- yesterday
This week on The Vergecast, guest host Mia Sato talks to YouTube fitness pioneer Cassey Ho (better known as Blogilates) about the well-oiled machine that is the dupe economy. Ho shares her experience creating her own line of athletic wear that sooner or later gets ripped off by countless copycats — and how she tries to fight back.
Category
🤖
TechTranscript
00:00:00Welcome to The Vergecast, the flagship podcast of knocking off other people's work and selling
00:00:07it for $2. I'm your host, Mia Sato, and today we're talking about knockoffs and waste,
00:00:13two big problems in the fashion industry. Whenever a design goes viral, the copycats
00:00:18are close behind. Today, I'm going to talk with an OG fitness YouTuber, Cassie Ho, better
00:00:24known as Blogilates, about how she fights the dupes of her products. Another result
00:00:29of the ultra-fast fashion cycle is a lot of textile waste. I visited a textile recycling
00:00:36plant in Brooklyn, New York, to find out how they save textiles from the landfill. And
00:00:41finally, if you're into fashion like me, you probably wish you had the clueless closet.
00:00:47We'll have V-Song to take a listener question about how to make that a reality. All that
00:00:51is coming up, but first, I have to go maximize shareholder value in an ad break. We'll be
00:00:56right back.
00:00:59Welcome back. The internet is built on repetition and copying, and now that same dynamic has
00:01:08permeated our real lives as well. A photo will go viral, and thousands of lookalike products
00:01:13will follow, often sold from faceless, nameless companies. Cassie Ho built a fitness empire
00:01:20on YouTube. She now has her own line of athletic wear that's prime material for dupes.
00:01:26Cassie, you've been online a long time, so tell us who you are and what you do.
00:01:31All right. My name is Cassie Ho, but I may be better known as Blogilates. I started my YouTube
00:01:38channel in 2009, teaching free fitness workouts. And it's been a long time. I can't believe it's 2025
00:01:44now, but I am still online, but my content has changed a little bit. It transformed from free
00:01:52fitness, horizontal, long-form videos to now vertical, short-form, where I'm teaching people
00:01:58about the why behind my designs. I run a very rapidly growing activewear and apparel company called
00:02:07PopFlex. And we just started our second brand, launched our second brand, Blogilates, at Target
00:02:14earlier this year. So my life is all about innovation, design, and it's just been really,
00:02:21really fun to build this company.
00:02:23I just want to clarify for anyone who doesn't know that Cassie is an OG blueprint fitness blogger.
00:02:31I remember watching Cassie's videos when I was a teenager, so it was kind of surreal to talk with
00:02:36you about something that is kind of, you know, related but different. So you've been building
00:02:41PopFlex Active, you have this Blogilates deal with Target, and obviously you share a lot of like
00:02:46behind-the-scenes stuff and development with your fans online on social. Do you remember the first time
00:02:53that you saw something, whether that was online or in store, and you were like, wait a minute, I designed
00:02:59this? Yeah. I mean, I designed this very specific skort called the Pirouette Skort in 2021. And I
00:03:08remember as I was designing it, I told my husband, who's also my business partner, I said, Shein's
00:03:13going to take this one. I just knew it. I had a feeling. We released the design, it goes viral,
00:03:18and three months later, guess who takes it? It's Shein. So that was a whole situation. I made a big
00:03:26post about it. The U.S. Shein president reached out to me and wanted to speak because his daughter
00:03:31was a fan of Blogilates and came into his room yelling, being like, oh my God, what did you do,
00:03:35Cassie? And I'm very grateful for her because we ended up talking. And even though he and Shein
00:03:42promised that this wasn't going to happen again, surely enough, in another three months, another
00:03:48dupe of the Pirouette Skort shows up. And since then, there's been multiples, over a dozen different
00:03:56designs from Popflex stolen by Shein. But also since then, I've been granted the USPTO design patent
00:04:04for that specific skort, which has helped protect it in some ways. But at the same time, it's been
00:04:10extremely frustrating because the lack of enforcement from the government to help innovators,
00:04:17inventors, designers protect their creative work makes it almost impossible sometimes to go up
00:04:25against these Goliaths when I'm this small David. But I keep speaking up because it is unfair to be
