Style Workshop Week 3: Edit Down
Does your inspiration board feel all over the place? Unfocused? Overwhelming? Before you let the chaos get the best of you, know you are not alone. Actually, this is where you’re supposed to be! You’re in the perfect place to carve out your defined style.
This week we edit, “finishing” our work for now on your visual inspiration board. But you should expect to continue the process of adding and editing over time - maybe forever! Style is an evolution, and an inspiration board captures that evolving style so it continues to inspire you. You should naturally revisit it when you feel it needs an update or to accommodate for life changes. Think of it as buffing your car rather than changing all its parts, after all, we are here to build your authentic style that is - for the most part - timeless.
Once you complete your homework you should feel proud of your work and confident in the direction of your style. Keep in mind that your inspiration board is here to guide you for the rest of the course, but should never feel constraining. Rather, focusing and defining your style should give you a sense of greater ease and freedom as we move into the next phases of work.
The Lesson
This week’s lesson is about editing, and the most important part of self-editing is taking your time. The benefit of having an editor is a new perspective, unencumbered by the creators own vision, able to see the unfiltered reality. During this process we want to replicate that experience as best as possible by ourselves. Giving yourself time is the best way to come to your work with fresh eyes, more acute at spotting areas to delete or explore. This is why we’ve devoted a whole second week to this process, as it may have felt rushed to try and build and edit in the same week.
You may find the process to be therapeutic. Deleting an image you *thought* to be reflective of your style, but now looking at it with fresh eyes feels wrong or constraining should feel relieving. Adding new images that may be edgier, or more feminine, or less professional than you initially thought to be your style should feel refreshing. When it stops feeling therapeutic, that is a clue that it’s time to step back and take some time away.
Editing has a tendency to bring out the neuroticism even in the most zen-meditation loving ones among us. You may at times obsess over one image, but here is two things to keep in mind:
One image doesn’t make or break your inspiration board. In the words of Gen Z: it's not that deep.
We’re not in a hurry. Whenever you feel confined, take a step back and return refreshed. For the purposes of this course, we will keep moving forward after this week, but you can keep pruning for as long as you want.
But, naturally this process will require you to make some tough decisions. Here are a few scenarios that may evoke frustration and how to handle it after taking your Indyx mandated break:
Representing your multi-faceted style (and personality!) while staying cohesive
Fran Fine’s loud and sexy looks and Blair Waldorf’s buttoned-up girly preppy style can both spark joy for you - they sure do for us! - but it would be very difficult or maybe impossible for one person to represent both without feeling like you have a split personality. If you’ve gravitated towards more images in-line with Blair’s style than Fran’s then you should ask yourself why exactly you like those Fran images. Is it the color combination? The off-the-shoulder detail? The way she has layered a textured shag coat over a monochromatic layer? If you can identify the specific element you love and want to incorporate into Blair’s base style to make it your own, then the image can stay. Or, is it more about the person: the pose, her carefree personality, or your nostalgia for the character? In that case, it may be a better choice to edit it out. And, there is an element you like but the image doesn't quite showcase it, consider finding an different image that more clearly shows the element you are drawn towards.
The opposite problem: desiring a visually pleasing, “aesthetic” board without capturing anything uniquely you
We can fall victim to the visually pleasing but content scarce inspiration board when we focus on creating an “aesthetic”. We strongly advise you against deleting something because it doesn’t fit a certain aesthetic or mental image of what a certain “style” should look like. You can’t wear an aesthetic - those boards usually rely on an unrealistically tight color palette and a Lightroom preset. But no one builds a wardrobe on two colors and a filter. The only person it needs to serve is you and so the big picture question you have to ask is: does this communicate the aspirational me?
And when in doubt, we recommend removing the image. Or, at least moving it to a secondary board to save for further consideration.
At Indyx we believe in decluttering your mind, so if there is no space for clothes that feel lukewarm, why should it be any different for your inspiration? For the purpose of giving you clarity, it is probably better to air on the side of a very tightly edited direction than having too many images that you’re not 100% sure about.
