Jessie James Decker Shares Must-Have Tips For Your Trendiest CMA Fest Look

Jessie James Decker manifested her fashion line from an early age.

The country singer-songwriter, actress, cookbook author, TV personality and entrepreneur shared some of her go-to style inspiration when it comes to dressing for country concerts and festivals. Decker, 38, met with iHeartCountry at her clothing store in Nashville, Tennessee, days before the Country Music Association’s CMA Fest kicked off. Decker said the key to pulling off the perfect look is confidence.

“First off, you got to be confident in whatever you're going to put on,” she shared. “I like to be super trendy, and I like to follow what's going on in fashion. But I also feel like during CMA, this is your time to kind of break any of those rules and really embrace our surroundings. We're in Nashville. We are in the country music capital of the world, and that inspires our fashion. And so for me, it's time to wear your fringe. It's time to bring out your cowboy boots. It's time to bring out your lace. I mean, we have anything and everything you need: all the denim, we got sequins, we’ve got anything and everything to really play the part. And this is the time to do it. Getting dress up as so fun. It just is, and I love having a theme or a reason to.”

Decker said she always found inspiration from the late Selena Quintanilla, who blazed her own trail as a singer-songwriter and fashion designer. Decker remembered she “should have been focusing” in math class, but instead, spent time sketching fashion designs and dreaming of wearing those looks on stage. “And then when I was 15, I was in a dressing room and…I had a little black dress on that was too grown for me, and a woman said, ‘You are very kittenish.’ …I was like, ‘One day I will have a fashion brand and I will call it Kittenish.’ And I manifested it right then and there.”

Decker said her go-to fashion staples include “a handful of basics” to create any looking style them accordingly. She recommended “a good pair of jeans, you need a black and brown belt, you need a great pair of kitten heels, which is what I have on, and you need a great white button up, a black blazer, a black leather jacket and a white T is all you need. If you have those basics, you can throw anything together and shake and throw it and walk out the door and feel confident, but everyone should have those key pieces and then you can accessorize from there.” She assured that fashion “doesn’t have to be complicated.”

The singer-songwriter and fashion expert looked ahead to CMA Fest and the fall release of her new cookbook, The Secret Sauce, co-authored with her mother and her sister. The trio will share “a lot of tips and tricks and secrets,” including a chapter titled “The Fountain of Youth” that reveals “why my mother is aging backwards,” Decker said. She also hinted at new music and a return to the stage after welcoming her fourth child with husband Eric Decker in February 2024. “I really miss it,” she said.

Through it all, Decker opened up about enduring migraines throughout her life. She was in middle school when she experienced “severe headaches,” and realized later that they are migraines. Eric Decker encouraged her to see a doctor when she was around 22 years old, and now, she’s teaming up with AbbVie to help others understand how to cope. “I want to be able to be an advocate for people that are in my situation that have had this their whole life and didn't know what to do with it, didn't know who to turn to,” Decker shared. “And I also feel like within this, I don't want to just advocate for the people struggling with it, but the people around them to say, ‘Hey, pay attention to the signs, be there to be a support system’ because I've been fortunate enough to have a support system. …You are not alone.”

Scroll below to see Decker’s fashion inspiration and a look at her upcoming cookbook.