00:04:34taken advantage of. And at least I have a platform from which to speak, whereas a lot of independent
00:04:39designers may not. So when I do this, I speak for all of us. Yeah. And I want to just sort of
00:04:46describe the skirt a little bit. I have a skirt in the other room that I bought for the story that
00:04:52I was working on. But it's like sort of a unique type of activewear. It's like, you know, kind of
00:04:58lilac. Well, the one I have is lilac, but it comes in a bunch of colors. It has several tiers of mesh
00:05:04skirting, shorts underneath. But what else makes a design special where you were like, I know that
00:05:09this is so special that someone will knock it off. Yeah. So the thing with Popflex, with me and all
00:05:15of my designs is I add this element of just like romance to every design because I'm very much,
00:05:22that's who I am. And so I love when there's this intersection of fashion and functionality and
00:05:28innovation all together in one. So you get this beautiful, twirlable mesh skort with tiers. And then
00:05:36you also get the functionality of a drawstring to cinch in your waist a little bit. Of course,
00:05:40no front seam for no camel toe. Pockets on the side so that you don't have to carry a purse if
00:05:45you don't want to, which I don't really. And so this skort was so unique. I had never seen anything
00:05:52like it on the market before, which is also why the USPTO granted me the patent for it, which is
00:05:57extremely hard to get, but like so exciting that I was able to get it. And then wildly enough,
00:06:04a couple years after the Shein incident, Taylor Swift ends up wearing it in 2024. And then the
00:06:14skort goes crazy viral, so viral that our sales go up insanely. But at the same time, the dupes get
00:06:22out of control because now everyone has seen it. And since then, it's been so wild. There has been
00:06:30over 2065 different infringements on my designs since the Shein one. It's insane. And it is game
00:06:40of whack-a-mole. And is that just a drop in the bucket? Do you feel like you're getting a lot of
00:06:45these dupes that are floating around? I mean, I think we're getting some of them. I don't think
00:06:50I'm getting all of them. It's nearly impossible. You know, I have almost two full-time people
00:06:57constantly typing in these forms to take down these infringing listings. And it's so frustrating
00:07:05because it takes so much time to take down a listing. That's if the platform even like decides
00:07:10to believe in you that day. I feel like sometimes the rules are just changing all the time depending
00:07:14on who's reading these forms. But it's like that's with the platform. They have a place for you at
00:07:23least to type in the form, right? But then when it comes to these larger multi-billion dollar
00:07:29companies, which is something that just recently happened within the past few months. And I'm
00:07:34talking about the Nordstroms, the Kohl's, the JCPenney's, the Macy's, the Victoria's Secrets,
00:07:39the TJ Maxx's and Marshall's. Now they all have dupes of either this score or other patented products.
00:07:46And with them, it becomes a game of money, right? Who can pay their lawyers more to shut the other
00:07:53person down, to overwhelm the entire out the other person? And so when I talk about being a David versus
00:08:00a Goliath, this is exactly what it is, except I'm one David against several Goliaths now. And it's just
00:08:06so frustrating that these are American corporations. We're all supposed to be abiding by the same law,
00:08:13but there's no governmental enforcement to help me enforce the law. So it's just been so frustrating.
00:08:21And that's why I keep speaking up about it. Because there is also the court of public opinion
00:08:28and social media. But when it comes to money, they obviously have the billions that I do not.
00:08:34Yeah. I wanted to ask, where are these dupes popping up? Are there certain sites that every
00:08:39single day you know there's going to be another lookalike product as yours? Or are there some
00:08:44sites where it's shown up once and then you kind of knocked it out and then they didn't try it again?
00:08:49But where are you seeing the dupes? Yeah. The biggest culprits are TikTok Shop,
00:08:54Amazon, Timu, AliExpress, Alibaba, and Shein, of course. But I feel like everything is coming
00:09:04from probably these third-party sellers buying from AliExpress or Alibaba because some of these,
00:09:11they look exactly the same, but they're under different vendor names.
00:09:14Um, so trying to attack the Ali sources is the best, but it is a constant game of whack-a-mole.
