Stylish jeans are the foundation of every wardrobe, but finding the perfect jeans can be tricky. Here's a guide to low-rise, skinny, stretch, colored, trendy denim.
Dangerous Tapered Jeans
Tapered styles draw attention to and accentuate your bottom, stomach and hips, and have the tendency to leave your legs looking like spindly, shapeless sticks. If that wasn't enough, they also create an awkward juncture when meeting shoes.
Tapered jeans are most flattering when worn tucked in high boots, but can also be fashionably worn with ballet flats or high heels. Hopefully the evil stirrup pant is no longer being manufactured, but should you come across this vile pant-leg, run.
More universally flattering styles are the straight or boot-cut leg, which create longer silhouettes.
High Rise Jeans
High rise jeans are extremely fashionable this season, and are a stylish option for most body types.
Low Rise Jeans
Low rise can be sexy, but resist wearing extreme low rise jeans such that your underwear are exposed above the waistline of the pant. Nobody wants to see your thong; it is not a fashion statement. Pulling off the low rise requires a significant amount of work: ab work.
It is never flattering to have a muffin top (bulge of fleshy midriff) exposed above a low rise pant.
Stretch Denim
Stretch is not meant to be tested at its limit. Denim is blended with stretchy components to facilitate freedom of movement in snugger styles.
Just because you can squeeze your body into a size doesn't mean it fits: can you walk around comfortably? Can you bend your knees? Can you breathe? If not, move on.
Trendy Denim Details
If you have a heavier bottom, avoid very large pockets or other design elements that draw more attention to that region.
Denim Sizing
There is no shame in wearing a size that fits. Avoid getting pegged into a certain 'size number'. Different designers use different standards for sizing: know your measurements and a general range, but try items on to be sure they fit properly and are cut to fit your particular shape. Alterations may be necessary in order to get the perfect fit.
Having said that, realize that jeans will likely stretch slightly, losing some of their sexy snug factor. Again, do not purchase a pair of jeans that feel uncomfortable in the store - they will remain uncomfortable, unworn, and consequently a depressing reminder of the money that would have been better spent elsewhere. Also be sure not to buy jeans that are too big or bulky, especially around the waist and bottom. They will never quite complete the hip or funky outfits you intended to create with them, and (unless you put on a few pounds) these jobbies will also remain unflattering.
Denim No-No's
Colored Jeans
As a general rule: avoid light-colored and colored denim.
Darker shades of blue read more like a basic black, and are more versatile in that they may be more appropriate for casual work-wear or dressing up for a night out on the town. Extremely light blues tend to look less sophisticated. Colored or bleached denim (including white, black, red, green, and any other non-blue shade) was a bad mistake from the late 80s early 90s; don't re-live it.
Distressed Denim
There is something to be said for worn jeans that look faded or distressed because they have actually been worn.
Designers will often slightly distress or artificially age jeans to give them a more lived-in look, and when this is done in moderation, it usually looks great. However, jeans marked with distinctly distressed stripes and splotches (for example on the bottom, thighs, or hip-crease) belong in the same category as acid-wash jeans: Save your money and move on.
