more of an average frame than petite. To balance out the full skirt make sure the shoulders are a good fit and a banded neckline can add defi

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 28th, 2008 at 8:33 am and is filed under Clothing, Women. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.