The struggles of short girl shopping

What is petite? – some girls aren’t blessed with supermodel legs and long slim torsos. We all come in different shapes and sizes. One of the categories for women clothing is “petite” which recognises that there is a need for clothes designed to fit women who are 5”3 and below. (similar to the Olsen’s and Kim K).

Being 5 foot 3 myself, I know that it isn’t always easy to buy clothes if you’re short. I recall once buying a pair of size 8 trousers online and no joke, the trousers fit the length of my entire body, the waistline was at my neck!! I couldn’t believe it! I find it so frustrating as I can’t just buy a new pair of trousers online with a new retailer.

Here’s some of the work arounds I’ve found when buying clothes:

• You could cut off the bottom (but it only really works with jeans without looking like a dog has eaten them). A jagged hem is on trend and looks more edgy

• You could take up the trousers (but sometimes that is more expensive than the actual cost of the trousers and you have to actually wait for the work to be done)-in my opinion this isn’t a long term workaround-you shouldn’t need to do this for everything. Plus who has time for that?! Not me!

• You could fold them up, I do this loads and it does look really nice. Though sometimes it can look a little chunky if you have thick material.

• You can buy a regular sized cropped trouser so that it fits your petite legs as a full sized trouser. I do this so many times with work trousers

• Sometimes you see a dress online which is a mini dress but on petite girls it hangs over the knee. You can work the longer dress or add a belt and make the dress a little shorter

• Buying smart clothes-particularly trouser suits is soo difficult! A few retailers  have petite workwear sections like : Debenhams, next, Dorothy Perkins. i’ve seen many more brands incorporate a petite section so it’s worth looking at these before considering tailoring or folding up.

Other brands with petite sections include:

-PLT (pretty little thing)

-Boohoo

-Next

-River Island

-Dorothy Perkins

-Miss Selfridge

-Topshop (get a lot of jeans from here)

-ASOS

-Missguided

-New look

-Wallis

**on the plus side we sometimes fit kids clothes which is a little cheaper! (I also confess to owning a pair of kids Nike gym trainers which were a bargain!)

I recently made a video of 5 petite suitable topshop items and not all of them were from the petite section. Go and take a look!

I’m going to make a huge effort to share all my petite appropriate finds with you- so make sure to stay tuned on my instagram accounts, pinterest, and of course youtube where I will try them all on for you.

If anyone has any tips/hacks or advice when shopping for petite girls then please do share!

Speak soon

Natasha

Tattie xo