Secrets of a Fashion Therapist: What You Can Learn Behind the Dressing Room Door

by Betty Halbreich

Go from clueless to confident in the dressing room. If you're a "fashion buff," then this book is for you. Betty Halbreich, the legendary director of personal shopping services at New York's chicer-than-chic Bergdorf Goodman, draws on her exquisite fashion sense and years of experience to help you dress to feel beautiful, confident, and perfectly at home in your own personal style. As your fashion therapist, Betty will give you valuable tips Witty, warm, and wonderfully illustrated, this guide to shopping and dressing is the perfect accessory to any wardrobe.

Genres: Nonfiction, Fashion, Design, Memoir

224 pages, Paperback

First published August 31, 1997

About the author

Betty Halbreich was an American personal shopper, stylist, and author known for her career at the New York luxury department store Bergdorf Goodman, where she served as Director of Solutions. Her 2015 memoir, titled I'll Drink to That: A Life in Style, with a Twist, was featured on The New York Times Best Seller list.

Reviews

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

While this books wasn't helpful for me (I've been studying fashion for a while), it's a great guide for any woman who's starting to build her basic wardrobe. The author has great tips on where to save or splurge and how to care for your clothes.

[Anne · Rating 3 out of 5]

I just wanted more of Betty Halbreich after reading her memoir. This is a nice follow up that i read quickly as most of it was covered in her memoir. She's a force.

[Alison Peters · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read right after Halbreich's biography which made the sidebars very interesting. I liked the book - but I also like clothes, so no surprise.

[Terri Durling · Rating 3 out of 5]

Most of the fashion/style books I read give the same advice; it's just written in a different format with different illustrations. Betty Halbreich's book isn't much different, although I'll hasten to guess she is probably the oldest author of any of the other books I have read on this favorite topic of mine. Her expert advice hits the mark and I think it would be every woman's dream to have Betty pick out an outfit because she is one of the best in the business and knows her stuff. Although she works for a very expensive store, Bergdorf Goodman, she doesn't appear to be pretentious and doesn't believe in selling an item to someone unless it really suits them. Her taste is impeccable and her talent for knowing what works for every woman regardless of age or size is truly admirable. She's no spring chick and, as far as I know, is still working at this store doing what she loves and knows best - clothes inside and out.

[Rebecca · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think I was hoping for some kind of insightful tell-all by the legendary personal shopper from Bergdorf Goodman. Like, thoughts on what our clothes say about us or something. Instead, it's a treatise on how to buy clothes that doesn't actually offer much insight on building a wardrobe that isn't covered more thoroughly elsewhere. The extra-wide margins are filled with cute-but-unhelpful doodles and fawning quotes about how much everyone loves Betty.

[Tina · Rating 3 out of 5]

In this era of fast, cheap fashion, these tips were helpful toward making selections that will stand the test of quality and time. I loved the illustrations and was inspired by the accessories section.

[J · Rating 3 out of 5]

Betty's fashion opinions and advice are similar to her personality - original, offbeat, entertaining and insightful. I found myself loving and hating things in equal measure. Hence, the three star rating. There is nothing really neutral about this author though!

Some stories (and whole sentences) were lifted from this book for her biography, especially in the introduction. But this book focuses on fashion advice, while her biography is mainly her life story and a lot of name dropping. I was glad I read her biography first; it provided a colorful backdrop (and context) to her fashion advice.

This book was written for her typical New York client - a woman of considerable means for whom image and appearance has a high priority. Especially at the book's beginning, I felt like Betty was living in an alternate reality that I could not connect with. At moments, I felt totally alienated by the book. And, at other times, I felt totally embraced by it.

By the end of the book, Betty had worked her magic. I was enchanted with her and wanted to go exploring through the store racks and see what I could find! I did actually go shopping immediately after finishing this. Betty makes shopping seem comfortable (vs. intimidating) and also adventurous and fun.

There was a lot of self-promotion for Betty in the book. Every few pages had a quote in the margin from a famous person praising Betty. It made me wonder if this book was originally intended to drum up direct business for Betty's personal shopping services. If I had the means, I would hire her! She is a lovable grandma with a ton of fashion knowledge and no problem telling you immediately if something looks horrible.

I did not particularly care for the sketches drawn throughout the book. Notably, there were two drawings of groups of women with full frontal nudity. Graphic and totally unnecessary.

LOVED the accessory section! This inspired me most of all. It made me want to wear scarves and lapel pins. Bring elegance back! Betty has an old-money, old-fashioned gracious outlook on life, which I love! This is especially evident when she discusses cleaning and maintaining your own high-end items.

Some of her questionable recommendations included:
-Buy drug store makeup (I've never heard a makeup artist recommend this! Everyone seems to agree higher-end makeup is healthier for your skin. Betty says the colors are the same, but this isn't the point.)
-Wear a watch with evening clothes (etiquette clearly dictates against this!)
-Buy knock off purses (umm, illegal! And shocking for someone in the fashion industry to recommend)
-Mixing gold & silver as well as black & blue (I've heard this "wild" advice before, but never cared for it)

Betty gives the sensible advice to first learn the "fashion rules" (and she definitely knows them herself based on her biography). But then she wants the reader to feel free to disregard them, if they have a reason to do so. She makes even high-end fashion seem very comfortable and approachable. Again, her clients are women of means. So, they can afford to break the rules - they will most likely be seen as "cutting edge" or at worst "eccentric", rather than just fashion illiterate.