00:09:21It's insane. I also see dupe influencer as a whole category, especially with the affiliate links that
00:09:29they have. Like, it's multiplying like a virus. It's really bad right now. We will actually gift
00:09:36influencers the real Popflex, obviously. But there was an incident where we noticed that this
00:09:42particular influencer was then promoting the dupe and linking to it with an affiliate link. And so,
00:09:49you know, the internal team was like talking about it, like, how, how do we deal with this?
00:09:53This is so weird. And so, um, we crafted a response that was very much like, Hey, I don't
00:09:59know if you've like seen Cassie's stories and stuff, but it was very much like an educational response.
00:10:02And like, uh, we, we hope that you can continue to wear the real one. And so that particular influencer
00:10:09was very sorry. She didn't realize what was going on. And so she was fine. We've had other
00:10:13influencers, um, where they'll promote a dupe, we'll reach out and offer to send them a free one
00:10:19of the real one. And some have been gracious and accepted and some will just straight up ignore us
00:10:24because they'll know, they know that they can sell the dupe, but maybe they can't sell the original
00:10:29version. So it's, um, it's, it's a, it's a tough place out there, but all I can say is that I can lead
00:10:35with love and education, but what people decide to do is what they decide to do. And I don't have
00:10:40control over that. That's absolutely wild. Like I have to say that is really, really wild. Um,
00:10:47and it's, it feels like, you know, because the dupes are constantly popping up on platform after
00:10:53platform, like there's always that affiliate money theoretically, right? Like dangling in front of
00:10:58them. Even if one Amazon listing gets removed, you can just link to a new one. So it really feels
00:11:04like, um, like I think you use the term whack-a-mole. Whack-a-mole. It is absolutely whack-a-mole.
00:11:09And like, we also have affiliate links to Popflex, but I understand that there is that dupe customer.
00:11:17How many dupes does your team go after in like a month, let's say?
00:11:21Just this year, it's been an average of 600 a month. So it's gone insane in 2025.
00:11:28Mm-hmm. And when these are showing up on these platforms, are they using your photos? Are they
00:11:34taking their own product photos? Like what do the listings actually look like?
00:11:37It's a mixture of everything. So in the beginning, it was a lot of just taking photos from our website.
00:11:44And then because we were able to take down listings based on copyright infringement,
00:11:49they then used AI to change the model's faces, even though it was still obviously the same photo.
00:11:55So that made it really hard for straight up like copyright infringement. So we had to prove in
00:12:01different ways that no, this is actually our photo, but manipulated. Then it turned into them
00:12:05stealing my content, um, and posting it, for example, as a TikTok commercial, which would then
00:12:11link over to a dropshipping website, which also had the, the photos stolen from our website. So what
00:12:17ends up happening is that a fan or a potential customer will think it's me because clearly it's my
00:12:24content linking to a place with our photos. They buy it. They get something that's really bad
00:12:28quality because obviously, and then they end up coming back to my page and blaming me for bad
00:12:34quality, slow shipping and all this stuff that is not my product. So when it comes to duping,
00:12:39oftentimes people are like, Oh, well, but you should be grateful for the free marketing or
00:12:44whatever. And it's like, no, actually they have duped the customer so hard that not only do they blame
00:12:49me for bad product. In some cases, fans have DM'd me and say, and they've said like, Oh,
00:12:54is Hilara your sub brand? Because they've copied the marketing, not just of me, right? But the
00:13:01marketing of them hiring a model with my body type shooting in a bedroom that looks like mine
00:13:07to the point where people think it is my company because they're like, I have such a, um,
00:13:13a way of doing my marketing. So the duping has gone so insane and so deep that it's not
00:13:21beneficial at all for anyone who's trying to say that it's absolutely harmful and tarnishing the
00:13:26brand. And the other thing is once you start seeing all these dupes everywhere that aren't mine,
00:13:32it kind of saturates the market. People become tired or sick of seeing this thing, but the thing is
00:13:38it wasn't the original thing. It's everywhere because it's also the fake thing. So it also
00:13:43devalues the novelty and the specialness of the original design. And that's extremely frustrating.
00:13:49Yeah. There are so many weird levels of like lookalikes happening in that example you gave.
