Whering App: Transforming The Way We Shop, Style And Dress For The Future

Imagine opening up your wardrobe doors with an outfit already decided for you. It is the ultimate dream for a woman. With that in mind, focus your attention on the Whering App, which allows the consumer to reflect on new ethical ways to shop, style and dress. The app creates better choices in spending less on newness in the shops and utilising the idea to mix and match what we already own.

Think about the character - Cher from the 1995 classic film Clueless. She used an application on her computer that gave her plenty of clothing options of her choice. With a click of a button, she was able to put together her daily outfit with ease. With the Whering app, you will receive the same treatment and more. The digitalised styling tool is designed for future generations to stop and think about sustainability as a crucial factor in our lives and moving ahead towards the future. By changing your wardrobe into an ethical space, you can minimise the “buy-use-dispose” attitude of the norm.

The Whering app gives women hope and the encouragement to make quick and easy decisions with their wardrobe. It is the perfect reliable styling tool each woman should have on their devices, a suitable application for a woman on-the-go.

Like any other woman, we love the idea of going out and shopping for something new and fresh, instead of facing the same collection of clothing you see daily. Breaking up the cycle for unnecessary purchasing allows the consumer to make use of their wardrobes more effectively and efficiently.

With this digital platform, you can see all of what you own and love in one space. You can minimise your spending for the better, shop less and turn your wardrobe into a sustainable palace that you will appreciate in your daily life.

“We’re making way for a new generation of closets. Whering is about promoting a culture of caring for your clothes”, Bianca Rangecroft, Founder of Whering.

She aims to create a wardrobe zen experience for women to interact with the clothes we have never experienced before. She explains why:

1) Why do you feel it's important for the consumer to have everything they own in one place? I founded Whering out of a profound desire to democratize the personal styling landscape (after having worked on the Stichfix IPO whilst at Goldman Sachs) and fundamentally change the way we interact with our clothes (i.e. upend the throwaway culture). For me the system was broken; the vicious cycle of not being able to see what you own, impulse buying (but never getting it quite right) and the lack of inspiration in the styling process meant only one thing, we had to take it digital and harness the power of machine learning to hyper-personalize our fashion experience. Seeing everything in the palm of your hand and being able to create outfits on the go (or one's you'd never thought of) is a game changer for me. 2) Where did you get your inspiration to create this app? First and foremost it was an homage to Cher in Clueless - I'd always wanted a product like that and couldn't understand why anyone had built something similar - because as a consumer the options are endless and so exciting! More seriously, the ‘I have nothing to wear’ dilemma felt universal and that sensation of being trapped in indecision only too familiar. For me, part of the problem isn’t having nothing to wear, but having nothing new to wear. We keep buying because we think that just one more item will unlock our ideal wardrobe – but how can it if we have no accessible inventory of what we own nor time to style our pieces in new ways? 3) So far, do you think your consumers have warmed to the possibility of digitalising their wardrobe more easily and effectively? Yes! We've certainly had a wonderful community of early adopters who jumped on the bandwagon on day one - but we've seen a huge uptick in the number of pieces digitised on the app (especially during covid - as people had more time on their hands) - above 100k images uploaded so we're feeling confident this will become the new norm and a crucial part of our fashion experience. 4) Has this app been more effective during our current time of the pandemic? In many ways I think it allowed women to take back control of their wardrobes and realise that there is power in a more conscious and personalised way of shopping (aka less but smarter). Taking stock of what you own (and being able to see it!) can be incredibly rewarding - and many of us have relied on Whering to get dressed in the morning and blow away those wfh blues. 5) When did you launch your app? End of February - so super recent! We're only 6 months old as a company and have moved really fast whilst staying close to our community so that we could build what they wanted most. 6) Do you think this app save time and energy whilst getting dressed? One hundred times yes (and money!). The signature Dress Me feature auto-generates looks for you on a daily basis - so you can literally wake up and go. For the busy gals, we've also built a calendar to which you can add your weekly looks and the OOTD pops up when you log onto the app - a planner's paradise. I personally used to do this on excel back in my banking days - so that those 5am wake up calls weren't so hard. 7) How important is it for consumers to utilise their spending power? For me, two things are crucial - one is cultivating a slow mindset (only buy things you will cherish, look after, repair, repurpose or ethically donate) and the other voting with your wallet. Utilising our spending power for good is the biggest change consumers can make towards a more conscious relationship to fashion; investing in smaller or sustainable brands (i.e. higher quality, durable garments & living wages to those who make them), buying pre-loved when possible and renting outfits you only want to experiment with is truly how we will shift our habits and start cultivating 'greener' wardrobes. 8) Some women are used to the possibility of buying something new and in season to add to their wardrobe, do you believe if they can view their pieces styled differently, they would think twice about purchasing something new and on trend? Absolutely. One of the biggest things we're looking to help women with is that feeling of clutter and mental overwhelm which results from over buying/buying for trends. At Whering we're striving for #wardrobezen - so learning to buy fewer things, styling them differently to get that dopamine hit and investing in those purchases to ensure what we buy is during, fits our style and wardrobe is essential. 9) Is this an idea that was always on the cards to create for your career? Not at all! I was working at Goldman Sachs in their Consumer Division and was loving the world of finance. However, when I worked on the Stichfix and Farfetch IPOs I became engrossed in the customisation possibilities in the fashion space (especially with machine learning) - that's really when the beginning of Whering started burgeoning in my mind.

10) To create the best styling environment for each customer, you have a personality test, what type of questions do you ask to get to know the customer's style of fashion? Getting to know our Wherers is what matters most to us. We ask you a whole host of quick fire questions to determine your style personality, as well as learn from the beautiful outfits you create yourself on Whering to offer you styling recommendations based on these two inputs. We'd ask you things like what's your work to play ratio, which city break best describes you, what your body shape is etc. 11) Were you influenced by the 1995 classic film Clueless? As if! No but seriously - this was a major source of inspiration - because we can all relate to Cher's floordrobe and wished we had Whering in our lives to help us get dressed every day. 12) On one of your Instagram feeds, it mentions "We all love clothes, let's remember who made them". Would you say this is one of your core values for your Fashion app?

Yes absolutely - that and we are working tirelessly to extend the life cycle of the millions of clothes lying idle in our physical wardrobes by taking them digital. Everything we do at Whering is about enabling us all to fall back in love with what we own, respect those who make our garments and acquire the knowledge needed to best care for our items in the long run.

View below the format of the Whering App from wardrobe selection, outfit choices/alternatives to your final look chosen.

Click here to learn more about the app.

Words from Charlene Foreman.