WE love walking into clothing stores to check out what’s hot and burning up the shelves.

Nothing matches that feeling you get when you walk past huge windows displaying all the latest trends, and then trying things on and paying for your beautiful purchase at the cashier.

Unfortunately, most of us don’t always have the time to shop (and window shop) all day, every day, whenever we like.

Even those few hours sitting in the salon having your hair done is never enough time to flip through as many fashion magazines as you want.

Which is why fashion lovers all over the world rejoice that fashion has found its way online, and in a big way, too. The best thing about it is that we can enjoy it all for free!

We can now surf some of our favourite fashion sites at any time of the day and zero in on trends we love, so that we can plan our shopping trips and maximise on our precious time in the mall.

Thanks to the Internet, we don’t have to physically go anywhere to see what everyone is wearing. Through websites like The Sartorialist we can check out what ordinary people are wearing in fashion cities like New York, Milan, Paris and Tokyo. Several sites give us tips on how to mix and match, without us having to go through the embarassment of trying stuff on in changing rooms and blushing when retail assistants give us other ‘’suggestions”.

As a tribute to the wonderful fashion out there in the web, here are several websites that give us fashion like we’ve never seen it before.

The Sartorialist

www.thesartorialist.blogspot.com

Selected as Time magazine’s ”Top 100 Design Influences”, this former fashion merchandiser and photographer goes all over the world in search of ordinary people with different fashion ideas.

The Sartorialist

No one escapes his keen attention to style — not elderly couples strolling along the streets of Milan, nor young boys in berets in Paris or model-esque young women in New York.

Somehow, he gets them all to pose as models would, hands on hips, eyes gazing off into the distance, seated on steps grinning broadly into his lens.

What sets his blog apart from many fashion sites is his ability to make even the most unsuspecting of subjects look like they’ve walked straight off a fashion runway into a backlane, a skill which is the envy of aspiring fashion photographers everywhere.

Style Tips 101

styletips101.com

We can’t all afford stylists, or a hundred magazines to give us tips on how to mix and match, which hairdos are in and which shoes are a no-no this season. That is why the Internet gods gave us Style Tips 101.

Style Tips 101

From giving advice on which swimsuits suit what kinds of figures to how to wear certain colours to how to shop smartly, this site has just about everything you need to know about fashion.

There’s even a section on celebrity fashion, because everyone needs a star to look up to and aspire to be (or at least dress like).

Blog Reviews

FOR those who like to shop in the comforts of their own home, detest traffic jams and crowds, online shopping is a godsend.

There are hundreds and hundreds of blogshops out there, so how would you know where to find the best deals and most stylish pieces?

The answer is: Blog review sites. Although there are a growing number out there, two blogs definitely stand out — A Shopaholic’s Den (www.ashopaholicsden.com) and Little Accompaniments (littleaccompaniments.blogspot.com).

Updated regularly, these sites bring you up to speed on what’s happening on blogshops, without having to go through all of them, so you can window shop and purchase items in minutes, all out of your comfortable home.