Style star

STYLE counsel

Khalilah Jones builds confidence through fashion By Maeve Hayden

Khalilah Jones wears many fashionable hats as owner of Chic & Classy Image Consulting. She’s a style curator, image consultant, graphic designer, brand ambassador, fashion show coordinator, and advocate for the marginalized and underrepresented. She sums it all up with two words: atmosphere shifter.

There’s no cookie-cutter approach to shifting a client’s atmosphere—each consult, or chic chat, requires Jones to come up with a unique game plan. “I am very intentional about providing a person-centered experience for each individual that I work with,” she says. “Each experience is customized and caters to my client.”

Through wardrobe consulting and styling, she helps clients look their best so they can feel their best. Two common fashion faux pas Jones says she sees often are impulse buying and not letting go of the past. “If you feel like you peaked in high school and you’re still wearing off-the-shoulder graphic tees, cuffed Jordache jeans with a braided skinny belt, slouch socks, and Keds” you’d probably benefit from a closet audit.

Clothing is key, but “it’s so much more than just the wardrobe,” says Jones. “I truly feel I’ve done my job, not when they can craft a look using my formula, but when they walk in any room like they belong there. It’s the fierce, radical, and unapologetic self-acceptance and confidence. It is not thinking, ‘I hope they like me.’ It’s knowing you’ll be okay even if they don’t, because you’ve got enough love for yourself to last 1,000 lifetimes.”

Style consultant Khalilah Jones (front) says her image work on the outside builds a client’s internal perspective, resulting in “unapologetic self-acceptance and confidence.”

Jones’ support extends beyond image. When a client was diagnosed with cancer, and lost her hair, she had a hard time getting out of pajamas. After a special-occasion styling with Jones, she says she found new confidence. “I never thought I’d wear clothes again or even look in the mirror without crying. … All night I kept hearing [Jones’] voice say ‘always wear your invisible crown.’”

That positive attitude is something Jones works hard to drive home with every client: Wear your invisible crown, she says, and “visualize your highest self and start showing up as her. You’ll find that you gradually develop a signature style that evolves as you do.”

“You know,” muses Jones, “the most rewarding part [of my job] is when I follow up with clients and see so much growth and development in their life overall … the almost palpable confidence, the boldness. I can never get enough of that.“

This story originally ran in C-VILLE Weekly.