00:13:54There's like obviously the lookalike product. There's the lookalike model. There's the lookalike
00:13:57house. There's a lookalike photo shoot. Like I'm like, it's like breaking my brain just thinking
00:14:02about like how, how deep this goes. It goes really deep and people don't know. And even when I try to
00:14:08explain to them that they can't really understand and you don't really understand until you've gone
00:14:12through it yourself. But yeah, it goes too deep. And the consumer, I mean, I don't even blame them
00:14:18for not knowing. If someone's duping you this hard, how are you supposed to even get out of that?
00:14:23Yeah. I know you've posted about one really wild example where like your face was sort of like
00:14:28face swapped in some way and it was your video, but the face was different. Can you talk about that a
00:14:34little bit? This one just brought chills throughout my body. When I found this video, I was like,
00:14:43wait, that's literally my house, my body, but now the face is the face of a Caucasian woman. And I was
00:14:52like, what? And for everyone listening, who's not watching this, I am Vietnamese and Chinese. So that
00:14:57was very unsettling to see. And again, because if the platform is using an AI tool to check if this
00:15:06is copyright infringement, they're going to be like, no, the face is different, but it's obviously
00:15:10it's taken from a source, which is mine. And in so many ways, just duping in general has been so
00:15:19dangerous for, you know, small business owners, creatives, but women as well. And I've seen a lot
00:15:26of influencers have their faces taken, um, mouths manipulated to sell something that they never
00:15:32even spoke about. Um, and it gets even dirtier and deeper than that when it comes to, uh, certain
00:15:37websites that, you know, certain people are visiting for certain types of videos. I think you know what
00:15:43I'm talking about. And it's, it's a lot of AI, I don't know, violence, I suppose, against women too.
00:15:49And that that's just a whole nother topic. I'm curious if you've ever purchased a dupe of one
00:15:54of your products and what was that dupe like? Yeah. So I have purchased the Shein dupe, um,
00:16:02because I just wanted to see what it looked like. It was horrendous quality. The mesh was kind of rough.
00:16:07I believe that one had a front seam still. I don't even know if it had pockets. I'm not sure,
00:16:11but I just needed to have one in my hand. So I knew, but more recently I got a dupe from
00:16:18TJ Maxx and Marshall's because a fan had gone shopping and alerted me that there were racks
00:16:25full of pirouette skort dupes. And when I compared it side by side, I knew for sure that they had my
00:16:32skort, my original skort in hand, because there were details on that skort that you can't see from
00:16:37the online photos. You can only see it if you have it in hand. For example, we have this
00:16:41specific, um, bar tack in the back of our waistband to ensure that the, the drawstring doesn't fall
00:16:47out in the wash. You can't see that on the photo that was there. Even the shape of the end cap at
00:16:53the end of the drawstring was exactly the same. I want to switch gears a little bit and talk about
00:17:00like, you know, a lot of the discourse around dupes ends up actually kind of maybe spiraling in
00:17:06other directions into sometimes a discussion of class or what people can afford. And, you know,
00:17:11there are a lot of shoppers who say, well, we deserve a cheaper alternative because it's not
00:17:15our fault. We can't afford the original, or we don't want to pay for the original. What do you make
00:17:19of that kind of like discussion? Look, I understand because I grew up shopping at the Rosses and, um,
00:17:29buying everything on clearance. We never bought anything full price. Okay. However,
00:17:34in this day and age, you know, you've also, you also have so many different ways to get clothing.
00:17:43There's, there's thrifting. Of course there's clearance racks. There's also sample sales. Like
00:17:47we just had our sample sale where you can get the original score. It's the original Poplex anything
00:17:53at a literal fraction of the price. Um, and we had people lining up around the block to go purchase
00:18:00this. And so there are different ways to do this, um, without supporting thievery because that's what
00:18:09it is. And like, I understand like not being able to afford something. And that's why I came out with
00:18:14the Blogilates line at Target, which is a more affordable price point for something still designed
00:18:20by me, still designed by Cassie Ho. And so I feel like with those like alternatives, why do we have to
00:18:27go in by the dupe? Why do we need to do that? Cause you're only hurting someone. Um, and I just feel
00:18:35like that's a, like, I can understand where that argument comes from, but there's also alternatives
00:18:40and I've tried to offer solutions so that you don't have to.
