The Look: A classic 50's style cotton midi dress is perfect for Tia's Sunday transition from church to a downtown brunch date. She makes it her own by adding key details like the yellow skinny belt and other great pops of color, such as pastel sea-foam blue nails and gold bangles from Cambodia. By the way, this dress has pockets, which are admirably practical, sure, but also such an interesting style boost. Simply by putting her hands in her pockets, Tia can't help but look confident.

• Sophorn Kuoy

"Casually sophisticated. I usually tend toward more classic pieces because they never go out of style, and that's what I'm most comfortable in. I prefer to be effortlessly stylish, and most importantly, comfortable and not overly done-up."

Her favorite places to shop?

"Almost anywhere and everywhere. To be more specific, Ross, Ann Taylor, Target, TJMaxx, and a few random consignment shops in Memphis. You can really find some treasures in there. I once found an Escada couture pencil skirt in perfect condition for only $7!"

Now that it's spring, and actually feels like spring, my shoulders and legs reunite with the sun, and my all-black wardrobe gets injected with a few brightly colored tops, floral fabric heels, and bold geometric accessories.

Investing in key pieces to add to my wardrobe is a long, thoughtful process that usually involves discovering new local designers and boutiques that offer custom handmade items or limited collections. In a city like Memphis that breeds entrepreneurship, those indie designers and boutiques are emerging more and more. Finding them is the hard part, so here are some feature items from up and coming designers and my favorite local boutiques.

SHOPPING GUIDE

Custom Coats, Scarves, Dresses and Tops
DeNovo Style by designer Elizabeth Holliday
DeNovoStyle.com
Etsy

Handmade Jewelry
Light It Up - Jewelry Arts Studio by artist Sarah Seligman
LightItUpJewelry.com
Facebook
Etsy

Clutches
Elly Deyhle Handbags by Elly Deyhle
Available at James Davis in Laurelwood Shopping Center, Memphis
EllyDeyhle.com
Facebook

Local Boutiques
Sir Samuels
522 South Main, Memphis
Facebook

Crazy Beautiful
3536 Walker Ave, Memphis
Facebook

Eye-Con Couture
1645 Union Ave, Memphis
EyeConCouture.bigcartel.com

SPECIAL THANKS

Hair and Makeup by Jennifer Ralda
Facebook

Photography by dirk olsen
DirkOlsen.com

Click here for more information, and check back in this weekend to see more updates from Memphis Fashion Weekend 2013.

Salutations, stylites! Welcome to 2013!

We hope you're all starting off the new year in style (of course you are.) We'd like to highlight one lucky lady who will have a head start on a new look for 2013: Wendy Mink, the winner of our $1,000 gift certificate to Laurelwood Shopping Center.

• Winner Wendy Mink (center) pictured with Cory Prewitt and Jenne Williams of Laurelwood

Thanks to everyone who participated in our sweepstakes! We're looking forward to a year of more prizes and more style and way fewer drop crotch pants.

• Hannah Sayle
• Styles from Laurelwood at this year's Strut!Memphis

Click here to enter! We'll draw a winner on December 20th. Best of luck!

Last night's Strut!Memphis event, an annual benefit to raise money for the Community Legal Center, was the place to see and be seen. Between the runway full of Laurelwood's finest fashions and the stylish attendees, we found plenty of photo-worthy outfits. Check out the slideshow for a taste of the evening's display.

If you've ever thought about designing your own clothes, Memphis Fashion Weekend is here to make that passing thought into a fledgling design into a runway reality. The Emerging Memphis Designer Project is new to the Memphis Fashion Weekend festivities in March, and we sat down with organizer Abby Elzemeyer Phillips to find out the details.

• Hannah Sayle

We got a lot of submissions last year from local designers who either had full collections but weren't the current season, or didn't have full collections and therefore couldn't show on their own. This was a way to bring all of the designers in Memphis together to create new Spring/Summer 2013 looks without having to create a whole new collection — because that's time consuming, it's costly, and it's hard to do if you're not a full-time designer or you're just starting out.

So how does the process of selecting designers work?

We have an application process and the designers will submit sketches for Spring/Summer 2013 looks. We have given them a color forecast. For Spring/Summer 2013 there are four different color forecasts that showcase the different trends for the coming season and we picked the one called "Clarity." It has a lot of beautiful pastels and also has some rich plums and greys. We're asking that designers stick with this color palette so that when they all go down the runway together they'll still look like a somewhat complete collection.

So you're hoping to get multiple designers involved in one collection?

We're hoping to have 25 looks walk the runway. Each designer can submit up to five looks. We may have five designers with all five looks, or 25 designers with one look each. We're just not sure what that breakdown is going to be yet.