The Homework
The homework for this week is to edit the inspiration board we began building last week.
You have so much great inspiration in front of you, and now it’s time to carve out what will serve you. There isn’t a list of the five things to avoid, because there is no “right” image - just images that help you. We will suggest a few specific steps to help you focus on different elements as you edit through your board.
Part 1: Editing Down
It’s time to take your virtual scissors out!
Round 1: Initial run through
Since last week a few items will likely quickly stand out to you as not in tune with your taste. You might notice that most of these images were the very first ones you added to your board before you honed in. They will feel out of place or simply not you. Let’s get those out of the way.
Round 2: Identify patterns and misfits
Once you’ve gotten rid of the low hanging fruit, we move on to pruning our tree. But to do so we need to see our intended outcome first. Look for patterns among your images - perhaps it’s flowy clothes, or 60s-inspired boxy silhouettes. In order to identify the outliers, it may be convenient to group these patterns into sub-boards. You don’t necessarily need to delete the images that are left out, but it will help you identify the images you should definitely take a second look at and understand what drew you to them in the first place.
Round 3: Consider your lifestyle
Wouldn’t we all like to have a inspiration board filled with poolside outfits? But if you’re spending the majority of your time in a corporate office in an urban metropolis, that may not be realistic.
Round 4: What is the attitude of the image?
While the lighting, filter, posing of the image may seem superfluous to the actual clothes, it does speak to the attitude you are looking to present. Are you shy? Dramatic? Powerful? Bubbly? The posing is key to translate the attitude through your board. It can also help you find further influencers, celebrities and brands that can inspire you.
Part 2: Editing Up
Editing isn’t only about cutting out - it’s also about filling in the holes and exploring interests that stand out from the pattern. This is a time to bring your inspiration board together cohesively, so that it feels like one guiding image.
Dive deeper: You may have identified some outlying images that - rather than editing out - you actually want to explore more. Or, you’ve identified images where you appreciated certain elements but the overall picture doesn’t fit into your board. Search for images that can fit this hole.
Colors: Looking at the big picture of your board, can you identify a color palette? You want to have an array of about 5-7 predominant colors, unless you prefer a monochromatic wardrobe á la Wednesday Adams. If you can easily identify those colors, search the corresponding Pantone swatches and add them to your board. If your predominant colors don’t stand out to you, identify the ones you love the most in your board and play around adding them to your board to notice the effect it has on the overall image. Color swatches bring your board together and also show you where you may be lacking definition.
Designers and brands: This may feel confusing since we’ve avoided adding branded content, however, here we can take a moment to do so consciously. Having analyzed your style board quite thoroughly at this point, you may note that certain designers or brands fit well. As you update your board in the future, those brands can be helpful inspiration for modern takes on your style.
Part 3: Organizing
The last part is very simple and a great test of the cohesiveness of your new defined style. Organizing the layout of your board can help make it as visually appealing as possible, but mostly we want it to easily speak to you.
Pinterest has a Shuffle option, where it will automatically rearrange your images randomly. This is an excellent test on how cohesive the overall impression of your board is. No matter how many times you reshuffle your board, it should still present the same united guiding inspiration.
If you chose a platform other than Pinterest, or if you prefer to play around yourself, ensure that there is a good mix of visual elements distributed throughout - we want it to look like one single united board, rather than segmented parts glued together. We recommend against segmenting it into disparate sections like: “work” and “weekend”, or “pants” and “dresses”.
The Indyx Team’s Homework
In case it is helpful to visualize by seeing an example, below is this week’s homework as completed by the Indyx Team.
Courtney: https://www.pinterest.com/myindyx/courtneys-style-inspiration/
Therese: https://www.pinterest.com/myindyx/thereses-style-inspiration/
Erika: https://www.pinterest.com/myindyx/erikas-style-inspiration/
Devon: https://www.pinterest.com/myindyx/devons-style-inspiration/
Kinsey: https://www.pinterest.com/myindyx/kinseys-style-inspiration/
Yidi: https://www.pinterest.com/myindyx/yidis-style-inspiration/
Until next week…
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