Stylebook App Review

Hi there! A while ago I mentioned how I was considering downloading the Stylebook app and so I finally decided to go ahead and buy it. Now usually I don't like to pay for apps so I always try to find a free version of it. But after researching & discovering everything Stylebook had to offer and how amazingly organized it looked, I went ahead and bought the app.
First of all, I want to mention that this post is not sponsored by Stylebook. Anything and everything I've said in this post is my opinion only and I am not receiving any sort of compensation for this review. I did this as I was cataloging my own closet so I can get an idea of how I can pair different pieces of clothing together and create an outfit! For me, it's easier to see an outfit on a screen (thanks to Pinterest) instead of pulling out all of my clothing every time I try to put together a fun outfit. This is one of the very few times technology wins over the usual "old school" way in my book.

Okay, so now that's out of the way, let's get to it. I will be honest and will tell you that I have still not cataloged every single piece of clothing I own and uploaded it in stylebook. I started with the new clothes I've been buying for PA school since we have a business casual dress code and have not made it through the rest of my closet yet. This is because taking photos that come out good and can be edited using Stylebook's editing options takes quite a bit of time. More on that later.

What I Liked

1) The app lets you categorize each piece of clothing such as tops, bottoms, dresses, accessories, shoes, bags, and outerwear. Then it further breaks it down into sub-categories. Let's take tops for instance. Tops get sub-categorized into blouses, sleeveless, sweaters, shirts, etc. You get the picture. This makes it easy to find the exact piece you want to put together in an outfit instead of going through all 50 tops you may have taken a picture of.

2) You can create a look and organize it by categories such as day, evening, work, formal, vacation, etc. And if these categories don't work for you, you can also change their names and the order they appear in.

3) It has a calendar you guys! This is right up my alley, since I've already talked about how I like to plan my outfits for the week in advance in this post. You can create an outfit and add it to a specific date on the calendar! This is so convenient as I can plan my outfits for a week without even having to open my closet. Once you add your outfits to the calendar, the app will also help you figure out how often you wear a certain item and which ones you have been neglecting. This is great for a person like me as I usually sticks to wearing the same items (neutrals & solids) over and over again.

4) I use Stylebook app on my iPhone and iPad and it gives me the ability to easily transfer new outfits or items through Wifi Accept. I've read about some people having issues with this but it went pretty smoothly for me (so far).

5) There's a shopping option right in the app! Now while I probably won't ever shop through Stylebook, I like that this gives you the option to save items to your closet or to your inspiration list from a store's website. I have the stores I frequent marked as my favorites and have found so many items to save straight into the app, so I don't have to take pictures of any new clothes that I purchase. This is super convenient and saves so much time.

Things I Didn't Particularly Enjoy

1)  Taking pictures of clothes doesn't seem that hard, right? Wrong. I spent close to 3 hours on a Saturday morning taking pictures of my clothes and I'm not even done with bags, shoes, and jewelry yet. The hardest part is to remove the background once you take a picture. The app is great at removing the background for some items, and for others its just straight up torture. You have the option to manually remove the background by using your finger as an eraser but let's be real, that takes forever and the end result still isn't what you would've liked. At this point, I've started adding things by finding them in the shopping section of the app. Sometimes it's not the exact same thing, but it's close enough to give me an idea. You can also find the item you bought from a store's website and save the photo and upload it in to Stylebook. However, since I'm pretty picky, I only do this if the item is pictured by itself and isn't on a model.

Honestly that's the only thing about this app that I wish were easier or different. Once you get your clothing cataloged, the maintenance is really simple. When I find the time, I will be adding my shoes and bags to the app and hopefully that won't take as much time.

This past weekend, I went through every single piece of clothing I own and cleaned out my closet. I move in less than a month (!!!) so I'm slowly starting to clean through my things before I begin packing. That way, I only take things that I still like and need, instead of carrying around things that really just need to go.

If anyone has any tips on how to take pictures of jewelry and make it look good, please do share! Have any of you guys used Stylebook already? How was your experience? I'd love to hear from you in the comments.

P. S. - I'm 29 days away from PA School Orientation!!! And only 2 weeks until the roomie beach trip :) So many things happening on this side! Watch this space for more updates. Enjoy your Tuesday.