00:18:44And I'm curious, like how you feel as someone whose creative work went into this product. Like
00:18:50when you see a dupe, are you, do you, I guess you feel like your creative work is being devalued?
00:18:58When I see a dupe, I feel like it's my stolen property. I feel like someone went into my house
00:19:03and stole something, um, from my closet. Like that is literally what it feels like, except
00:19:08multiply that and see it also morphed into something uglier. Like that's really, really weird. And
00:19:14because I spend anywhere between one and a half to three years on one design, these are my babies.
00:19:23It's not just like a thing that I'm throwing out there. I, there's love and passion and soul in
00:19:30every single one of these. And look, like if somebody can't spend the time to design their
00:19:36own creation, then maybe do we talk about a royalty situation? Like, it's like, I'm not trying to keep
00:19:42this away from anyone. It's, but it's just like, but don't steal it from me either. This has to be,
00:19:47uh, done in a business partnership type way. You can't just steal. That's not fair.
00:19:55Fashion obviously is a pretty wasteful industry and humans are buying more clothes than maybe ever
00:20:02before in the history of humanity. Um, how do you as like a designer and a business owner,
00:20:07make sure that you sell, what you sell will last a really long time, that people will love it
00:20:12how do you convince shoppers that, you know, spending a little bit more to buy the original
00:20:16is worth it for them? Yeah. So look, the quality of an item is going to be how long, uh, how long
00:20:26does this last, right? That's the sustainability of an item. Now I will say at, at the beginning of
00:20:31this conversation right here about sustainability, that the best way to be sustainable is to not buy
00:20:36anything. Okay. To be like our dads who are still wearing shirts from the eighties. Like that's the
00:20:41most sustainable. Now, um, I am in the apparel industry and I am creating product, but I am
00:20:47choosing the best fabrics that don't break down. The fibers don't break down in the wash after like
00:20:54the first one, like it's going to last you like several years or more. Um, and I'm, and what we do is
00:21:00we do wear testing on all different sizes. We're checking everything. It goes through a third party
00:21:06testing to ensure that this product is really good. And here's the thing. I'm not charging
00:21:12Lululemon or aloe prices. Um, I'm also not charging Shein prices. I'm somewhere right in the middle,
00:21:18but I'm giving you that same quality. And I'm just going to say it like as a Lulu. So I think it's a
00:21:24great deal. Um, if you're willing, I guess for certain price point people, if you're willing to save up a
00:21:30little bit and, and buy this like one good legging instead of like seven bad leggings, it's going to
00:21:36feel so good and a lot more sustainable when you can do that. Yeah. You mentioned that, you know,
00:21:40sometimes you spend years designing and developing products. I wonder if you can talk about like how
00:21:45that compares to the speed with which dupes kind of just are churned out. Like those happen what,
00:21:52like overnight? Oh my God. It's insane. Okay. So like I said, I spend between one and a half to
00:21:57three years designing and developing one style. Okay. The Shein dupe came out, uh, like three months
00:22:06later, which that's when I found it. I don't even know when it actually came up, but I would not be
00:22:15surprised. And I've like read it in different places that sometimes, uh, dupes can come out in
00:22:19as little as like three to seven days, like based on whoever this manufacturer is, because
00:22:25they might just have stock mesh on hand. They may have stock, whatever on hand. And they just,
00:22:30I don't even know how the supply chain works for fast fashion. I can't even comprehend it
00:22:35because for me, it's like every time we develop something, we're actually like weaving the actual
00:22:41fabric. We were dying the fabric that we cut in. So, and then there's like so much stuff that goes
00:22:46into it. I do not know how these fast fashion companies do it. They have to have on like on hand
00:22:51stock or something so that they can just like go. Um, and it's funny cause sometimes I'll like
00:22:57watch these tick tocks from girls who are buying from these fast fashion websites and they're getting
00:23:01things that don't look like the picture, which no duh, if you're buying a dress for $5, it's not
00:23:05going to look like this dress that, you know, I saw somewhere else for 250. Um, and you can so tell
00:23:11that whoever, I don't even want to call it a pattern maker, but let's just say the sewer was forced
00:23:16to copy this thing from a photo. You can so tell that they had no idea what they were doing because
00:23:21there was no time for like pattern making and developing. It's just sew it, get it out. Uh, I, I
00:23:28honestly, I mean, I think you'd have to talk to someone in fast fashion to truly know, because I
00:23:32don't even know how that works. Cassie, you and your team encounter dupe listings constantly. So have
00:23:37you found any like tips for how consumers can spot whether something is a dupe? Yes. These are the
00:23:44things that I look out for as a consumer myself when I'm shopping online. Okay. So one, if you see
00:23:50a listing where the angle stays the same the whole time, and as you're clicking different colors, only
00:23:55the color is Photoshopped and changing super red flag. If you see a listing where all the models heads
00:24:01are cut off super red flag. If you see, um, that all the photos in the listing kind of look like
00:24:09they're from different photo shoots. That is also a red flag. There's just so much you can tell
00:24:16from, um, the listing specifically the photo shoot that definitely gives me like, this is a dupe vibes.
