Styling Your Wardrobe Based on Ellie Jean Royden’s Body and Style, Style Roots System
I really enjoy Ellie Jean Royden’s content. She has clearly put a lot of time into her content and developing her own systems. She has also created a lot of free content. Aside from her tik tok, youtube, pinterest and instagram, her website has 14 free quizes to help you figure out what clothes will bring out the best in your features. She generally steers away from the idea of an ideal female form, towards a system that honours the unique beauty in each person’s individual shape. The system is designed to complement and flatter features, rather than disguise or hide them.
Ellie Jean breaks down style into 8 style roots. These are: Sun, Earth, Stone, Mushroom, Flower, Fire, Mountain and Moon. The idea is that you figure out which 3 roots best represent your style and use that to guide your wardrobe decisions.
It’s important to note that the 8 style roots fit into a broader personal style system. The style roots focus on expressing your personality in the way you dress, which Ellie refers to as your essence. The other elements of her system include the body matrix, which focuses on complementing your figure through the cuts and shapes of the clothes that you wear and your colour season. She also creates content relating to the Kibbie Body Types.
The 8 Style Roots
The eight style roots are: moon, sun, earth, fire, mountain, stone, flower and mushroom.
Moon
Dark and rebellious.
Sun
Bright and experimental.
Flower
Delicate and pretty.
Fire
Sensual and luxurious.
Earth
Natural.
Mushroom
Classic and elegant.
Mountain
Strong and powerful.
Stone
Relaxed.
I really like her system and I can see how the names and symbolism of the roots could be very useful for those who find it easy to get their head around how “Mountain” represents “strong and powerful”. I just find the name a bit more confusing, as I just think of “Mountain” literally and associate it with what I picture someone wearing in the mountains! In Ellie Jean’s style roots system, that aesthetic would be associated with “Earth”. Because I am lazy (sorry Ellie!) I am going to include their more boring, literal descriptions to name them. Therefore, we have: Dark, Bright, Delicate, Sensual, Natural, Elegant, Powerful.
It may now have become apparent that some of these style roots are more complimentary to one another than others, whereas others are juxtaposed. For example, Sensuality is often associated with Dark aesthetics, whereas Dark and Delicate could be seen to contrast one another.
Traditionally, we have some common core styles that are categorised as: Boho, Preppy, Grunge, Punk, Casual, Street, Artsy, Sporty, Chic, Formal, Vintage, Classic, Old Money, Girly, Minimalist, Romantic, Retro and Tomboy.
So the question is: does conceptulizing style in this roots system make it easier to create order out of chaos, with the infinite ways you can style your wardrobe?
In a way, the style roots can afford some flexibilty in your outfit choices, as your style is a combination of three different roots.
So how do fashion styles fit into the 8 Style Roots system?
We can start to break down diffent styles and fashion subcultures into the different roots as follows:
- Dark and rebelious (Moon): Goth, Punk, Witchy and E-girl.
- Bright and experimental (Sun): Maximalist, Retro, Vintage and Arty.
- Delicate and pretty (Flower): Vintage, Girly, Cottagecore and Boho with a monochrome white or light palette.
- Sensual (Fire): Romantic, Femme Fatale, French Sensual Chic.
- Natural (Earth): Boho, Fisherman.
- Elegant (Mushroom): Preppy, Minimalist, Old Money and Old Hollywood.
- Powerful (Mountain): Executive Chic, Boss Femme, Corporate Luxe, 80s.
- Relaxed (Stone): Tomboy, Casual, Street, Sporty.
Ellie Jean’s Book
To Learn more about Ellie Jean Royden’s 8 Style Roots and her Body and Style system, she has a book titled “How to Dress Your Best”, which is available from Amazon.
Her book contains a detailed explination of her Style Roots System, as well as her Body Matrix system.
You can see more sample pages of her book on Amazon.
Ellie Jean Royden Body and Style Worksheets
Core Style Elements List | Worksheet
Here you can access her free worksheet to help guide you towards the key elements of your style. This worksheet is designed to help you narrow down from the list of elements to curate your wardrobe.
For More Ellie Jean Royden Qizzes and Worksheets
You can visit the “Freebies” section of her website here.
