A one-hour shopping session with a personal stylist, at about $175. I desperately wanted to break out of my t-shirt/blue jeans habit, but parsing clothes sizes, trying things on, and getting opinions is equal parts sorcery and torture for me. (I'd tried Stitch Fix and felt like it wanted to reinforce my habits rather than break me out of them.)
After sending her details about my problems and the kinds of styles I admired, the stylist experience was very old-school retail — a department store — but she was unexpectedly pragmatic, giving great advice about picking durable clothes and materials that specifically fit well on me, with lots of wink-and-nudge budget advice (like "This would look great on you for $50 less" followed by flashing me a Nordstrom Rack or Poshmark listing of it).
Also, finding out that the department store has a complimentary tailoring service for hemming and adjusting the waistline on pants you buy from there permanently changed my clothes shopping process.
I don't want to belittle your experience as stylists can be helpful for achieving a certain look, but often department stores (especially Nordstrom) have sales associates trained as stylists.
They will spend a lot of time helping you with your style for free, albeit you'll probably want to buy from that particular store. Nordstrom clothes are a bit on the pricier end, but ~most~ are often good quality.
We went to a Nordstrom, actually, and worked with their designated stylist who did quite a bit of the picking. The value for the hired stylist was not working for Nordstrom, which meant being able to say "that looks good, here's something that will look as good and cost half as much, and also here's why that looks good on you and where you can find it elsewhere".
EDIT: I really also want to stress that the stylist was just... nice. Completely non-judgmental about me waffling over things, offering lots of advice beyond just the clothing — how different postures affect fits, being able to explain to me why layering was sometimes uncomfortable and how to alleviate it, how to better adjust my fit when my body's size changes, even a gym recommendation. The in-shop stylist was also very nice, but the hired stylist got me through the door to the shop, and for me at least, that was worth the $175.
Interesting, I have a preferred stylist at Nordstrom in Seattle and there’s never been even a suggestion she would charge $175 (or anything) for services. Definitely possible to not take along your “hired help” and be successful!
I spend 60-90 minutes with her a handful of times a year and it’s been awesome - something I wish I’d started doing a decade ago in fact.
I also never felt entirely happy with Stitch Fix, or shopping the racks myself in stores. It was harder for me to find items which work well together and which fit well.
Nordstrom also tailors almost everything I buy in at least a minor way — length of arms, waist size, length of leg. Really does make a difference.
I get it, and I've been back to that Nordstrom without the hired stylist and gotten advice from the in-shop stylist. I expanded my answer a bit, but I never would've gone into the Nordstrom to shop if it hadn't been for the hired stylist. I didn't know what I didn't know.
Maybe $175 wasn't a good objective value for that, but for me, it worked.
I think that’s a good point, some things are extremely obvious for some people and they don’t need any consulting on that subject. Good for them, but it may not be obvious for other people. That’s normal and that’s fine.
It is completely normal to hire a trainer for learning a new sport, why shouldn’t you do that for other skills. If you’re bad at picking clothes, you can easily spend way more than $175 on stuff that isn’t comfortable and you will never wear.
And if you look at people on the street, at least one third seems to be bad at shopping clothes ;)
No, I’ve never tipped them. Once asked if that was expected and she said no.
I believe Men’s and Women’s is 8-10% commission rate, but believe Kid’s is higher. Shopping in Men’s a single jacket from Armani runs about $1500-1800, formal trousers in the $350-500 range, decent jeans or shirts seem to be in the $150-250 range, tees they carry from e.g. Robert Barakett around $70.
It adds up and I feel like it’s hard to get out of there with a few new outfits for under $2000. It’s worth using their loyalty program [1] and worth considering their store card, although “Icon” status means spending >$15k per year on their store card.
If you end up liking Zegna then you’re up into the stratosphere at $3500-5500/ea for many of their items.
I guess it’s possible tips are appreciated if you’re going to visit, take an hour of their time and emerge with one $70 tee at the end? That’s not been my shopping experience, I don’t wear Zegna, but I usually buy a few pairs of Paige jeans and some Bugatchi shirts, perhaps a new merino wool pullover, probably some shoes. By the time I’m ready to spend 90 minutes in Nordstrom shopping and getting the tailor to measure for alterations, I’m usually looking for enough new stuff that the stylist will make $200-500 in commission.
Edit: Oh, and worth knowing is Nordstrom does sales at the start of the AW season [2] for incoming items. It’s a quirk, and it’s worth timing some of your shopping to coincide because it’ll save you 15-30% off a lot of items!
Usually they work for commission, at least where I shop. They either go to the cash register with you or put stickers with their personal number on the price tag.
Which means they will give you the clothes with the highest commission, and are going to tell you that those look best on you.
I used to work at fairly expensive furniture/houseware retailer. They had a big squad of interior designers who all worked for free. They drove so much additional revenue that we didn't need to charge customers at all.
I have no experience here, but I'd guess they would. It would be better to guarantee a sale than alienate a customer who would consider returning of the experience went well.
A lot of current season clothing will have MAP (minimum advertised pricing) agreements in play meaning you’re probably paying list almost anywhere which is an authorized retailer.
Now, what you can do is figure out what brands suit you and fit well, what sizes are good, then shop past seasons in Nordstrom Rack or elsewhere. Popular sizes and colorways may sell out quickly so it’s a more frustrating experience, but you can see items marked down 55-75% too!
