One busy morning, I found myself staring at my overflowing wardrobe, feeling frustrated and overwhelmed. I had a meeting to attend and wanted to look my best, but after try countless options, I felt like I had nothing to wear. In a rush, I grabbed an outfit that didn’t quite match my mood and I didn't feel comfortable at all that day.
This experience made me realise how much time and stress choosing an outfit could cause. I thought about how many others must feel the same way—standing in front of their closets, unsure of what to wear, and wasting precious time. I envisioned this app that could help organise clothes, suggest outfits, and ultimately boost confidence.
Some important data points that I found and the results of an online survey done by 48 people:
Time Spent Choosing Outfits: A survey by Marks & Spencer revealed that women spend an average of 17 minutes daily deciding what to wear, while men take about 13 minutes. This highlights the potential for an app that streamlines outfit selection.
Impact of Clothing on Mood: Research from the Journal of Experimental Social Psychology found that wearing formal clothing can enhance cognitive flexibility and abstract thinking. This suggests that feeling good in what you wear can positively affect performance and confidence, reinforcing the app's value in helping users choose outfits that boost their mood.
Consumer Trends: A report from Statista indicated that the global online clothing rental market is projected to grow significantly, suggesting that consumers are increasingly looking for innovative ways to manage and curate their wardrobes.
Wardrobe Management Apps: According to a survey by App Annie, fashion and clothing apps have seen increased engagement, with users spending more time on apps that help them organize and style their clothing, indicating a demand for such solutions.
Sustainability Awareness: A study by McKinsey found that 67% of consumers consider the use of sustainable materials important when making clothing purchases. An app that helps users maximize their wardrobe can promote sustainable fashion practices by reducing unnecessary buying.
I also interviewed 8 people, their needs are reflected on the following comment:
I conducted a benchmark with over 30 functionalities that my app could have. This, along with the negative reviews of the competition gave me many ideas. After several rough sketches, I decided to address the following problems represented in my user persona:
To address my user persona problems, the final prototype needed to have the following functionalities:
Organise and maintain an inventory of her clothes.
Create looks with her items and customise them in a calendar, including the time and event for which she plans to wear them.
Receive outfit suggestions based on the items she owns.
I then created several prototypes that were tested by 20 users:
The low-fidelity prototype for quick testing of the basic element placement.
The medium-fidelity prototype with recognisable patterns to determine if it is intuitive enough for users aged 12 to 55.
Testing led me to the final high-fidelity prototype, which I will explain by accompanying Becky in three different situations:
Becky complains to her friend that her wardrobe is full of clothes, but she feels like she has nothing to wear or has very similar items. Her friend recommends M!Closet, and she downloads it.
Upon opening the app, she encounters a simple onboarding process that introduces the main features. We ask for her name to personalize her experience and to engage with her more. She selects her usual style when dressing and arrives at the home screen.
Becky from the Homepage touch the screen and immediately the app show her a short tutorial on how to add her clothes to the app.
Next, she adds an image of one of her garments from her gallery, edits it to remove the background, and categorise it filling up filters such as type of garment, colour, and brand…
She saves it in the Closet > Clothing > Blouses.
This time, Becky is standing in line to pay for a green dress on sales at Zara. There are a lot of people and she opens M!Closet to check if she already has a similar one and if the purchase is necessary. On the app, we see her logging into her account, where the homepage shows the look she created for an event she has that same day.
Then, we see her in the Closet section, where she has three options: view her clothes, her looks, or chat with an AI stylist. She clicks on "Clothing" and filters to see which green dresses she has. She realises she has plenty of them and doesn’t need another one. She decides to save time by focusing on getting ready for the event later that afternoon, and she’s also saved some money.
Becky is on the bus and gets bored, so she grabs her phone to see what she’s going to wear the next day. Suddenly, she remembers that she has plans to meet a friend, so she goes to Calendar > October 8th and creates a look with her new dress and favourite sandals. Once added, she can make them larger, rotate them, or overlap them. She also personalizes the look of the day writing the name of the event "Breakfast with Emily" and set up the time 10:00.
