Tag Archives: shopping

Swishing Things Up A Little

Clothes Swaps, , , , , , , , , ,

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This season, we’ve upgraded the Style Lottery shopping experience. The first thing most people noticed was that we changed the name of our events.

So why a swish instead of a swap? It’s because swapping is simply about exchanging clothes while swishes are about creating community. Having lived in three cities in the last three years, I know from experience that meeting new people can be somewhat intimidating. Style Lottery brings people together and creates a sense of community around fashion. Our swish events happen on 3 levels (college, city, and community). Our events are our way of making our communities feel more intimate and our impact more evident.

For this event, we teamed up with a local creative collective called goDesignDC to create a unique shopping experience for our guests. The creative geniuses behind the collective (Obi and Amanda) gave us the boutique look we were going for. Here are a few highlights from the event.

A thoughtful & sustainably designed space

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Style Lottery is serious about sustainability, so teaming up with goDesignDC was a match made in Heaven. The team build the ceiling fixtures and racks from locally sourced and recycled materials. If you want to see more of their design vision, check out their Instagram page.

The chance to meet new people in your community _MG_8351

We love when our social circles overlap and our friends meet each other. Friends can turn into style soulmates in a matter of minutes. We witnessed it happen several times throughout the event. A style soulmate is someone who wears a similar size in clothing. Although you didn’t intend to, you end up picking up most of the things she brought to the swish. Once you find her, you decide you have too much in common not to be friends in real life. You exchange numbers and decide to go on a roadtrip to Philly together. That last part actually did happened at our last event. We couldn’t have made it up if we tried.

A curated boutique experience

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Our guests’ favorite part about our events is our ever-changing inventory. As the swish goes on, new items are brought out onto the floor. We had blogger and stylist, Buki Peters of Style With Buki, in the building helping guests style their swish finds. For guests at home missing out on the action, Buki also did a LIVE style session on Periscope.

The option to recycle clothes

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For this swish event, we were fortunate to partner with a local H&M store. The leftover clothing was donated to the store’s recycling program. Most people don’t know that H&M will give you a 15% off coupon for recycling with them. To reward the ladies for lowering their carbon footprints, we made sure that each woman received a 15% off coupon for her contributions.

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Thank you to everyone who made it to our first ever City Swish in DC. We’re always looking to improve your shopping experience for our guests. The feedback we received from our guests has been fantastic!  If you’ve ever been to one of our events, we’d love to hear from you. Please take 2 minutes to fill out our survey.

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   Photo cred: Obi Okolo (goDesignDC)

Behind Every Interesting Chair is an Equally Interesting Story

Splore Syracuse, , ,

 

 

Chair #1

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On our way home, my friend (who will remain nameless) spotted a couch on the sidewalk in front of a house. The owner saw us admiring the cute design and yelled from her window that we should feel free to take it. At this, my friend got excited and attempted to lift the couch. We then realized that we were about 3 to 4 blocks away from our neighborhood.  At the thought of dragging the couch all the way down the street, I had already resigned, in my head, to leave it where we found it. A kind stranger walked by and suggest, half in jest, that we hoist the couch upside down on my bike and wheel it down the street. We had no other option, so off we went, down the street with our curb shopping spoils. We received many stares and glances. All the while, I reminded myself that I was doing a favor for a friend and tried not to think about how my friend had even convinced me to transport the couch in the first place.  

Chair #2

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This fabulous high heel chair was spotted at the Westcott Street Fair in Syracuse this weekend, in front of the Boom Babies store. It’s funky and retro. It would make a fun personal chair to brighten up the color of a room. 

Chair #3

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This chair was a hard plastic chair in the shape of a hand that we found in front of a consignment shop. Something about it made me feel like a little kid and I had to sit on it.

I’m not sure how I found so many cool chairs this past week, but it made me feel like Goldilocks. Of all the 3 chairs we saw, we only took the couch (chair #1) home. The other two belonged to the stores.

10 Steps to Hosting a Clothes Swap

Clothes Swaps, Fashion, , , , , , ,

howtohostswap

1. Make an evite or Facebook event

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Tip: Invite your friends whose style you like and those who you think would enjoy the swap

Be sure that you explain what a clothes swap is in the info section of the evite. Many people are apprehensive about swaps because they have no clue what to expect.

Watch this quick video to learn more about clothes swaps:

2. Find a Venue

Depending on the kind of atmosphere you want to create, you need to pick your location wisely. I have been to a clothes swap in a small boutique with strangers (as an attendee) and I’ve hosted many in living rooms of homes with friends. Both were entirely different experiences. The boutique was interesting because I was getting to shop in strangers’ closets. It was nice to meet the other ladies and sample treats from local vendors. The swaps I had in homes felt comfortable and fun. I saw old friends and made new ones. I have concluded that there is no right or wrong location for a swap. You simply need to find a space that is big enough to store and display the clothing, a mirror for guests, and perhaps a private area (like a restroom) where they can try on clothing.

Another thing to consider is the size of the venue. In my experience, it’s best to over-invite. Cancellations are expected of any event. On average, I have about 15 guests at my swaps. This is a good number for such an event. 15 people will provide variety among the clothes, yet it is a small enough number for the event to still have an intimate feel. Make sure the venue can hold the number of invited guests and their belongings.

3. Collect donations

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Some guests, like my friend Bunmi, prefer to donate their items before the event.

There are a number of ways to get clothes to your swap. First, look in your own closet. Purge it of any items you no longer wear. Wash the items and put them aside for the swap. Then you can send a reminder to your guests to start putting aside some items about a week before the event. Guests often ask me what to bring. I throw the question back to them.

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Here’s an example of the poll I posted on the Facebook event.

Most guests opt to come to the event with their donations in hand.

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I asked my guests to bring a minimum of 5 items.

4. Sort through the items (guests can do this themselves)

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Tip: Keep an eye out for the condition of the items. I occasionally have a “shop at your own risk” box for items with rips or tears 

5. Mix and Mingle

You and your guests should set aside the first 15 minutes of the swap to sort through the clothing. My guests and I enjoyed some light snacks while we waited for the swapping period to pass. The snacking continued as the swap went on.

6. Setup and Organize the items into their designated areas

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Tip: Use racks and hangers, if possible.

If everyone sorts and organizes what they brought, the process is much faster.

7. Shop!

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Tip: As the host, you can help your guests shop.

Shopping is the easiest and the best part. There are a couple options when deciding how gets are going to shop:

Option #1: One-for-One trade- This means that the more you bring, the more you get to trade.

Option #2: First Dibs Goes to the Highest Giver– The person with the most donations gets to pick their items first

Option #3: Free-for-All– Everyone can shop to the hearts’ content, regardless of how much they brought.

All of my swaps have been free-for-alls. I have never had anyone complain or fight over clothes. The free-for-all has the potential of appearing a little chaotic, but as long as your guests put back the items they don’t want, this option is a lot of fun.

Don’t forget to shop for yourself too. It can be easy to forget that you are a shopper as well when you’re floating around doing host-duties. By all means, help recommend clothes for your guests

8.Choose a charity or resale store to donate the remaining clothes

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Tip: Donating to a thrift store you often shop at is a great way to give back.


9. Pack them up and donate themScreen shot 2013-06-03 at 4.04.29 PM

10. Fill out a donation receipt

If the donation is big enough, it just may help you out on your taxes.

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Planning a clothes swap might take some work, but you and your friends will get more out of it than you put in. Give it a try!