The Essential MTF Clothing Guide for Beginners: Style & Fashion Tips

  1. Don’t Choose Flashy Clothes For Your First Outfit
  2. What Kind Of Neckline Should I Go For?
  3. How To Pick Clothes That Hide Your Muscles
    1. Clothes Recommendations (Tops)
  4. How To Pick Your First Dress (Or Skirt)
    1. Dress And Skirt Recommendations
  5. Finding Outfit Ideas

Don’t Choose Flashy Clothes For Your First Outfit

Picking clothes when you’re transgender or just dressing feminine isn’t so simple. But don’t worry, this MtF fashion guide will help you navigate the process of choosing clothing that will make you look great, without breaking the bank. You can ditch the “sexiest red dress” idea for now. For someone who’s just beginning their transformation journey, that flashy dress is poor choice because it will draw a lot of attention to you, and bring eyes to your chest. If you don’t have breasts yet, that’s something you’ll want to avoid.

Your first outfit should be something casual you’d see any woman wearing on a normal day out. Think something like a simple blouse or sweater, and some jeans. It’s much easier to blend in that way, and you can still do things to feel sexy in an outfit like that.

What Kind Of Neckline Should I Go For?

To all the transgender women and MtF crossdressers out there, I recommend avoiding any necklines that’re designed to show off cleavage until you have some. I typically stick to boatneck, round, and high neck necklines when I want to go for an everyday type look. For a fashion-forward sexier option, I go for off shoulder or asymmetric/one shoulder necklines. Shoulders can be just as sexy as breasts!

How To Pick Clothes That Hide Your Muscles

While there are great looking women who are bodybuilders, they have less muscle mass than someone who is (or used to be) a male bodybuilder. If you’re someone who lifts weights regularly and early into your journey (or not on feminizing hormones), I recommend putting together outfits that minimize the perceived size of your arms.

This means for tops, I recommend wearing something with long sleeves when the weather allows for it. It’s alright if the sleeves are skin tight, but it’s best if you find some that are loose and flowy instead. I still do bicep curls regularly and none of my long sleeved outfits show a hint of it.

Muscle mass in the legs, however, is totally fine. Skirts and dresses typically don’t go high enough above the knee to show enough of your thighs to cause any change in your perceived gender. Not to mention, cisgender women can also build pretty bulky legs.

Clothes Recommendations (Tops)

Clothes like this top are great for hiding your muscles

This top is an off shoulder neckline top. It shows no cleavage, looking sexy by showing plenty of skin elsewhere.

How To Pick Your First Dress (Or Skirt)

For skirts and dresses, here’s a pro tip: get one with an “A-Line” fit. What “A-Line” means is the dress widens and flares out at the bottom, creating the visual of a triangle toward the lower end of your body. My reasoning for this is that people assigned male at birth typically have bodies that are either shaped like a straight line, or widen at the top. So a flared dress or skirt like that would help create the impression of an hourglass figure. Wikipedia probably says it better than I do.

Dress And Skirt Recommendations

Clothes like this dress make for great outfits

This dress was actually the first one I bought, and I still have it. It looks good on anyone without effort.

This skirt is a perfect example of an A-Line fit.

Finding Outfit Ideas

You can discover fashionable outfit inspiration by searching for terms like “cute summer outfit” or “sexy summer outfit”. You could also enter search terms that include the color of your wig, like “hot outfit for brunettes”. Basically something that matches “[ADJECTIVE] [SEASON] outfit” will work, as there are tons of websites and articles on Pinterest dedicated to this.

There’s also a great feature on Amazon’s phone app called “StyleSnap” where you can upload a picture of someone and it will find clothes on Amazon that look similar. You can get to this feature by clicking the camera shaped button in the search bar. That feature is also on the desktop site. Another helpful tip is to try using Prime Wardrobe, which lets you send clothes back without a hassle if they don’t fit. I can’t remember the amount of times I’ve bought some womens’ clothes and they turned out not to fit right.