Who says labcoats have to be boring? Now you can maintain your professional image while adding style that distinguishes you as a holistic health practitioner.

Evosia’s labcoats are specifically designed for the natural healing professional in mind and incorporates features typical labcoats do not have:

* Choice of organic and fair trade natural fabrics to meet your environmental and health standards.
* Different fabric weights to meet your seasonal needs.
* Lighter fabrics in strategic locations to help you maintain your cool.
* Unique pocket partitioning system to keep your tools such as needles and ear seeds organized.
* Three different fits to suit your body type and personal style: flowy (loose) fit, standard fit and modern fit.
* Made to Measure and Bespoke options for those who want the perfect fit and design.

Evosia donates 5% of net profits toward social and environmental causes.

Link: Evosia’s Online Store Page

Evosia is an environmentally-conscious and socially-responsible holistic clothing and lifestyle company. We believe that clothes have the power to inspire, empower and heal. We combine style with substance, East with West, and ancient wisdom with modern sensibilities.

For thousands of years of recorded history, humans have recognized the power of clothing. Beyond mere function and visual aesthetics, clothes are storytellers. They tell about who we are — our personality, our outlook in the world, what we do and even our health. For the Daoists (Taoists) in ancient China, clothes help to create harmonious relationships between people, society and the environment. Materials, colors, shapes, silhouettes and patterns all have meaning. Woven together, they can enhance our personal and professional lives, as well as harmonize our relationship with the world around us.

Our products use organic natural fibers from fair trade sources. For more information about our social and environmental practices, please read about Evosia’s Global Commitment.

Visit Evosia’s Holistic Clothing Website

As with most things in life, practice makes perfect in the realm of knowing how to dress. Even if you don’t need to wear business clothes in the foreseeable future, get a head start now. Start shopping for the clothes you will need. Start dressing up. This way you’ll get comfortable wearing business clothes and you’ll have a better understanding of how things go together.

For most of my life I didn’t need to dress up. I was accustomed to wearing loose fitting and flowy clothes like Hawaiian shirts and Thai fisherman pants. Yes I did have a lot of preppy clothes but they’re preppy, not business. The only times I really dressed up were for graduations, weddings, and funerals. And looking back on those photos I looked awful because I was clueless. Luckily most other people in the world are also clueless. Which means you’ll really standout when you get it right.

When I first started sporting dress shirts and ties on a regular basis, I felt like a fish out of water. I remember having trouble tying my tie. I bought shirts and trousers that didn’t fit well. I wore the wrong fabrics in the wrong seasons. My neck wasn’t used to having my shirts buttoned up all the way. Overall the outfits didn’t feel like they were my personal style.

By the time I got into the clinic I had most of the kinks ironed out: I had the dress clothes I wanted, I no longer felt awkward in what I wore, and I knew how to put together kickass outfits from head to toe.

There are a lot of nuances you simply won’t appreciate until you start getting it all together. You’ll overdo it and under do it until you find your balance. So get to it! Your future starts now.

Ok you’re looking sharp in that suit you just got altered to fit perfectly. Now let’s take a look at personal hygiene. Yes you brush your teeth and shower everyday. Good start but there’s more! Once again, it’s in the details.

It’s all good stuff not just for work but also for your personal life. Your significant other/better half/date will really appreciate it. Your body will appreciate it too. Take care of your body and it’ll take care of you.

Here’s a checklist of things you should be mindful of.

Shave:
If you have a mustache/goatee/beard, be sure to keep it trim and neat. Otherwise keep it clean and shave! You don’t want to look like you just rolled out of bed. That five o’clock shadow is also going to tear up the collars of your shirts.

Hair Care:
Whether you have short or long hair, you need to have it cut on a regular basis. If you’re waiting until you look like Shaggy from Scooby Doo you’re waiting too long. Cutting your hair isn’t just about keeping it trimmed. As hair gets old, it starts to dry at the ends, split, and get fizzy. Cutting off the old hair will make it look healthier and allow it to grow.

Be proactive and keep you hair looking good all the time by getting it trimmed before it starts to get wild. Short hair should be cut every 3-4 weeks. You can go a bit longer with long hair but, again, watch the split ends.

Wash your hair regularly and use a real shampoo. Soaps tend to dry out your hair. I recommend organic shampoos that are free of harmful chemicals like sodium lauryl sulfate, a possible carcinogen. Trader Joes has a couple of shampoos that are affordable yet free of these chemicals.

Use a styling gel, pomade, etc to keep your hair tamed and styled throughout the day.

Deodorant:
Use deodorant to keep body odor under control. But avoid antiperspirants that prevent you from sweating. Sweating is a normal bodily function. It helps regulate the body temperature due to heat, exercise and stress. Antiperspirants contain a toxic aluminum based compound that pose serious health risks including Alzheimer’s and breast cancer. Deodorants, on the other hand, only take the odor away by killing the bacteria that causes it. I’ve personally been using the natural mineral crystals for years and it works great. Check out www.thecrystal.com

Clean clothes:
Wash your clothes regularly and iron them before wearing. Shirts should only be worn once before washing. Pants can be worn several times. This varies depending on how dirty they get.

