Style Workshop Week 7: Shop Your Closet
At this stage, you’ve got a better handle on your personal style than ever before, and your closet is newly cleared out. Ready to be filled up with new pieces, right?!
WRONG. At least, not yet. This is a critical point in the process where it’s all too tempting to rush out and refill that empty space. And maybe, just maybe, that’s where things went off track in the past. Instead, this is your moment to pause.
Before we dive back into shopping, let’s give your wardrobe a workout! You might be surprised at how much it has to offer when you put it to the test.
The Lesson
Why shop your closet?
Well, the founding premise of this whole freaking app is that the practice of regularly and intentionally shopping our closets is THE missing piece when it comes to finding our true style and dressing well.
As a society, we currently pour a ton of energy into the inputs and outputs of our wardrobes. What are we buying and what are we getting rid of? Those questions dominate 99% of the conversation, while the middle part (what happens with the things in our closets) gets completely sidelined.
It’s easy to see why we got here. That middle part is messy. It’s personal, nuanced, and hard to distill into neat, scalable advice. It’s much simpler (and much more commercially viable) for the capital-F Fashion Industry to focus on trends—what’s “in” and what’s “out”—than to grapple with the hyper-individualized puzzle of your closet and how to make it work for you.
But the messy middle is exactly where the magic happens! Your closet can already do more than you think, but ultimately it’s just a collection of things. It doesn’t make magic on its own. We shop in items, but live life in outfits - and, style is what happens when you step in and consciously connect the dots, bringing that collection of things to life. What you really need is practice turning all that stuff into something special. Personal style is a muscle, and we’ve got to work out to get stronger.
Not to mention: constraints breed creativity! Narrowing your focus to what’s already in your closet isn’t just practical, it’s powerful. When you work within limits, you give yourself the clarity to find creative solutions. What if your newly defined style could be fully achieved with the closet you have? Paradoxically, setting boundaries on the problem can be liberating.
And sure, you’ll add a few new pieces eventually, but those “gaps” in your wardrobe can only be defined by a test drive of your existing closet. Your wardrobe is a toolkit and the best way to discover what tools you’re truly missing is to push what you have to the limit. Mix it, match it, wear it, and discover exactly where it falls short.
So, let’s put the pieces in your closet to work!
How to come up with new outfit ideas
We’ve talked to a lot of people about how they get dressed and come up with new ideas, and it’s really all about finding a starting point. Pick a starting point and from there, it’s natural to successively “problem-solve” the other pieces in the outfit.
Start with a certain item. You could pick a piece at random. You could pick the pair of pants you’re feeling drawn to today. You could pick a statement piece. You could pick a piece you don’t wear very much or has a high cost-per-wear. Just pick something!
Start with an outfit you already like to wear and start swapping out items.
Start with an inspo image to recreate. Hey, didn’t you just build a whole board of outfit inspiration? Don’t sweat if you don’t have all the pieces in the inspo. It’s not about copying the outfit exactly, but more about drawing inspiration from the overall vibe. Get creative!
Indyx Creative Director Therese’s personal tips on how to generate new outfit ideas
What to do when outfits aren’t quite right
Yeah okay sure, I *could* close my eyes and scramble together a ton of new outfits. But, how do I know when those outfits actually work? What do I do when something is off, but I don’t know what?
This is where the real work begins! Don't be discouraged, as this is exactly how you build the muscle to consistently translate your aspirational style into what you actually wear. You are building the ability to think critically to the point of clear articulation of what feels off to you. Because to fix something, you usually need to understand what’s wrong.
At first, this may feel like an experimental “test and learn” process. When an outfit feels wrong, switch something out! If that new piece feels more “right” to you, that’s your time to STOP and analyze why. The more you do that, the more you can start to predict what’s “wrong” about an outfit and be targeted in your fix rather than swapping in new pieces at random.
But if we can distill all the styling advice we’ve ever found helpful into one single takeaway, it’s this: it’s all about creating balance.
When an outfit feels “wrong”, it’s almost always because some dimension of balance is out of whack. To fix it, you want to think about your closet as toolkit, with each piece being a tool that you can use to create balance. There are two tricky bits to this:
Learning what dimensions of balance matter most to you
Learning what role each piece in your closet plays as a “tool” to create balance along these dimensions
Did this just get wildly theoretical to you? Let’s walk through two dimensions of balance that tend to matter quite a bit to most people.
Your style words
Remember when we said your style words would become a guide to getting dressed? Here’s where that comes into practice! Notice whether all three of your style words are represented in the outfit - and, the relative balance between them. Nailing your style isn’t just about building outfits that in some way represent - for example - “classic”, “chill”, and “sporty”. It’s one level deeper than that, having an intuition for exactly the right balance between the three.
