Tips for 'Dressing Up' When Your a Goth Girl

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This Tuesday I am recieving an english award from my high school.  When told about it I was also told to "Dress up".  This is pretty basic I know, you go to an award cerimony obviously your not going to wear ripped jeans and a Sex Pistols shirt.  The problem for me is that my everyday attire does not consist of ripped jeans and a Sex Pistols shirt.  This is for a couple reasons, one, I do not own a Sex Pistols shirt and I only own a single pair of jeans.  Two, I feel terribly uncomfortable in jeans and usually just throw them on when I haven't done laundry in a while.  Three, I like to feel pretty and I don't feel pretty when wearing old worn out jeans.

So in short, my everyday attire is very different from other students.  For them dressing up is wearing a cute skirt and possibly a blouse or just a nice top.  For me my everyday attire is fancier than most of their ideas of dressing up, in a casual way for an award ceremony.  I wear lace dresses and flowy skirts on a daily basis which means that my version of dressing up is very different from others.

If I were to dress up I am nearly positive I would be over dressed for the ocassion, but at the same time, no matter how trivial it sounds, I feel like it isn't as important if I'm not dressed up.  So now I am stuck in this delema of what to wear for my award ceremony.  If I go 'dressy casual' I feel no different than any other day, and if I go all out with a poofy dress with lace, sequins, and corset lacing then I will be extremely out of place.  Usually I don't mind standing out from others when I'm walking down the street, but being on a stage infront of judgemental parents I am slightly more uncomfortable with looking out of the ordinary.

I figure I cannot be the only goth girl that has been in a situation where they want to wear something a little more special without looking over done, so I am going to post some tips on feeling dressed up without having to over due it.
Buy Something New

I'm not sure about you guys but I always feel gorgeous when I wear a new dress for the first time.  It doesn't even have to actually be a new dress but as long as it is new to me it still gives me that feeling of being a princess that can put on a new dress everyday(of course I do not actually only wear my dresses once but I do enjoy having the feeling of doing so, even if it is only for a day).  This feeling is even petter if you pair your new dress off with either a new pair of shoes or a pair of shoes that you don't wear very often.


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That Perfect In Between Dress

Most girls will probably know what I mean by this.  A perfect in between dress is a dress you consider too fancy to wear every day, unless you are like me and have days when you feel extremely great and want to boost that feeling with wearing something special, but are a far cry from being something you would wear to prom.  My in between dresses are usually bought around christmas time or closer to prom(one of the more casual prom dresses).  They are a step above casual and a step bellow red carpet ready.  They can have some ruffles or some lace but are not super poofy or formal looking.  They are usually around knee length because anything much shorter should probably be thrown into the casual pile. 

To sum it up they are those dresses that do not get alot of day to day action and instead are usually reserved for a grandparents birthday or a christmas dinner.  Not casual, but also not fancy.

Playing Up a Casual Dress

This is pretty simple, you take a casual dress and you do something to make it seem more formal.  You can do this in a couple ways.  Firstly you can put your hair into a nice updo or durl it into elegant ringlettes.  Another great way is to pair it with some great accessories, a nice hair piece or a victorian necklace work great.  Switching up a casual flat ballet slipper for some more elegant but not too high, high heels is also a great way to play up a casual dress.

Playing Down a Fancy Dress
This is the exact opposite of playing up a casual dress, this is when you take that poofy lace covered prom dress and pair it with items to put a casual spin on it.  The two easiest ways to do this are with hair or a cardigan.  For hair you can leave it down with just some gentle waves or straighten it pin straight.  Using a casual hairstyle automatically brings you look down a couple of notches.  The second way is to put a casual cardigan over top, of course you want to make sure it looks alright before doing into public because to be honest not all dresses will look lice paired of with your favourite cardigan.  When using this tactic you also want to either go with minimal jewelry or crap loads of casual wrist bands.  If you pair this dress with victorian jewelry obviously your going to give it a more elegant, ballroom ready look.  But if you pair your dress with two dozen squishy bracelets you will give your dress more of an 80's madonna vibe.  Also this look is wear you will wanna take those ballet flats from the idea above and wear them.

Of course you can ignore this advice if you are pefectly fine being on stage infront of people and standing out.  Hell, if you are comfortable with this I praise you, I would love to not give a shit and go up looking like a princess.  But anyways I hope you guys like this advice, also if you have anything to add don't be afraid to comment.