00:24:23And of course the price, like if the price just seems too low to be true, likely it is.
00:24:29Yeah. Sometimes I also will take an image that I see from like Amazon and just throw it in Google
00:24:36reverse image search to see what site it's actually from. And that's actually a really good way to
00:24:41figure out like, Oh, this is definitely a copy of something. Oh, 100%. I will also do that as fast
00:24:48like specifically if I just can't find it. And I know like this is definitely from somewhere else.
00:24:53Um, Oh, something else to check too is go to like the returns, like FAQs page. And if it's starting to
00:25:00get a little dicey, like you can't find an address or it's from overseas or they don't allow returns or
00:25:05exchanges, like super duper red flag. Cause you want to be able to try something on and return it
00:25:11if it doesn't fit. Yeah. I actually wanted to ask if you like do a lot of online shopping. Like I
00:25:16am also kind of paranoid about buying stuff, especially from like new brands that I've never
00:25:20tried. Um, so do you shop online a lot? Yes, I shop online a lot. And because women's sizing is all
00:25:29over the place and sometimes brands don't even pay attention to their own size chart. Um, what I do
00:25:34sometimes is I have to buy two of everything because I'm never sure. Um, and then I'll end
00:25:39up, I'll, I'm happy to pay the return fee. Um, I'll pay it. Yeah. Have you ever gotten got by any
00:25:45listings where you were like, Oh, I think I like this. I think I want this. And then it came and
00:25:49you were like, I was definitely catfished. Oh, gotten got, um, yeah. TikTok shop. Um, some of my
00:25:59friends have been like, Oh my God, I love TikTok shop and coupons and stuff. I'm like, Oh, I don't
00:26:04know. I feel weird about this, but I kept getting an ad or like influencers or creators talking about
00:26:09this, like one jump shoot with jumpsuit with a scrunched butt that just make the butt look so
00:26:13good. And I was like, Oh, okay, fine. It was like really late at night and I like decided to just buy
00:26:19it, whatever. And you know, it came back. And, um, when they sent me, I bought two things when they
00:26:28sent the wrong thing, which was bad. And then secondly, the other thing, uh, the scrunched butt
00:26:33wasn't doing anything. And so, you know, I just, I don't trust TikTok shop for clothing. I'm very
00:26:40scared. And so I'll stick to like my, my main brands that I buy from that. I, I know my size in
00:26:46it's just too scary out there. Yeah. I'm so curious if the jumpsuit with a scrunched butt was
00:26:51in fact, maybe a dupe of something else, like a poorly executed dupe. You know what? I'm not sure
00:26:57because that scrunched butt jumpsuit, I see it all over Amazon. I see it on TikTok shop. I also see it
00:27:03with the head cut off in certain places. And then I see it on like AI models, but I actually don't know
00:27:09where did that come from? There should be a website. I feel like someone needs to make a website called
00:27:14like, um, I don't know, like dupesexposed.com or something. And then you could like put a picture
00:27:21of the thing that you're looking at and they can show you where the original came from. Like that
00:27:25would be a really, really good idea for somebody out there. Yeah. I mean, I think it's really hard
00:27:29to just like get to the bottom of things, right. And like track down where it started because these
00:27:35things pop up in so many different corners of the internet. And it's, I'm sure like you can attest to
00:27:40this. It's impossible to track them all down. It's impossible to get to every customer and be
00:27:44like, no, no, no. This is actually a lookalike of this other thing, right? Like there's just like,
00:27:50there's endless shelf space on the internet and someone's got to fill it. No, that's very true.