I did the same thing several years ago, only in my case I was able to follow the guides at /r/malefashionadvice for free, highly recommended if you don't want to or can't afford a personal stylist right now.
Look at the guides on their sidebar (on old reddit at least) and they have everything you need, such as a basic guide, what to buy for $X, and so on. Take particular notice at their What Are You Wearing Today (WAYWT) threads, while they are sometimes ludicrous, they often show the current fashion zeitgeist.
Is there not a simple "look book" that exists and gives you examples of where you can find / buy the kinds of clothes that you see and like? (hopefully for less than premium prices)
I find it odd / annoying that all the clothing is made in low cost countries, but we need funnelers of information or access or recommendations who tack on a surcharge at every step until you're paying $50 for a simple t-shirt.
I equally find it very strange that, for companies making and selling clothing, I can only imagine it costs very little much more to make good-looking clothing and copy the latest styles. Why does cheap clothing always seem to be so unstylish?
Example: someone manufacturing a tie (if people wear those any more even), the material and labor scarcely costs more if it's ugly versus nice. Why are ugly ties still made?
Just looked up stitch fix to see what that was since I never heard of it. First results include news stories of the CEO stepping down and laying off 20% of its workforce in the last 24 hours. Ouch.
its not personalized. Funny story. My wife tried it out one time, and we went to meet up with a friend who we haven't seen in 5 years who just came back from working in Japan. The friend and my wife have vastly different body types, hair colors, height and style. Guess who ended up matching exactly in clothing for the night?
It’s not personalized at all when I tried it about a year or so back.
I signed on and in my intake explicitly said I wanted new shorts and I live in Texas so don’t need jackets.
They sent me a jacket and some shoes and shirts and no shorts.
If you’re looking to build out a whole new closet it might be okay if you just want whatever the current style is but if you want something specific it didn’t look like a good product.
Which is hilarious since they were well known for having an insanely huge data science team supposedly working on really tough problems in personalization. They had a constant stream of (interesting) blog posts but I was always curious how much of that work really touched the product. AI/ML was supposed to be their big market edge.
Not too surprised that didn't work out given my experience with every other company that had built out massive teams of largely inexperienced DS people.
I went to Nordstrom looking for a nice blazer to up my wardrobe with a hard limit of $400. I had a couple guys who kept bringing me pricey items that didn't match what I asked for and half heartedly saying "looks good bro trust me". It was annoying, I know they're on commission but at least make an effort to sell.
Finally another of the sales guys started chatting with me. I explained what I wanted and he went and grabbed exactly that. The item was less than my limit and on sale. With the savings in mind I asked if he could suggest a couple more items, told him the colors I like and general style. He brought a few more told me what he honestly thought (if it looked good or not) and I knew this was now my personal stylist.
Now whenever I walk in if he's not working I just come back another day. This guy is good at his job, and has learned what I like. He makes recommendations, I give my feedback when I don't like something, and he rolls with it.
So all I can say is create a litmus test, and don't be afraid to tell them they have totally missed the mark and you're gonna look around on your own. Soon enough someone else will walk up and you try again.
My wife is a stylist and does an online-only version of this (and other related services) over at https://estilistas.co.uk/ (hope no one minds the plug!)
I'm always surprised how often her clients come back multiple times per year. She's had quite a few from the US and Canada too. She caters for men & women
> I'd tried Stitch Fix and felt like it wanted to reinforce my habits rather than break me out of them.
Wow, same! Who/what service did you use? This was my biggest gripe with Stitch Fix, my friends are all surprised I complain about it. I wanted an opinionated new style and all I got was the same stuff I usually wear, just more expensive.
The "stylist" part of Stitch Fix disappointed me the most. I had a different stylist each time even when I didn't request a change and none of them seemed to take feedback into account in the selections. It made me doubt that the "stylist" was anything but a vague algorithm with a boilerplate letter generator.
I used FernDate,[1] which is pitched as a dating profile consult but lets you select services a-la-carte. You can find local stylists and negotiate with them if all you need is a consult — the prices they list on their websites are often expecting to do a full wardrobe assessment, outfit curation, and co-shopping for a femme client, but (in my limited experience) will mark prices down a bit if you're masculine.
Thanks for that. I'm in the PNW and I've been looking around for a good tailor. I was ordering some of my stuff pseudo-custom from sonofatilor but it's a bit hamstrung by how bad I am at taking my own measurements. Other than that the shirts are really nice, but the wool is a bit fragile (no afilliation). I also have a bit of an odd shirt size so this is helpful
Lots of Googling, then a little calling around. I started with one in my neighborhood who also runs a hair salon, who was also the only one I found who specifically advertised a masculine-specific wardrobe assessment service.
When I described my problem, she gave me a shortlist of several other stylists who were outside of what I thought I was looking for, like FernDate, Duchess, and some local vintage-specific pickers who just aren't online.
After sending her details about my problems and the kinds of styles I admired, the stylist experience was very old-school retail — a department store — but she was unexpectedly pragmatic, giving great advice about picking durable clothes and materials that specifically fit well on me, with lots of wink-and-nudge budget advice (like "This would look great on you for $50 less" followed by flashing me a Nordstrom Rack or Poshmark listing of it).
Also, finding out that the department store has a complimentary tailoring service for hemming and adjusting the waistline on pants you buy from there permanently changed my clothes shopping process.