Daily Hits of Happy: June 6, 2020 - 267 - "My Favorite App: Stylebook-Part 1-Setting It All Up"

Virtual Wardrobe

I've intended to post about the Stylebook app (Stylebook App) for a long time, mainly because I freakin' love the thing.

My step-daughter, Kristine, recommended it to me. She said you take pictures of all your clothes, so you can access them from anywhere.

I thought it sounded like a cool thing, but really time-consuming. Kristine explained all the million ways having this app set up would streamline my clothes packing, planning, and purchasing and, basically, completely revolutionize my life. (She's an excellent salesperson and made me feel like I'd be a moron not to try it.)

I believed her, but just couldn't picture myself doing all that work.

But the more I thought about it, the more I realized it was the perfect time for this project. I'd just done the entire Marie Kondo declutter plan, and my wardrobe was a ghost of its former self.

I had tossed or donated a considerable percentage of my clothes. I had nothing left that didn't fit, wasn't in good repair, or that I didn't like.

I figured if I was ever going to do it, this would be the time.

The weekend after that conversation, Michael went on an out of town trip, and I had three days off of work. I thought: Why not? No time like the present.

Setting It Up

It turned out that I was right about it being time-consuming. Even after ditching so much, there are still a lot of items that go into a wardrobe. Trying to make a visual record of every item does take awhile.

I took the suggestions from the app's website and got a little system going. I cleared off the bed and started grabbing one small section of my closet at a time. I laid out each article of clothing, snapped a photo of it, rehung that one, grabbed another, and took a picture of it.

I got a cup of tea, and later in the evening, a glass of wine, listened to an Audible book, and just kept working away.

The idea is to lay things out kind of in the way you might wear them so they'll look like an outfit when you put all the pieces together. Here I used a pot to wrap scarves around.

For the apps background-remover to work best, you want to take pictures with the most contrast between the clothing and what it's lying on as possible. So I first separated out all of the white items (because I had light sheets on the bed) and set them aside for later.

I later switched to the dark sheet to do the white clothing items, but then got extra-ambitious and started working on taking a picture of every piece of jewelry I owned.

It took a couple of days (working about 3 hours a day) to make all of those photos.

Then I started using the app to remove all the backgrounds and sort the items into categories. I did that in my downtime: waiting in a line, at a doctor's office, or whatever. It sort of feels like playing an online game, but a lot more constructive in the long run.

Eventually, I went back and even added things like swimsuits, exercise gear, and pajamas.

Here's my short sleeve t-shirts section:

It Really Works

I noticed recently that I've been using this app for nearly 5 years. The benefits have made that initial investment of time well worth it. I'm not sure I could function anymore without the thing.

I'll get into details about its benefits in the next post, but my top three 'wins' from using this app are: 1-Being able to decide what I'm going to wear for the day...while lying in bed. 2-Being able to plan my packing lists...while laying in bed-sometimes in a different city from where my closet is. And, 3-Knowing what I already have at home and what sizes I bought, while standing in a store somewhere.

A Funny Ending

Sometime after I did all that work, I thought to mention to my step-daughter how much I loved the app she recommended.

She said: "I never set it up. It takes way too much time." (Sounding like anyone wasting their time on this nonsense were morons.)

Bahahahahahah! I'm glad I caught her on the day that she was high about that app. Otherwise, I would be missing all the great perks I get from using it all these years.