Have a stain removal pen handy to keep stains from setting in before you have a chance to take care of it. It will save you from buying new clothes or wearing ones with stains on them. I personally like the Tide to Go Instant Stain Remover pen.

When you clean your clothes, follow the care instructions on the label. It’ll extend the life of your clothes and keep them looking great. Separate your lights and darks so you don’t have that new red t-shirt turn your white dress shirt pink. I tend to add an extra rinse cycle to my loads. One rinse isn’t enough to get all the detergent and dirty water out. It also prevents your white shirts from turning gray too quickly.

Don’t over dry your clothes as it will shorten their lifespan and generate more wrinkles. Take them out while they’re still a tad damp. And definitely never leave clothes in the dryer longer than they have to. If you have the option, hang them up to air dry. It’s more environmentally friendly, energy efficient and it’ll save you money.

If you do need to get clothes dry cleaned, make sure to go to a place that doesn’t use the common dry cleaning agent perchloroethylene (aka perc or PCE). It is a central nervous system depressant and a known carcinogen. Inhaling its vapors can cause dizziness, headache, sleepiness, confusion, nausea, unconsciousness and death. If you don’t have a choice, be sure to remove the dry cleaning bag outside. Let your clothes air out for at least a day but preferably four to five days before wearing them.

Nose and Ears:
Trim those nose hairs and clear out your nostrils. Visible boogers aren’t very sexy. Wash your ears and clean them out regularly with a q-tip.

Skin Care:
If you have dry skin, use a moisturizer. There’s stuff for the body, stuff for hands, stuff for the face, stuff for around the eyes, etc. If you’re just starting out, go with something general purpose for the whole body. I have dry skin so I apply moisturizer immediately after I shower. I tend to use a lighter body oil during the warmer months and a heavier body butter during the colder months. I like the organic stuff with a subtle natural scent. You’ll smell nice without having to use colognes/perfumes that are often carcinogenic. And if you do use fragrances go subtle. Less is more and some people have allergies.

Check out the skin care section of local Whole Foods. They usually have a bunch of products you can sample to figure out what you want.

Also, check out the all natural products by Golden Path Alchemy. They use Chinese and Western medicinals and botanicals in their products. You’ll love it.

The Importance of a Tailor in the Age of Ready to Wear Clothing

Our bodies come in a wide variety of shapes and measurements. The mass produced clothes that most of us wear (also known as Ready To Wear or RTW clothing) attempt to simplify these broad ranges into a limited set of standardized sizes. While we can usually go into a store and walk out wearing something we just bought off the rack, ready to wear clothing is not designed to fit all of us perfectly.

For casual and street clothes, a perfect fit may not be that important. A half-inch off here, an inch off there is good enough. You can cover it with a sweater/jacket or adjust with a belt. But if you want to look professional, small details do matter. An outfit that fits perfectly brings congruence. It doesn’t just look good, but it also feels great.

An experienced and skilled tailor can help turn your ordinary outfit into something that looks and feels extraordinary.

Common areas of clothing to get altered
Refer to my previous tip (part 1 and part 2) on wearing clothes that fit to learn about how things should fit on you. Here are some common things to get altered by a tailor:

• Hem your pants. You should not be sweeping floors with your pants for free.
• Take in the waist. Your pants/trousers should stay up without the assistance of a belt.
• Take in a shirt or the body of a jacket. If you are a thinner build like me, you don’t always want to look like you can shoplift watermelons.
• Shorten the sleeves. The sleeves should cover your wrists and just reach the beginning of your thumbs. You shouldn’t be able to shoplift watermelons in your sleeves either.

Buying Ready to Wear Clothes
If you are buying ready to wear clothes that you want to bring to a tailor, keep in mind that a tailor cannot create additional fabric out of thin air. Don’t buy anything that’s too tight or too short unless you know there is enough fabric to let out. You want to buy stuff that fit as close to your measurements as possible.

Getting Clothes Tailor Made
If you are paying retail prices for dress clothes at midlevel retailers such as Banana Republic, J Crew, or Nordstroms, chances are that you can afford tailor made clothing. Yes, clothes made specifically to your measurements and what you want. Modern Tailor is one place that comes recommended. If you are in Asia, Hong Kong is an especially good place to go for high quality tailor made clothes at prices midlevel retailers can’t touch even during a good sale.

Finding a good tailor
A good tailor isn’t just someone who can do a good job tailoring your clothes. A good tailor is knowledgeable about fabrics, fits, trends and, most importantly, what looks good on you. A good tailor is not easy to find and they most likely do not work out of your local dry cleaners. Yes they may be more expensive than having something done at the dry cleaners but you get so much more value when you develop a good relationship with them.

If you are on the west side of Los Angeles, I highly recommend Anna’s Custom Tailoring on Washington and Redwood. She’s a sweet Italian lady who is highly skilled and very knowledgeable. I also suggest checking on Yelp.com for good tailors near you.

Next tip: Personal Hygiene