A day with a personal shopper in Dubai: what happens and what to expect

Shop talk: A personal shopper can do wonders for your wardrobe as well as your knowledge of fashion dos, don'ts and must-haves.

The personal shopper Orla Lamb, left, shopping with and for her client Shireen Mzgurn at Mall of the Emirates in Dubai. Pawan Singh / The National

I’m 5’3”, with a small frame and ample padding around my hips and thighs. With my body shape, shopping isn’t always easy, but it’s compounded by my dislike of busy malls and spending time in changing rooms. Some women think there is nothing better than hours spent dashing from boutique to boutique, but I dream of being able to click my fingers and having a wardrobe of perfectly fitting clothes that I haven’t had to shop for.

This is where stylists and personal shoppers come in handy. The rich and famous have had them for years – but the average person may consider it a little extravagant and not within the monthly budget. After reading about a promotion being offered by Kempinski Hotel Mall of the Emirates and the Dubai-based stylist Orla Lamb, of Style with Orla, I set out to try a personal shopping experience for myself. My challenge: to find a new outfit to wear to work, one that won’t date quicker than milk left out in the summer sun.

A quick introduction: Lamb has been a personal shopper and stylist for about two years. It was a natural progression as she had been advising friends and family on their wardrobes for years. Having spent many years in the airline industry, Lamb not only knew how to look fabulous all the time (ever wondered how flight attendants always look fresh, even on a long-haul flight?), she knew how to create many different looks from a simple wardrobe. She calls this her “capsule wardrobe” and it consists of a few basics and a lot of mix-and-match accessories.

Using the capsule wardrobe as inspiration, Lamb suggests we create one that I can use for work. A few office basics – skirt, trousers, dress and jacket – and lots of accessories, tops, and bits and pieces that I can use to mix-up the look. My problem, I tell her, is that I can never find trousers to suit my shape.

We continue chatting, by phone, and she asks about my fashion likes (more classic than trendy) and dislikes (polka dots and Paris Hilton pink), my budget (on a scale of H&M to Harvey Nichols), and whether I’ve had my colours done and if I stick to them, or experiment with different colours. She also quizzes me about accessories and if I wear them. Lamb admits that she is the queen of accessories, while I confess that I have a number of necklaces, bangles and dangly earrings, but am usually too lazy to experiment with them.

A few days later, Lamb and I catch up for our shopping expedition. We meet at 10am for a coffee in Aspen, the lobby lounge at the Kempinski hotel, and I discover that she has already scoped out the mall to find pieces that she thinks may appeal to my tastes and my budget. Reiss and Ted Baker are top of her list for the capsule wardrobe, with a few stops for accessories afterwards to complete the outfit.

She tells me that one of the advantages of shopping with personal shoppers is that they know the mall and its shops inside out, and that includes what is in stock and on trend at that time. This definitely appeals to people who are time-poor or impatient, like me. Another advantage is that personal shoppers will have built up a rapport with the sales assistants and the brands, which makes you feel rather important when ­everyone is fussing over you.

After downing our coffees, Lamb and I head to Ted Baker on the first floor in Mall of the Emirates. After a few failed attempts in recent years to find clothes that suited me in Ted Baker, I had always dismissed it. I’ll admit I was also thrown by the ­unfamiliar sizes. But always willing to give things a go, I did a quick once-around the shop as Lamb grabbed things off the racks.

She frogmarched me into the changing room, where I must have tried on at least 10 different outfits. First was a tailored grey dress, which we paired with a matching jacket, silk scarf and pale pink belt. The dress was snug and slimming and fitted my shape perfectly. The jacket was great, too, although my arms were a little short in it. The accessories, I found, were what really set off the outfit. I tried the matching trousers, but they sagged in all the wrong places. Giving a thumbs up to the dress combo, I proceeded to try on other dresses and trousers. Under normal circumstances, I would have given up in frustration by this time, but having someone there to give me honest feedback and make suggestions – as well as a team of sales assistants treating me like their most important customer – gave me the will to continue.