00:27:54And that's why I am so vocal about telling my story and calling out these thieves that are doing this
00:28:01because what ends up happening is that if you are able to educate a larger audience, then they'll also
00:28:06want to help fight for you. And it's been really cool to see us all rally together. Um, because by
00:28:12telling my story, I've connected with other independent designers who are going through
00:28:15the same thing. So new friendships have been, um, brought forth there. And then, you know,
00:28:21I'll meet fans on the street and they'll just be like, keep fighting, like never give up. And so
00:28:25it's been really, really cool because nobody wants a big corporate Goliath to take advantage of them.
00:28:31And so I feel like we're all just helping each other. And also seeing the comments online too,
00:28:35underneath someone selling a dupe, um, some of my fans will call it out. And like,
00:28:41I love that. And I'm just so grateful for it because me as a singular human, I, there's no way
00:28:47I could do this alone. You have been online through many different iterations of the internet. You've
00:28:53seen platforms come and go. You've seen formats come and go. You've seen businesses come and go.
00:28:58You've seen creators come and go, I'm sure. And I keep having this experience recently. And it's
00:29:04really why I wanted to write about dupes where I just feel like I'm seeing the same thing online
00:29:09over and over and over again. Like it does not stop. I scroll my feed. I get like four of the
00:29:15same videos. I go on Amazon or I go on other shopping platforms and like item after item,
00:29:21it's just the same thing. Um, do you feel, well, one, I guess, does that feel familiar to you? Is this
00:29:28your experience right now of parts of the internet? Yeah. I mean, TikTok when it first started for a
00:29:35lot of us in the pandemic was such a pure and innocent, fun, quirky place, right? Like as
00:29:42any website or social media platform, um, when it begins, it's very much like that. Right. And now
00:29:49it's turned into what feels like a vertical video QVC. Like everyone is selling at you. It's a lot of
00:29:58affiliates. And when affiliates can make their little chunk of change from their link and it becomes a
00:30:05very viable business for them, then that ends up becoming the feed because it also helps TikTok end
00:30:10up making money. And at the end of the end of the day, like we talked about with the big corporations,
00:30:14like continuing to sell my product, even though they're infringing my patent, like it's about the
00:30:19money. So my experience is the same as yours. And it is frustrating to have product being pushed in my
00:30:26face all the time. When sometimes I'm, I'm just trying to, I don't know, see a recipe, a look at
00:30:31the different fish in the ocean or just like a new trend. Uh, yeah, I'm seeing a lot of the same
00:30:38thing, but yeah, it's, it's a lot of creators also kind of mimicking other creators because they've
00:30:46seen what works. Um, yeah, it's starting to get really tiring online. Yeah. And you know, obviously
00:30:55you've had your designs, your physical, um, goods copied. Have you had content copied in the past?
00:31:03Oh yeah. When I first came out with my format for a design video, which really tells you the why
00:31:10behind a design, I'll put like, you know, I'll tug on the front seam, uh, or the lack of a front
00:31:14seam and show that there's no camel toe. I'll put a very specifically, I put a water bottle in my
00:31:19pocket. I remember just a few months after me doing that, I started to see that type of video
00:31:27almost frame by frame with the same phrasing that I would use like anti camel toe, like who says that
00:31:34used in videos across the internet. And it made me really upset. But of course, like I, I don't own
00:31:40a video format, whatever. Right. Everyone says like, Oh, imitation is the best form of lottery.
