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Joanne Steenberg curled up on a soft leather couch in her home overlooking Pierce Pond in Penobscot. As she leafed through a pile of magazine clippings, she shrugged her shoulders and turned to Haydee Foreman like she had a confession to make.
“I feel like I don’t expose myself enough to fashion,” she said. “I can tell you what yoga outfit I like, but when I’m teaching math …”
Steenberg let her voice trail off and continued flipping through the pages she had amassed. Then Foreman opened O: the Oprah Magazine, to an earmarked photograph of a woman in a sleek, chic purple ensemble and showed it to Steenberg.
“That’s lovely,” she said, smiling. “I don’t have anything like that in my closet.”
Steenberg has long, sable hair with warm highlights and on this day, she wore a chocolate brown velvet suit that ties at the waist. She is a busy woman who plays many roles: mother, entrepreneur, math teacher, yoga instructor, marketing dynamo and wife, to name a few. She enlisted the help of Haydee (pronounced eye-DAY) Foreman to help her dress the part – all of them.
Foreman is known as The Style Coach, a fashion consultant, personal shopper, color guru and closet organizer who travels throughout the state to help people dress for success.
For some clients, that means accentuating the positive while camouflaging figure flaws. For others, it means developing a wardrobe that will help them ace the interview, land the promotion or wow former classmates at a reunion. But with every client, Foreman has a common goal: To help that person feel comfortable and confident inside and out.
“It’s gratifying when people can stand up a little straighter, walk differently, talk differently – feel better about themselves,” Foreman, 41, said on a recent afternoon in the Blue Hill home she shares with her teenage son. “It’s a whole different person, and I like to bring that person out.”
She speaks from experience. A visit to an image consultant in 2002 left a lasting impression on Foreman – she still wears the colors and styles that were recommended to her then, but she tweaks them to reflect her personal style. Her own tailored yet comfortable wardrobe highlights her dark hair and porcelain skin. And she has always had a knack for finding clothing and colors that look good on other people.
“It’s not always something that’s polite to speak about,” she said. “I don’t think of myself as a clothes horse, but I do like clothes and I like color.”
Fashion and beauty were only part of the appeal of style coaching, however. At the time of her initial consultation she was studying anthropology and international affairs at the University of Maine, and the concept of clothing as cultural icon appealed to her academic sensibility.
“There are these symbols in dress in every culture,” Foreman said. “We still wear something because it’s a symbol – a status symbol. There are messages being sent at all times visually in every culture.”
That philosophy became the basis of a new career for Foreman, who set up shop as The Style Coach in November. Since then, her work has ranged from clients in need of a special-occasion outfit to clients in need of a complete closet purge and wardrobe makeover. Her goal is to work with women in transition.
“There is this sort of window, whether they’re empty-nesters, recently divorced or changing jobs – that’s a time when they’re really in need of a boost in self-confidence,” Foreman said.
That was the case for Steenberg, a native New Yorker who moved to Maine in 2003 after spending the earlier part of her career in the corporate world. When she arrived, she worked as the development director for the Bay School, and her all-business wardrobe of tailored suits was appropriate for that position. She recently embarked on two entrepreneurial ventures and a math-teaching job, and she was ready for a change, so she gave Foreman a call.
“I’ve been locked in these tired two or three colors – gray, brown and black – for so long I don’t feel like I really know what avenue to go in,” Steenberg explained. “It’s that safe place. So I wanted to see what her thoughts were in terms of moving beyond that safe place.”
Moving beyond that safety zone involves a little homework, however. A typical session with Foreman begins with a “Personal Image Assessment Profile,” with questions about the way a client would like to be perceived, personal and professional goals, clothing preferences, budget, fashion or beauty hangups and activities. The results give Foreman a clearer picture of how a person’s wardrobe complements – or conflicts with – her lifestyle and personality.
“It’s all a matter of looking at your life and planning in the same way you’d plan a vacation or plan your finances,” Foreman said. “A lot of people don’t look at it that way.”
Foreman also asks clients to pore over magazines and catalogs to find pictures of clothing they love, looks they hate, and photos that represent their current image.
After Steenberg flipped through her pile of clippings, Foreman led her to a director’s chair positioned in front of a mirror and lit with a pure white bulb. Steenberg took one look at the setup and said, “Haydee, this is so cool.”
It got even cooler when Foreman draped a white sheet over Steenberg’s shoulders and flipped on the light. On one shoulder, she placed a bunch of flag-size swatches with cool undertones. On the other, she draped swatches with warm undertones. As she flipped through the fabric, it became clear that Steenberg was a “winter,”
“I do color like they would in the ’80s, but it’s a little more refined,” Foreman explained.
She gave Steenberg a color fan, which looks like a packet of paint chips, to help her find flattering shades while shopping. Then Foreman asked Steenberg to step in front of the mirror so she could determine her “basic shape.”
“Oh boy, I can’t wait,” Steenberg said sarcastically, as Foreman assessed her waist.
“Imagine talking to someone else you love that way,” Foreman chided. “You would never say nasty, negative self-talk like you say to yourself. We have to just love where we’re at in the moment.”
Foreman worked quickly, sizing up Steenberg’s figure and jotting down notes about her defined waist and hourglass shape, which would be accentuated by tailored jackets and pants with flared or boot-cut ankles.
Then she asked Steenberg to try on a few of her favorite outfits, so Foreman could get a sense of what was – and wasn’t – working. A slate gray suit got the thumbs-up, as did a flattering teal pashmina. But Foreman shook her head at an oversize brown jacket.
“I think you’ll feel more feminine and womanly if you wear something that emphasizes your shape,” Foreman said, “but it seems to me already what you like is working for you.”
Steenberg went into the bathroom to change, and when she returned to the living room, Foreman praised her fashion instincts. The women then discussed an “action plan” for weeding through Steenberg’s closet in order to determine what she had, what should go and what she needed to buy.
“It’s really just a matter of taking the time and knowing you deserve the time to do this,” Foreman said.
As Foreman and her sometime assistant, Julia Gilmore, packed up the mirror and chairs and loaded the fabric swatches, lights and binders into a series of brightly colored L.L. Bean totes, Steenberg curled up on the couch again and reflected on her style coaching session.
“The greatest message it has given me is, ‘Be in the moment. Focus on right now. Be more comfortable with my body and the way it is today,” Steenberg said. Then she turned to Foreman with a look of gratitude. “There’s a lot of value to what you just did.”
For information, call Haydee Foreman at 374-5718 or 266-3872, or visit www.mainestylecoach.com.
Tips from The Style Coach
. Don’t be afraid to pair color with color.
. Get a great haircut: “A great haircut can make or break an outfit.”
. Know the difference between a cool item of clothing and a flattering item of clothing: “I want the person to get compliments, not the item of clothing.”
. Don’t underestimate the power of great undergarments. Foreman recommends Spanx and Sassybax.
. Have fun with accessories.
. You don’t have to spend a lot to look great.
. If you’re holding on to outdated clothing in the hope that it will come back into fashion, know that the trend is usually slightly – but noticeably – different the second time around.
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