Did you just find out your silhouette and want to know how to Dress the Apple Body Shape? Well, today is your lucky day because I want to share with you all the tips and tricks to choose the best pair of pants! Before we start I want to say that this is not a precise science.
I’ll share with you the most flattering trousers for your shape based on the “standards” and I’ll also attach some drawings so you can make the final decision about what you like the most! We’re all unique, so follow your uniqueness.
The Apple body shape is defined by the width of the hips being similar to the width of your shoulders. There is not much definition around the waist and the apples are normally top heavy (with wider back or bigger bust).
To find the Perfect Trousers for your Apple Body Shape, is by balancing the heavy top and adding definition around the waist. Your trousers should do the following:
Having said that, don’t forget about body proportions, they will also play a big role in finding the best fitting trousers, in this case you might have a shorter torso because of the little waist definition. Let’s look into the perfect trousers for the apple body shape.
Let’s talk about waistbands. They are the “magic” part of the trousers that will tell our eyes where the waist is, this means they will mainly have an effect on our body proportions. A side from the proportions, they can be important for the body shape and comfort. In theory, there’re 3 main waistlines: the high waisted, the mid-rise and the low waisted.
The theory says that as an apple, you should lean towards mid to low-rise waistlines to make your top less heavy. In my opinion, the waistband normally has more to do with body proportions and in this case, for me, I actually prefer the high rise waistline.
There’s some information out there saying that the apple shape should lean towards wide waistbands. I think the width of the waistband has more to do with balancing the outfit than changing the body shape.
The next trouser characteristic is the length of your trousers. You can change it because of the time of the year, or it can also help balance out your body proportions.
There are a couple of lengths that have a name (see image) but you can always make them as long or short as you want. Now let’s see how to change your body proportions:
I know it sounds very obvious but just think about balancing your proportions! Play around with volume and length and see what you like the most.
The leg-lines will help add or remove volume when needed, so let’s see what the best options are for your figure.
There’s 6 main leg-lines: the slim, the tapered, the straight, the boot cut, the bell bottoms and finally the wide legs.
As an apple, you want to add volume to the lower part of your body without emphasising the hips. To do that, try to avoid slim fitting or tapered trousers, they will make you look unbalanced. The best fitting trousers for your body type are the ones that add volume to the lower body, like the boot cut or the bell bottoms. The straight and wide legs might make you look boxy and undefined.
If I look at the image, I have to agree with the “theory” this time. Remember to pick the silhouette you like the most!
The next chapter is about design details that can be added to draw attention. This part of the trousers will have some effect on changing your body shape and they’ll help make you look cool!
There’s a bunch of design details but here’s a few of them:
Something I haven’t said is that the apple body shapes are normally known to have a rounder belly (which I think happens for all body types). If this is the case, things like the fly, pleats or big pockets might make the area around your belly too voluminous.
If you have a flatter stomach, the details will help you emphasise the lower part of your body to look a bit more balanced. You probably already know how you feel about details, for example, do you normally stay away from pleats? Then trust your judgment!
The last thing we’re going to talk about today are fabrics and colours. These two characteristics will help soften your shape and balance the look.
When talking about fabrics, you can choose light weight or heavy weight (and in between). The lighter fabrics will soften your shape and are a great option for apple body shapes. The heavier fabrics will sharpen your figure.
For colours, they will help draw more or less attention to your lower body. Light colours make you look bigger and darker colours slim your figure. Can you see that illusion in the image?
Use these two things to balance the final look. If you want more volume, then darker colours will make them look narrower. If you want a slim leg-line, you can balance it out by choosing a lighter colour.
In your case, dark colours always work better than light ones because they hide the width of your hips and make your waist look narrower.
And with all this information you’re closer to learning how to dress the Apple Body Shape. If you don’t know where to start, here you have a matrix with all the pants that have a name (you can make any combination, of course). On the horizontal line you have the leg-lines and the vertical line shows you the foundations.
Now it’s time to get crazy! Combine foundations, leg-lines, fabrics, add details or change the colours! You can make any trouser design you want.
When learning how to dress the apple body shape, tops will have the biggest effect on changing the body proportions. This is because tops will influence the 3 main points: the shoulders, the waist and the hips. Remember that the body shape theory only looks at one dimension, so take into account your body proportions and the size of your chest when choosing a design!
Tops can be divided in 6 parts: the shape, the silhouette, neckline, sleeve, length and fabric and colours.
The first two go hand in hand and will be the same for all the body shapes. In general, the idea is to always define the waist as much as possible, but of course, this is personal preference so I won’t go too much into it. Once you’ve decided the shape around the waist, it’s time to look into the silhouette. This can be done by moving or converting darts into volume or details. You can do that in two ways:
Let’s add an example. If you are an inverted triangle, you could separate the top and bottom of your design and add gathers to compensate the shoulders. Or if you have small breasts and you want them to appear larger, you can add gathers around your bust. Play around and see what works for you!
Now let’s look into the other characteristics.
The first thing we see in a top is the neckline. To understand how it can change our body type, let’s separate them into groups: the width, the depth and the shape.
The apple body shape is very similar to a rectangle, which means that the shoulders and hips are well balanced. The trick here is to create the illusion of a waist and stay balanced.
Let’s start with the width. Necklines can be either Wide or Narrow. Wide necklines will widen the shoulder and bust areas and Narrow necklines will accentuate the slender look, elongate your silhouette and narrow the shoulders. Apples want to slender their look so Narrow necklines are a good option.
The second group is the depth. You can choose between high and low necklines. High will hide your chest and low will elongate your body and break the chest vertically. Like I said before, you want to elongate the body and break up the chest, so deep necklines will work well for you.
The last group, is the shape. You can either choose round necklines or sharp ones. Round necklines will create curves and won’t draw much attention and sharp shapes will make you look more squared and edgy. As an apple, both options are good and it will depend on how to balance the rest of the outfit.
One last thing you can do is to add embellishments around the neck like collars, lace, trims or ruffles. This will draw attention to the upper body, so remember to balance it out around the hips.
The next thing on the list are sleeves, which can also have a big impact on your body shape. Here we’ll talk about 3 types of sleeves: long, short and straps.
Once you’ve defined the length of the sleeve, you can add volume in different ways:
The apple body shape wants a sleeve that takes attention away from the midriff. You can do that by adding interest to the shoulders with puff sleeves for example. If on the other hand you don’t want to add more volume to the shoulders, opt for a fitted sleeve.
If on the other hand you want to wear straps, thin straps will elongate your shoulders and wide straps will do the opposite. The option you choose will depend on the rest of the outfit.
There’s other ways of adding volume and these are embellishments. You can add them to both the shoulders or the wrists and they can be things like
Another part of the top is the length. If you play with the length of the top and the waistband of the bottom, you will be able to change the illusion of your body proportions.
Let’s look at how the length can influence your proportions and shape:
You always have to combine the length with the other characteristics, a bit like what we did with the sleeves.
I’ve shown you some of the necklines and sleeves out there, but don’t forget there’s A LOT more to choose from. Take a look at the image below and remember to always draw your design before making any decisions to see how the volume will be distributed.
