Last week my roommate Jess literally cornered me in our kitchen at like 1 AM (she works late shifts at a restaurant) holding her phone with some influencer’s post pulled up. “Okay but seriously,” she said, “how do you always look so expensive when I know for a fact you survive on ramen and the free samples at Whole Foods?” I was standing there in my pajamas eating cereal for dinner, but I knew exactly what she meant because I get this question constantly on my content.
The answer is so stupidly simple that it almost feels like cheating. Ready? One good black blazer. That’s it. That’s the whole secret to looking like you have money when your bank account is crying.
I know, I know. Everyone’s always going on about “investment pieces” and “cost per wear” and blah blah blah. It’s usually bullshit designed to make you feel bad about not dropping your entire rent payment on a handbag. But this is different because a decent blazer doesn’t actually cost your firstborn child, and it works harder than anything else in your closet.
Like, two months ago I had this meeting with a brand about a potential collaboration. I was running insanely late because the Austin traffic was being absolutely psychotic, I had coffee stains on my shirt from my morning disaster, my hair looked like I’d been electrocuted, and I was wearing ripped jeans and beaten-up Converse. But I grabbed my black blazer on the way out the door, threw it on in the elevator, and walked into that meeting.
The marketing manager’s first words to me? “I love how polished you always look.” I almost laughed out loud. Polished! Me! The girl who had Cheerios for lunch because I forgot to buy actual food!
That blazer cost me $89 at Zara last year. Less than what I spent on drinks during my birthday celebration, which honestly makes me question my life choices but whatever. The point is, somehow this one piece of fabric convinced a room full of adults that I have my life together when the reality is I’m just winging it like everyone else.
Here’s what I’ve figured out from three years of trying to look professional on a content creator budget. Most clothes we wear day-to-day have zero structure, right? Crop tops, oversized hoodies, flowy dresses, stretchy everything. It all just kind of hangs on our bodies without really creating any shape. But a blazer actually does something – it creates shoulders, defines your waist, makes whatever random outfit you threw on look intentional instead of accidental.
The versatility is honestly insane. Job interview at a startup? Blazer over a band tee shows you’re professional but not boring. Date with someone whose Instagram suggests they have taste? Blazer over a cute bodysuit. Meeting your boyfriend’s intimidating friends who all went to fancy colleges? Blazer over literally anything makes you look like you belong there. I’ve worn mine to weddings, funerals, gallery openings, and that time I had to go to court for a parking ticket and didn’t want to look like a disaster.
My current favorite is from Mango – I found it during one of their sales when I was supposed to be buying groceries but got distracted by shiny things. It has just enough shoulder padding to make me look like I could run a small company, but not so much that I look like I’m cosplaying the ’80s. The cut is slightly oversized without being sloppy, and the fabric has enough weight that it doesn’t look cheap even though it definitely was.
I did get it tailored though, which added another forty bucks to the total. But here’s the thing – most people skip tailoring because they think it’s this expensive luxury thing, but it’s literally the difference between looking good and looking expensive. My tailor guy (shoutout to Miguel’s alterations on South Lamar) hemmed the sleeves and took in the waist slightly, and now it fits like it was made for me instead of some theoretical average-sized person.
The secret sauce is that from three feet away, nobody can tell if your blazer cost $80 or $800. The silhouette is what matters, not whether the lining is made from unicorn tears or whatever they try to sell you at department stores.
You want to look for shoulders that hit right at your actual shoulder point or extend just barely past it. Too narrow and you’ll look like you’re wearing your little sister’s clothes; too wide and you’re entering linebacker territory. The sleeves should be fitted enough that you don’t look like you’re drowning but loose enough that you can actually move your arms without feeling trapped.
Length is super important too – it should hit somewhere around mid-thigh. Any shorter and it looks more like a cropped jacket, any longer and you risk looking like you’re playing dress-up. The button placement makes a huge difference in how your proportions look. I’m pretty straight up and down naturally, but a single button at my waist creates this hourglass illusion that makes me look way more put-together than I actually am.
Oh, and always check the back view! I’ve learned this the hard way after buying blazers online that looked perfect from the front but made my butt look completely bizarre. You need either a friend with honest opinions or some serious mirror acrobatics to figure out what’s happening back there.
For shopping, honestly some of my best blazer finds have been at places fashion people love to hate. Zara obviously, but also & Other Stories has some really good ones that look way more expensive than they are. Express gets dragged constantly but they make blazers that actually fit normal human bodies instead of just models. H&M’s premium lines sometimes have surprisingly decent structured pieces.
If you want to spend a bit more – like $150-200 range – Banana Republic and J.Crew both make good basics, especially when they’re having sales which is basically always. Club Monaco is worth checking out too; their stuff tends to have better details that make it look pricier.
For thrifting, men’s vintage blazers from the ’90s are absolute gold mines. The structure and fabric quality from that era was insane, way better than most stuff you can buy new now. I found this incredible oversized Armani blazer at Buffalo Exchange last month for thirty-five dollars. It’s clearly from like 1995 and probably cost someone’s dad a fortune originally. Had to get the sleeves shortened but even with tailoring I’m still under a hundred bucks total for something that makes me look like I know what a stock portfolio is.
The funny part is, since I started posting more put-together content, people assume I’m making way more money than I actually am. Brands reach out offering higher rates because they think I’m this polished fashion girl when really I’m just strategically using one piece of clothing to create an illusion. It’s working though – my follower count has grown significantly since I started incorporating more “professional” looks into my content mix.
My boutique manager actually asked me last week if I wanted to help with buying because she said I have such good instincts for what looks expensive versus what actually is expensive. Which is hilarious because my instincts mostly come from being broke and having to figure out how to fake it till I make it.
The blazer thing has become such a reliable formula that I barely think about it anymore. Running late? Blazer. Important meeting? Blazer. Want to feel like an adult human instead of a college student who accidentally time-traveled five years into the future? You know what I’m gonna say.
Yesterday I posted a try-on video showing the same outfit with and without a blazer, and the comments were exactly what you’d expect. “Why do you look so much more expensive in the second one?” “What sorcery is this?” “I need that blazer immediately.” It got like 200K views in six hours, which tells me other people are definitely feeling this struggle too.
So yeah, if you’re trying to look like you have money without actually having money, invest in one really good black blazer. Get it tailored if you need to. Wear it with everything. Watch people assume you’re way more successful than you actually are. It’s not exactly ethical but it works, and honestly in this economy we’re all just trying to survive with some dignity intact.
Brooklyn’s a 24-year-old content creator from Austin who lives where fashion meets TikTok. She covers Gen Z trends, viral styles, and the messy reality of making fashion content for a living. Expect energy, honesty, and unapologetic fun.