One of the great things about shopping with an expert is having access to their wealth of knowledge. Having chosen the grey dress, matching jacket, silk scarf and pink belt, Lamb put the items on reserve so I could come back at my own leisure in a few days and buy them if I wanted to. Call me an amateur, but I did not realise I could put items on reserve.

Off we trotted to Reiss, where Lamb quickly narrowed in on a few ­different dress/jacket/skirt/trouser combinations. It was at this point that my body shape started to let me down. Having fitted so nicely into the Ted Baker clothes – with the exception of the trousers – I soon discovered that Reiss was not for me. Skirts, jackets, dresses – it did not matter – none were made for my body, and let’s not even get started on the trousers. Again, I wanted to throw my hands in the air and get out of there, and without Lamb I certainly would have. That was when I discovered the true value of a personal shopper. Without emotion or worry about my sensitivities, she easily delivered a verdict on each outfit – “Doesn’t work”, “It’s a bit tight around the hips”, “Too big here” – and kept on searching for items that might be better. In the end, Lamb delivered the final ruling: “Reiss just isn’t for you.” And off we went to one last shop – Uterqüe – which came highly recommended for accessories, albeit with a higher price tag.

By this time, I was starting to fade but I was impressed with Lamb’s ­enthusiasm and drive to find the ­perfect outfit for me. I’d never tried on any of the garments at Uterqüe but we soon discovered it wasn’t right. “Those clothes wear you,” Lamb remarked, and I agreed. I couldn’t put my finger on what was wrong about them, but I felt they did little to flatter my frame. Worn out from trying on clothes and needing to rush back to the office, we called it a day on our shopping adventure.

If I had taken advantage of ­Kempinski’s promotion, I would be heading back to Aspen for afternoon tea – the perfect pick-me-up after a hard day in the mall – and a lie-down in an executive grande ­deluxe room. Instead, I thanked Lamb for her time and expertise, jumped into my car and headed back to Abu ­Dhabi to finish the day in the office.

Like me, Lamb didn’t stop working. In the following days, she visited a few more shops at Mall of the Emirates, took photographs of different outfit combinations and accessories to email me and put outfits on reserve for me to try on later.

I have since been back to Mall of the Emirates to try on the reserved outfits and a few others, but found the biggest issue was knowing whether something really suited me, or whether the mirror was being kind (ever tried on something in a shop then taken it home and discovered you looked like a walrus?). Having Lamb’s unbiased, expert opinion was truly valuable, along with her knowledge of each store and what it offered.

The experience has inspired me to try different outfit combinations and experiment more with accessories. I still can’t say that I love shopping for clothes, but I do know that if I need help finding the right outfit, or sorting out my existing wardrobe, the services of a personal shopper are within reach – for much less than you'd expect. Style with Orla sessions start from Dh550 – money well spent if it means I have a clothes collection that looks great.

Essential items for every wardrobe, by Orla Lamb (www.stylewithorla.com)

- “My forte is creating a capsule wardrobe for male and female ­clients. Living in a sunny climate, I plan many outfits for women around a white base, building colour and ­accessories on top.

- “For both male and female clients, I advise putting money into core pieces such as suits, keeping the cut classic and pattern plain (below). From here they have timeless and lasting pieces, which they will be able to adapt to current trends and colours using accessories.

- “Men can have a lot of fun with belts, shoes, shirts and ties to bring their look up to date. Belts, for me, are a key piece in every wardrobe. They add detail, define your waist where you want it to be and help create the correct proportion between the torso and lower body.

- “Also, everyone should have a good pair of denims that fit well and are the correct style for your body shape.”

Fancy your own bespoke shopping expedition with the team from Style with Orla? Check into an executive grande deluxe room at Kempinski Hotel Mall of the Emirates for two nights or more (from Dh3,147 per night for two guests) and receive a private shopping experience and afternoon tea for two people. For more information, call 04 341 0000 or email [e-mail]