05 Feb 2013

Personal appearance or image usually gives an impression about an individual and the perception what others have on that particular person.

Meanwhile, there are people who can guide and offer expert advice to individuals on how to look good particularly on their clothes.

Local image consultant, Julia Ratladi is one such person who is in a business of teaching people how to dress well for their body shapes. 

Ratladi, also a certified image strategist, teaches people about different body shapes and elements of design that they have to consider when buying clothes for their body shapes.

Speaking in an interview, the Maun born lady said she uses a computer assisted program to asses and determine the type of cut, pattern and size that would be most suitable towards a particular body type.

“I take all body measurements including the face shape, and then process them with a computer program which then determines the type of clothes you are supposed to buy,” said Ratladi.

She said her target clients are mostly women aged 35 years and above because at that age a lot of bodies would have gone through different stages while each stage brings with it different body shape hence women most of the times struggle with what suits them.

Ratladi said she goes house to house for her clients to market herself and also visits different department and ministries to source clients.

As an image consultant, Ratladi does what she calls body shape and style analysis which determines eyewear, earings, colors and haircut.

She also does colour coding analysis where she chooses which colours would be most suitable towards a particular skin while she also develops dress code policies for some companies.

Ratladi graduated from the University of Botswana majoring in English and Environmental Science and was supposed to be a teacher but she decided to take the fashion path.

She said she started working in an insurance company and that’s when appreciation of image came about because she met a lot of people. 

The image strategist also trained with the South African Image Academy and she is the only woman in the country using a computer assisted program to aid in individual appearance. ENDS