By: Lauren Busser

When you purchase a series of style sessions with New-York based Alexandra Suzanne Greenawalt expect to hear more than how to wear the season’s current trends for your body type. Taking into account the clients personality as well as skin tone and body shape, she crafts a wardrobe that will flatter her clients in more ways than one.

She wasn’t always a fashion guru, the New York based stylist was once interested in pursuing dance, theatre, photography, and art.

“In my teenage years I was consumed with playing dress up and cracking my own code to look good. I was super small and skinny so much of what was fashionable looked pretty horrible on me. At sixteen years old I read Seventeen Magazine religiously and fell in love with a dress on the cover by Betsey Johnson worn by Nikki Taylor,” says Greenwalt about her start in the fashion world. “This was my first experience reading the credits on a magazine and the start with my fascination. I absolutely had to have that dress but alas it was not possible to buy it in the store so I got my first lesson in delivery dates of the retail world. Once I got training in color and shape analysis and cracked my own code to looking great I realized that I had a gift to share with the world.”

From there, Greenawalt spent her junior year abroad in Paris as an intern at that fashion showroom Bureau de Victor and she was hooked.

“My first job out of college was in apparel wholesale sales selling missy shirts to mom and pop stores. It wasn’t glamourous but I learned so much about the industry and was pretty good at it. I soon got bored and needed a more creative avenue in the fashion world,” says Greenawalt.

Eventually, she found herself talking her way into getting her first editorial assignment.
“I had plenty of moxie in those days!” she says.

She still has moxie. Her website has glowing testimonials from her clients including several raves about her “encyclopedic knowledge of her field.” One testimonial comments about how Greenawalt pulled twenty-seven dresses before she even arrived at the store and amongst those, she found the one she would wear to her event.

Greenawalt offers four different packages ranging in duration from one day to a year. Greenawalt considers her brand of styling to be holistic, starting with a Style Prescription. Greenawalt determines your prescription by taking into consideration things like color science and body shape and factoring in lifestyle needs and your image brand. Of course she also provides moral support on any style issues and all her insider information on the fashion industry.

Moving on, she starts with Closet Clarity where she assists her client in editing their wardrobe. After purging the closet of anything unflattering and getting a sense of her clients innate style as well as their blind spots, the shopping can begin.

“We usually start at the big stores like Saks, Bloomingdales, Barneys, Bergdorfs, and Lord and Taylor to identify what designers would most work for the client’s needs and then we visit small boutiques and designer stores as follow up,” says Greenawalt.

In the end, clients receive a Style Prescription, a Personal Color Pallette, a style Look book, a custom wardrobe master plan, and online curated selections sent to their inbox. In short, complete style therapy.

Not only is Greenawalt a stylist, but she is also an author. Her eBook Secrets of a Fashion Stylist is available exclusively through her website.

“I wrote the book frankly due to the outpouring of interest in my work from other stylists. I also felt when I got into the business I was looking for a book which demystified the process and couldn’t find one. So I wrote the book I wanted to read when I was starting out,” says Greenawalt.