This book was written in 1997 and a lot of her advice about fashion trends is still current. She really did know her stuff and was "ahead of her time" on the majority of things.

[Tama · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this book up in a Little Library in a campground. Even though it is quite dated (1997), I was interested in the historical perspective of fashion. The book is about Betty Halbrich who is what we would now refer to as a personal stylist or shopper. However, her career impacted many of the famous and well known women of the time. She was also a resource for media (movies, etc) for costuming. I had not thought of this role, but she needed to know the time period, socioeconomic level of the character and even the characters' personality to craft fashion, regardless if it was for a movie or for an individual. The sidebars provide many quotes from well known individuals. Betty provides her guideline for fashion. She did not seem like a rule follower, but she understood culture. At the same time, there were things she never bought into, such as using "the seasons" to determine a color palette. She believed it was to restrictive. (Yay!).

[Berenice · Rating 3 out of 5]

A 1997 book that today, in the second half of 2015, keeps bringing to us some tricks to play with our clothes in a most interesting way, picking them better at stores, taking care of them and manage them properly when we travel, for example.

On the other hand I found a lot of "no no" about body shapes, and I'm not talking about what to choose depending on your figure, but why to tell a figure is a sin, or a mistake. There's nothing different from 90's to 010's at this topic, we just can't go through life thinking that way. Clothes should be made for enhance bodies, not for "hide" mistakes.

Beside this, totally a most for a weekend. Ladies from other decades can teach you some interesting things.

[Colleen Wainwright · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked this up for the delightful pen-and-ink illustrations (by Jeffrey Fulvimari) and ended up reading the book in its entirety. If she'd been born a bit later, Betty Halbreich would have had her own reality-TV show; as it is, she dressed and costumed thousands well and quietly, without much fanfare (save the kind that sticks within your sphere, which was considerable, in her case, and the best kind of fanfare in any case). Doubtful that you'll pick up many tips from this, but I dug her charming, sensible ways, and I really, really dug those illustrations.

[Private Account · Rating 2 out of 5]

I literally learned nothing new in this book. It had nothing beyond what I have picked up from fashion magazines throughout the years. I liked her overall philosophy of having fun with fashion and not doing trends if you can't afford it but I thought her advice to just hold colors in front of your face and see what looks best rather than going to a colorist was not the best since most people who need colorists can't actually tell the difference between colors that look good on them and colors that don't. Also, this book doesn't dig that deep. It was just a bunch of magazine articles.

[Carrie · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was very disappointed in this book. It read like a collection of several outdated fashion magazines, instructing you how to construct a wardrobe. Moreover, I disagree with some of the fashion advice listed. Throughout the book were quotes from various rich women talking about the wonderful traits of the author. The book also presumes that all women have a great deal of money to spend on a wardrobe. I found this book to be outdated and unhelpful.

[Lorie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this one on my dinner hour tonight. It has a lot of very good, very basic information for the novice who wants to set up a decent closet of clothes. There were great snippets and snatches of "wow, I hadn't thought of that" mixed in. I found myself skimming the chapters and reading the sidebars. I do recommend it to anyone who needs a primer of basic fashion sense.

[Allison · Rating 5 out of 5]

Style and life wisdom

This is an entertaining book, that reminds me of Edith Head and her book 'How to dress for Success'. Betty is witty and funny, and her knowledge of the human condition informs her wonderful ability to style herself and others. As a lover of art and fashion, I thoroughly enjoyed this book.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

A delightful how-to primer from Bergdorf's formidable and legendary personal shopper (she also was featured in the wonderful documentary "Scatter my Ashes at Bergdorfs). Despite the publication dates, much of the information is timeless. A fun read for anyone interested in fashion.

[JS · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book about fashion and how to dress. It is simple and gives basic hints. It may help to watch the film Scatter my ashes at Bergdorf's first to understand more about Betty. It was a quick and easy book to read with lots of fresh reminders.

[Trena · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fun and funny read with some good advice.

[Ashley]

Hm...I'm about a third of the way in and so far not terribly impressed. Hopefully it improves!

[Jeannie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lots of fun for people, like me, who like to think about how people choose their clothing - or should choose their clothing!

[Cynthia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun read. She's hilarious and everyone who loves clothes or is interested in why people wear what they wear will love this one.

[Lorena · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great fashion advice from the best in the business!

[Angela Natividad · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love Betty and wish she were my friend. I'm also happy to say this book got me to clean my closet and evaluate dressing in a whole new way. Everything I own feels fresh again.

[Frankie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a follow up to "l'll Drink to That." Interesting fashion insights from the fashion consultant at Bergdorf Goodmans. But I really loved the cleaning and packing tips at the end.