Decoding your Style with Mayar Badie

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An electronics engineer graduate and an MBA holder, Mayar Badie decided to give her true passion for fashion a shot after years of working in the engineering field as she went on to study personal styling at the University of Arts in London. Despite being based in the UK, Mayar has an avid Egyptian fan base that follows her through her “Style Memoir by Mayar” social media accounts. The personal stylist and style consultant paid a visit to Cairo this month where she held two personal styling workshops. During the workshops Mayar thoroughly explained how understanding your body, shape, and style while applying rules of geometry, proportion and color can completely transfer the way you look and view yourself. We caught up with Mayar during her recent visit…

How did you discover your love for styling/fashion?

I’ve always had a thing for fashion, ever since I was a little girl collecting scraps of fabric, cutting and gluing them together to make dresses for my Barbie dolls. I’ve also always helped my friends pick what to wear for special events. I explored all areas of fashion; from design to fashion blogging, fashion history, fashion marketing, studied fashion styling until I realized that as much I love all things fashion, personal styling is what I’m passionate about the most. It’s the fact that using simple tricks you can completely change how a woman sees and feels about herself.

What advice would you give to someone who wants to be a stylist?

That even if you think you have the talent, styling is a skill you can learn. Research and read a lot. Try to get an internship. Network and build good relationships. An important aspect of personal styling is the trust and credibility you establish with your clients. Be genuine-in anything you do.

What are the main observations you had regarding your styling workshops in Cairo?

Of course the biggest challenge was trying to put it all together from a different country.

Apart from that, I think the ladies may have been a bit apprehensive to what to expect from a 6 hour workshop on personal styling, specially that it’s the first time a workshop like this is tailored for normal women who want to know how to dress their body shapes, pick the right color, cut, fit, style…etc. rather than for stylists/aspiring stylists.

I have to say we were both very pleasantly surprised from the energy and level of engagement throughout the 6 hours. Overall I really enjoyed the workshops myself, and very happy with the incredible support and feedback following both workshops. I put a lot of hard work and passion into preparing the workshop material myself, so hearing the ladies say it changed how they view their way of dressing, their body and wardrobe and that they know understand the universal phenomena of ‘I have nothing to wear’ makes me extremely happy 🙂

Top items that every woman should own regardless of her size and style…

A crisp white button-down shirt

A well-tailored blazer

A pair of nude heels