From Melbourne, Australia, Connie Cao is known for her trendy style with vintage and retro touches. She loves mixing vintage with some of her handmade items to create her girly and preppy look. Her blog Kis for Kani showcases her creative style and stunning photographs as well. If you’re looking to style your vintage pieces in a trendy way, keep on reading to scoop some of her tricks.
Like Connie, you may spice up your outfit with vintage-inspired accessories like hats, handbags, belts, hair accessories, necklaces, and even shoes. Connie often tops herself off with bow ties, floral headbands, or substitutes a cute hat. Vintage bags such as doctor’s bags, rattan bags, and even satchel bags in neutral shades of brown or even burgundy are great for complementing your vintage inspired theme. Combat boots, leather boots, and even Mary Jane-style shoes are great worn with leggings or stockings to give off the vintage feel.
To show off your feminine vibe, choose girly and feminine vintage-inspired ensembles. Connie’s style is very girly as she favors feminine dresses and skirts much of the time but skips miniskirts to maintain her vintage theme. Short skirts mirror the modern fashion so love long length skirts and dresses which will give you a vintage feel to your looks. Adding girly accents like socks or collars are great too.
If you want a Connie’s-inspired vintage style, do not be afraid to wear color. Connie is so creative playing with colors and isn’t scared to mix clashing hues like red-and-pink or yellow-or-purple. You may add a colorful knitted shawl, bright cardigan, colorful socks and shoes, or a bright bag to give your look a splash of color. To avoid clashing colors, you may look for pastel ones rather than neutral to keep the girly feel going.
Connie loves prints and patterns so have fun with florals, checks, polka dots, stripes, leopard, stars, hearts, and even funky or graphic prints. Just skip those demographic and punk ones to keep your style vintage inspired. Mix contrasting patterns and prints for a fun look to create a more artistic look. If you’re not a fan of mixing prints, you may wear an Aztec print romper, floral maxi dress, and even striped tea dress to be covered in creative prints without doing much work.
Whatever the season, be creative with layers. Connie always plays with layering to create interest and texture to her outfits. Play with textures like denim, cotton, wool, cashmere and such to add fun to your look. A simple outfit like denim overalls can be contrasted with a chiffon blouse underneath as well as cotton top-and-blouse with a denim jacket like Connie did. Just experiment with unexpected combinations as you never know what will work.
Vintage inspired fashion style doesn’t have to mean looking like you came out from your grandmother’s closet. Like Connie, you can be now trendy with your vintage-inspired pieces and look more fabulous than ever.