To diagnose where you’re feeling unbalanced, it might be helpful to articulate what you consider the opposite of each of your words. Taking the same example, maybe you consider the opposite of…
“Classic” to be “Modern”
“Chill” to be “Uptight”
“Sporty” to be “Feminine”
Use this translation to articulate one level deeper what feels “off” to you. Instead of saying, “this outfit feels wrong” maybe now you can identify that “this outfit feels too feminine”. And what is the opposite of feminine (to you)? Sporty! Can I remove or change the styling of something that’s reading very feminine and/or add a piece that has a sportier vibe? And now you have a direction to move in to create balance when it comes to your style words.
Big, slim, skin
We cannot take credit for this incredibly apt distillation of the elements of what (I think) is commonly described as “proportion”. It’s Amy Smilovic and the lovely folks at Tibi who coined this one. But, we’ve found it incredibly helpful so we’re passing it along to you, too.
Just like your style words give you three things to put into balance, “big”, “slim”, and “skin” are another set of three things you are looking to balance in your outfit. You want all three, and you want the relative amount of each to feel “just right” to you.
“Big” = anything that visually takes up more space. A chunky shoe, a full pleated skirt, a shoulder pad, or an oversized shirt could all be elements of “big” in an outfit.
“Slim” = anything that visually takes up less space. A slip skirt, a sleek ballet flat, or a skimming t-shirt could all be elements of “slim” in an outfit.
“Skin” = anything that shows some skin! And, this doesn’t have to be dramatic. Even simply rolling up your shirt sleeves past your wrists can create that slight relief of skin that brings an outfit into balance.
Again, the trick is noticing which of these three things feels out of whack to you. Here’s an example of Indyx stylist, Christina Mychas, putting these into balance for her.
Last thoughts on balance
We’ve just walked through two dimensions of balance that I think 99% of people find important, but this list may not be exhaustive for you! As you gain more experience, you may continue to discover new dimensions you want to play with.
For example, color may very well be one for you (and yes, we really like Tibi’s framework on color, too!). I recently watched a video by Hannah Louise Poston on balancing the “transitions” in your outfit that blew my mind! You’ll start to see how many seemingly disparate “style tips” are just different ways to consider balance between the elements in your outfit.
But don’t get overwhelmed by feeling you need to learn about and consider all possible dimensions all at once. You don’t. Start practicing the two we shared above, and your curiosity and capacity will naturally expand from there.
Along any dimension, each individual will percieve the “perfect” balance differently which is why there’s no one answer as to what makes the “perfect” outfit! You can’t possibly please everyone, so the only goal should be to please yourself.
Finally, always remember that when things aren’t working, it’s the clothes that are the problem, not you! Your clothes are tools. And, you wouldn’t blame yourself for being “too weak” if you found yourself unable to hammer a nail with a screwdriver. So, do not blame yourself for being “too” anything! You just haven’t found the right tool yet.
And, while you’re at it…
The more you actively shop your closet, the more you’ll start to notice the nuance of what you own. These are super valuable insights! Here’s what to pay close attention to and even note down.
Which roles do each piece play in creating balance?
Each time you work to balance an outfit, start to articulate what roles your pieces are commonly playing along these dimensions. For example…
These Nike sneakers always add a huge dose of “sporty” and an element of “big” to outfits. They’re quite light in color, so they tend to draw attention downwards if contrasted against a dark bottom.
In other words, this describes what type of “tool” they are.
What kind of tools do I have a LOT of? Which am I missing?
Once you can describe your tools, you can also start to notice which tools you tend to double (or, triple…) down in your closet on versus which you might actually be missing.
To continue to extend the same example, maybe I notice that I’ve already got a few different sneakers that give me the same “sporty”/big tool in my closet. But, I struggle when I’m trying to add more “classic” to the outfit when the situation also calls for a big shoe. Would a “classic” loafer style with a big chunky sole offer a combination of attributes that no other shoe in my collection offers?
And THAT right there is the very beginning of your wishlist! But, I’ve already dropped a potentially *overwhelming* amount of information here, so let’s not get too ahead of ourselves. For now, just focus on…
The Homework
The homework for this week is to use your digital wardrobe to style new outfits from your closet.
This is your journey, so exactly how far you go is up to you.
How far you go with this is totally up to you, but a great goal would be to make sure each item in your (digital) closet is part of at least one outfit to re-familiarize yourself with your entire wardrobe.
To see all the outfits related to each item, click on the item and check out the “Outfits” tab. If you're an Indyx Insider, the “Least Versatile Items” section on your wardrobe dashboard makes it even easier to spot pieces that haven’t made it into an outfit yet.
Not every outfit you style in the app will work in real life. But, (IMO) brainstorming digitally allows your creative juices to flow faster and without as much judgment. It quiets the negative voices in your head that tend to pop up whenever you’re looking at yourself in a mirror. You can even do it sitting on your couch! It’s much easier than rummaging around in your actual closet. I like to use outfit tags to tag “untested” outfits as such, so I can easily come back to them later when I’m ready to try them out IRL.
I’ll also mention: now is the perfect time to bring an Indyx stylist into the mix! A Lookbook gives you an injection of new ideas to work from. Or, The Feed gives you a style coach who’ll keep you moving forward, giving you new ideas and new prompts for this process of self-reflection each and every week. It’s all available in the app!
Until next week….
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