Carpe Diem. Yolo. Aloha. Ciao. Bonjour. Hello! However you choose to greet your day, greet it well. I’m a strong believer that each morning you begin anew. My name is Claire Walker and I am a Fashion Merchandising major at the University of South Carolina freshly starting my junior year.
The start of a new year brings so much promise. It rings true to the promise of change, new friends, new opportunities, fresh experiences and for some, a new style. I find that style or how one dresses day to day is a direct reflection of how they’re feeling in that current moment. As a self-professed yogi and lover of life, I believe it is all about the current moment, anything prior to now or relative to the future is completely out of our hands. So let yourself embrace the current moment with self-expression in your personal style. Clothes are so closely tied to who we are as people. Dressing is one of the best ways to express YOU every single day.
The beauty of personal style reflects life in that you are in control of it. You have the ability to change it at any point you so choose. I aspire to become a stylist, helping others work through their own personal struggles via style. Style mirrors how you feel on the inside by what you wear on the outside. It can bring a turtle out of its shell or let the wild ‘n crazy in all of us cut loose. In short, be true to you and hold nothing back especially when it comes to how you dress. I find each person’s unique personality and reflection through their style, magnificent. Style communicates so much without having to say anything at all. It is universal.
As for my personal style, it’s a blend of bohemian and classic; I like to call it bohemian with a vintage-glamour twist. I am a Goodwill thrift store junkie. Not to mention I was blessed with a grandmother who knew how to dress. I love pairing thrifted or up-cycled with vintage, proving it is not how much you to spend but how you rock it! Fashion is full circle in that trends always come back around. With knowledge of this, I love pairing old with the new and finding new styles in my Granny’s vintage pieces. For this look I am wearing cream espadrille wedges from my Gucci Goodwill back home, peasant dress from Rag-o-Rama in Atlanta, Georgia, rings and bracelets from my Granny and up-cycled earrings from our local farmers’ market—Soda City—here in Columbia, South Carolina.
I cannot wait to share my passion for style with y’all this semester, giving a glimpse into the awesome people I get to encounter here every day in The City of Dreams…Columbia, South Carolina!
