If you’re anything like me, you love clothes. But when it comes to packing for trips, we might not be as prepared as we think. I used to pack my suitcase with the clothes that I thought I wanted to wear on vacation and then, at the last minute, find myself scrambling around trying to figure out how I can make each outfit work! It was stressful and left me feeling frazzled before even boarding the plane.

That is why today’s blog post is all about how you can plan your outfits for vacation effectively, so you pack just what you will need, and there are no surprises along the way. I believe technology makes our life easier, so I’ll be using the Stylebook app, but you can use any other outfit planner app.

Decide how many outfits you need

The number of outfits depends on the type of travel you’re about to embark on and for how long. When I’m traveling, I always think of clothes for every kind of occasion that my trip will entail. For example, if there’s a formal evening event, you need something appropriate for it, or they might not let you into the event!

Each day has its own needs, which must come with accompanying outfits. One of the worst feelings is packing for a trip and realizing you forgot something. Avoid this heart-wrenching experience by planning: before your departure, decide what type of clothes will match each day’s activities.

RELATED ARTICLE: The Complete Guide To The Stylebook App: How To Use (+ Tips and Tricks)

So, once you have an outline of your activities, think about how many outfits you will need for each day, and add an extra one, just in case. Let’s say you have a 5-day trip that involves two formal evening events. Then, you may need to plan for six looks – adding an extra one just in case – for the daytime and two more for the evening (plus any extras, like exercise, swim, or lounging clothes).

Put the outfits together visually

There’s nothing like putting the looks visually together to realize how well each piece matches with the other. Visualizing also helps to optimize the number of clothes we need to pack. For example, a pair of denim shorts or a basic black skirt can be worn in so many ways that we could repeat that piece some days and look completely different.

After this exercise, you may realize that there are pieces that you were thinking of packing, but after seeing everything together, it does not make sense to take them anymore. Or, on the other hand, you might encounter that you need extra things, like another pair of comfy shoes or a scarf, to have a more enjoyable travel experience.

So, let’s use technology in our favor to visualize the upcoming adventure! 

Upload your clothes and accessories through photos

The Stylebook app lets you recreate your closet in the digital world. All you need to do is go to the Closet tab and add your items.

The first time you go in the Closet section, you will see some categories already created, such as Tops, Bottoms, Shoes, Dresses, etc. These categories are customizable to your needs; in my case, I left them as they are.

To add an item, you can tap into the category you want to add it to and take or upload an existing photo – or upload it from the web. Once you upload it, the app will automatically remove the image’s background, which is excellent! Then you need to fill in some details about the piece, such as brand, color, etc.

Pro tip: If you want your items to look nicer, you can download the photos from the retailer’s product page you bought them from, as those are usually very professional-looking.

Mix and match pieces to create the outfit combinations

Now, go to the Looks tab. You’ll see some categories here as well, such as Day, Work, Evening, etc., to classify your looks and make them easier to find.

Select one of the categories, and you’ll see two options to add a new look: 

• Outfit Shuffle™ feature lets you choose 3 to 8 clothing categories to mix items randomly; this is great to find combinations you never thought of!
• Manually create an outfit by adding items; use this if you have a specific look in mind.

Create as many combinations as you’d like! You don’t need to limit yourself only to create the specified number of looks you need for the travel. The more you have, the more you can optimize in the following steps.

Create your packing list

Once you have your closet – or part of it – digitized and your favorite outfits together, it will be straightforward to create your packing list.

In the Home tab, you can find the Packing section to add as many packing lists as you need. Once you create one, you can add looks and individual items to it as well.

I like that you can add all your desired looks at once, and your packing list is automatically created. For this example, I was able to make six looks based on twelve clothing items. Play around with the outfits to optimize the number of articles as much as you want or need!

Remember to add an extra outfit – or two, space permits – just in case.

When you’re ready, you can even generate a printable checklist. How awesome is that?

Create an outfit calendar

In the Stylebook app, go to the Calendar tab, and add looks to each day to fit your activities. You can add more than one look per day. Now you know what to wear each day without wasting valuable time from your travel!

Final thoughts

I hope you’ve enjoyed this blog post!. Also, I hope you can take at least one of these ideas that will help simplify your travel experience.

It can be easy to get lost in the packing process and forget about what clothes might work best for where you’re going or how many outfits you’ll need on a given trip. The good news is that with some effective and efficient planning, we should be able to avoid those headaches! What do you think? Let me know in the comments below.