November 2011 -

What To Wear This New Year’s Eve

After the family friendly fun of December, New Year’s Eve has traditionally been the time to go wild. To ring in the New Year, partygoers across the world let their hair down, drink their beverages of choice and wait for that magical instant when the clock strikes midnight. The first day of a new year is typically considered a time of possibility, when people get to improve themselves with resolutions. Some revelers prefer to send the old year out in style with one last night of debauchery before the sober task of following that list begins. Whatever your reasons for celebrating on December 31st, New Year’s Eve is the best holiday of the year for trying out a bold new look. Try these style ideas for New Years to accomplish it!

Shine in Metallic Tones

After frumpy Christmas sweater season, New Year’s Eve is a great time to rediscover glitz and glamour. Metallic sheens are a great way to draw attention to yourself on this fabulous night. For the courageous, a dress covered in sequins or metallic thread will suggest the glitter of Times Square, site of the world’s most famous ball drop. The less adventurous can still accessorize with shimmering eye shadow, sparkly clutches and statement jewelry. Gleaming tones can look good on anyone; women with “cool” skin tones look best in shining silver, while you can bring out “warm” skin tones with gold. Anyone can look fabulous with black or clear sequins.

Go Retro with a Vintage Piece

This year’s fashion has been all about borrowing previous inspirations for an updated look. When you welcome the New Year, you can reference the wisdom of decades past with a cool vintage piece re-imagined for a modern flare. The space age silhouettes of the 1950s and 60s are always a hit on New Year’s Eve, when revelers look towards the future. You may not have a flying car yet, but you can evoke the gee-whiz optimism of the era with a dress straight out of the Jetsons’ closet. For a thoroughly modern look, use just one vintage piece in your outfit. A brightly colored mini-dress from the 1970s can look fresh with modern accessories. The vivid tones of the 1980s will look daring enough without a big perm or legwarmers. Alternatively, you can borrow makeup tips from another era with a sleek cat eye or a classic scarlet pout.

Stay Classy in a Little Black Dress

At a formal party, New Year’s Eve can be a time for elegance. Live the sophisticated lifestyle with a little black dress accessorized for the occasion. A good cocktail dress is always in style, and New Year’s Eve is the ideal time to revamp this wardrobe staple with daring accessories. A statement necklace or a set of dangling earrings can make a big impression when paired with a simple dress. Smokey eyes or a bold lip color are perfect for an evening event. Because you may be eating or drinking all night, a lip stain will last longer than regular lipstick. Remember to test the stain at least once before the party, since the vivid colors in the tube can appear even stronger if they aren’t applied lightly.

Get Silly with Fun Accessories

With champagne flowing freely and revelers throwing confetti, New Year’s Eve is never the most dignified holiday. You can unleash your inner child with novelty accessories emblazoned with the upcoming year’s digits. Partygoers can peer through 2012 glasses, brandish noisemakers and wear tiaras or top hats. At a costume party, you can reference the events of the outgoing year with a clever outfit. After this year’s seemingly relentless march of bad headlines, New Year’s Eve is the perfect time to let off some steam and look silly.

Shop for holiday dresses and makeup at Nordstrom

Disclosures: Beauty and Fashion Tech at times reviews products provided by a representative of the company. When we do so, we specifically state so. We also use affiliate links. For more, please see the disclosure page

About the Author: Carleen Pruess Coulter

Well before it was the name of a busy pre-Christmas shopping day, the term Black Friday was used to describe a number of tragic and unfortunate events the happened to take place notoriously on Fridays. Interestingly, the first recorded instance of Black Friday was in regard to a financial incident rather than a disaster or invasion.

Gold Panic – 1869

Called the Gould-Fisk Scandal and it took place during Ulysses S. Grant’s presidency during the Reconstruction era. A couple of speculators conspired to drive the price of gold upwards, causing a panic in the New York Gold Exchange as well as America’s financial sector. As the scandal was investigated, the president as well as many of his close advisors were implicated as being directly or indirectly involved with trying to manipulate the gold market.

Philadelphia – 1966

Philadelphia newspapers started referring to the Friday after Thanksgiving as Black Friday when police started noticing increased traffic and congestion problems with the increase in shoppers on the streets. That Friday also coincided with the surge of visitors attending the Army-Navy football game that Saturday. While retailers were happy for the extra business and holiday traffic, civil servants and police forces were stretched thin as the crowds flooded streets and sidewalks. Black Friday carried a negative connotation as it referred to the extra problems and incidents the local police had to deal with because of the extra crowds.

Retailers Nationwide – 1980s

Store owners traditionally followed an unwritten rule and did not release their holiday product line until after Thanksgiving which officially marked the start of the holiday shopping season. And as they built up the release of the post-Thanksgiving product, consumers responded by flocking to stores in an attempt to get their holiday shopping started early. The only thing that kept retailers from really capitalizing on this consumer trend was the perception of Black Friday as an unruly, negative event because of its historical significance.

So retailers hit up on a genius idea: tie Black Friday into the profits generated by increased sales. When accountants track the revenue and profits of a business, that business is said to be “in the red” when in debt and “in the black” when making a profit. Retailers started to spin the idea of Black Friday as the day when businesses go from the red to the black with the start of the holiday shopping season and increased profits. This repurposing of an otherwise ominous term made the day after Thanksgiving seem to consumers to be not only a day to get exclusive Black Friday deals but also to help the economy and support local businesses. While it doesn’t make much sense that a business could remain open with staying red three quarters of the year, the terminology and appearance of logic was enough to retake the term Black Friday and give it a positive connotation in the eyes of American consumers.

Author: Analise Marcus can think of no better way to walk off a Thanksgiving turkey dinner than with a Black Friday shopping spree. She is always on the lookout for Black Friday deals from all kinds of retailers both in stores and online.