What does the application itself entail?

What we're requiring is a sketch and for people to fill out the application. We've said that if people want to submit a mood board to help us understand their creative thought process that would be helpful, but it's definitely not necessary. So many people are creating mood boards on Pinterest that creating a mood board is much easier than it used to be.

The application is really a chance for us to see the designer's background, find out whether they've done anything like this before — which they do not have to have done anything like this before. We're totally open to people going, 'Oh, I've always wanted to do that, let's see if I can.'

What sort of resources will be available to these emerging designers?

Each designer gets $40 per look, which isn't a ton, we know, but at least we can give them a starting point. Sew Memphis is one of our sponsors of this event and they are going to be giving time slots for the Emerging Memphis Designer Project to come and use their sewing machines. They'll also be giving one class to the designers to kind of give an overview of how to use the machines and the idea of patterns. If all they've done are sketches, and they haven't brought them to life yet, they'll get a better idea of how to do that.

Another one of our sponsors is the Memphis Fashion Group, Charlisha Renata, and she'll be there to help designers with the business side of things. She'll be mentoring the designers that are chosen, helping them figure out what is their aesthetic, how to stay true to that, and helping them with the business side of fashion.

What's in store for the designers after the Memphis Fashion Weekend?

I'm hoping we'll be able to team up with boutiques to showcase the designs but also help these designers make a connection for future sales. I know K'Presha downtown desperately wants to use local designers and is totally open to trying to sell local pieces and doing custom looks for people. It's just at this point she's had a hard time trying to find local designers.

What would you say to someone who has very little experience with designing, maybe doesn't even know how to sketch, but is interested in designing for the show?

That's the hard part. Because if you don't know how to sketch, it's hard for us to be able to see what your designs are. If we get something that we feel has the creativity behind it, has the passion behind it, we'll make sure we do everything we can to get the full idea of what they want to do for the application process. But we'd rather they give sketching their best try. We have on our website a couple of helpful links and one of those is a link to a YouTube video on sketching and some tutorials. We hope people utilize those links to help them through the process.

For more information on Memphis Fashion Weekend or the Emerging Memphis Designer Project, visit www.memphisfashionweekend.com or www.facebook.com/memphisfashionweek.

Check out this week's Flyer for an introduction to Talant Trade Co., a local design duo producing some of the coolest vintage-military-inspired bags straight from North Mississippi.

• Hannah Sayle
• Katie and Johnson Benjamin

• Hannah Sayle

Last night was the second annual Curb Couture Trashion Show, a fashion show fund-raiser featuring clothes made partially or entirely of recycled materials. Local designers used aluminum cans, plastic bags, newspapers, chip bags, cardboard boxes, and other discarded materials to create their own unique designs and support the work of Memphis City Beautiful and neighborhood beautification and greening projects.

Of course, on the way to the event, my camera battery died. Was it hoping to be turned into a snappy broach or a statement necklace? Too bad for it, I'm not as crafty as the designers in the showcase; too bad for me, I had to take all my photos on my iPhone.

Now, in the words of Alexis Grace: Are you ready to see some trash?

• Former American Idol contender Alexis Grace welcomes guests in a recycled dress.

• Model shows off a hat made of a screen door and a bag made of scrap leather and chair parts.

• A hat made of packaging materials.

• Mayor Wharton greets the crowd.

• Best in Show winning gown made of plastic bags created by costume designer Bruce Bui.

• Gown made of umbrellas and cleaning scrubbers.

• Model shows off a bowtie by Mo's Bows, crafted from an old church pew cushion.

When Gap closed its location in the Shops of Saddle Creek in April, Saddle Creek management wasted no time getting two upscale stores to take its place. Brighton Collectibles moved in on July 12, and Free People, the sister store of next door Anthropologie, opened its first Memphis location there on September 15.

Free People is part of the Urban Outfitters family of companies (UO opened its first Memphis location near Cooper Young last year), but its style is distinctive from both of its sister stores. Suited for an eclectic shopper, FP offers clothes, accessories, and housewares in a mix of boho, girly, tomboy, and beachcomber styles totally unique to its brand. And while the prices definitely fall more towards the Anthropologie end of the spectrum, we spotted a sale room that was already filling up...

This is only the second Free People location in Tennessee, so you can imagine how excited we were to take a little tour of the “Blacksmith Cottage”-style boutique. Although only 2,000 square feet, the new location feels bright and open, with natural elements and decorative touches that have us oh-so-ready for fall.

Scroll down for a look at the new store:

• Hannah Sayle
• Free People at the Shops of Saddle Creek

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Free People, The Shops of Saddle Creek, 7615 W. Farmington Blvd., 752-2886, freepeople.com