00:31:45Okay, fine. Whatever. Um, and it happened until it actually stopped happening because what ended up
00:31:51happening, that was a lot of happenings in one sentence is that I continue to innovate. So I can
00:31:56continue to do that type of video, not just for a legging or a biker short, but I have rompers,
00:32:03cargo pants, I have dresses, you know, things that these other brands, um, they can only copy me
00:32:09on the legging because they've only innovated so far. And so for me, that actually stopped happening,
00:32:14which is really great. I'm very happy. And I remember during that time, I was so upset and so
00:32:20sad about just being copied everywhere. It just like design wise, content wise, marketing wise,
00:32:25like everything. Right. But my friend told me, Cassie, you have to keep innovating, keep thinking
00:32:32about the future because even though they're going to copy you, like, don't think they're going to
00:32:36stop. They're going to keep copying you, but at least you'll always be a few steps ahead. So never
00:32:40stop focusing on the innovation. And because I've done that, um, the, I guess the copycat video is
00:32:47like kind of like, at least to me now is a smaller part of my frustrations than it was before.
00:32:54And do you spend that time instead just like designing new products or interacting with fans?
00:33:00Like what is your, what is like, I guess the antidote as someone who sees their work all over
00:33:06done by someone else? Yeah. I mean, I have to pour my energy into creation, into innovation,
00:33:11into design. Um, but in this very moment, even though I don't want to be, I am also pouring a
00:33:18lot of my energy into fighting the Goliaths and getting the story out there. I hope one day that
00:33:26I won't have to do that, but maybe this is a part of my journey as a designer and an innovator. Um,
00:33:33but I think the best use of my time, and I know this is to keep designing, but there's just that fire
00:33:40inside of me. And I just like, can't, I will, I won't stop. I won't be silenced if someone is
00:33:47doing the wrong thing, not just to me, but to a lot of other independent designers without a voice.
00:33:52And so right now my energy is split between that and, um, innovation. That's Cassie Ho from
00:33:59Blogilates and PopFlex. After the break, I have an audio diary from my trip to a Brooklyn fabric
00:34:04recycling facility. This is the Vergecast. We'll see you on the other side.
00:34:10Support for the show comes from Framer. No matter what industry you're in, if you run a business,
00:34:16chances are that you need a website, but don't panic because that doesn't mean you need to
00:34:20scramble to learn how to code or settle for cookie cutter site builders. Instead, you can try Framer.
00:34:26Framer is the design first no code website builder that lets anyone ship a production ready site in
00:34:31minutes. You can get inspiration from hundreds of templates or strike out on your own from a totally
00:34:35blank canvas. Multiplayer collaborations means your writer, designer, and marketer can all tweak the
00:34:41same page at once with no risk of corrupting version control. And under the hood, you'll get
00:34:45responsive break points, built-in hosting, a flexible CSM, and privacy-friendly analytics so that
00:34:51you know what's working and what needs fixing. And at every step, Framer's AI-powered dev assistant
00:34:56helps you generate banners, pricing tables, navigation bars, and more, all specified to
00:35:01your palette and branding. Ready to build a site that looks hand-coded without hiring a developer?
00:35:06Launch your site for free at framer.com and use code VERGE to get your first month of pro
00:35:11on the house. That's framer.com, promo code VERGE. Rules and restrictions may apply.
00:35:18Welcome back. Whether we like it or not, all of us take part in the fashion industry. We all do have
00:35:28to wear clothes, after all. But fashion is a dirty industry. Most textile waste ends up in a landfill.
00:35:36We talk a lot about planned obsolescence in tech. Gadgets and appliances that stop working and are hard
00:35:43to repair. Fashion, as it turns out, is similar. A lot of new clothing just doesn't last, and fashion
00:35:50companies end up trashing leftover materials that end up in landfills just like our old tech.
00:35:56I love fashion and clothes. But I wanted to know what's being done about the tremendous amount of
00:36:01waste in the industry, and what technological challenges exist for the people doing that work.
00:36:07Luckily, a small non-profit has saved millions of pounds of textiles from landfills.
00:36:12And they're doing that work in Brooklyn, New York. I went over there with my producer Owen Grove
00:36:17and made this audio diary for The Vergecast. But you can also see video on social.
00:36:25When I visit the Fab Scrap warehouse in an industrial part of Brooklyn,
00:36:29the first thing I notice is an enormous pile of black trash bags, stacked up to the ceiling and
00:36:36taking up an entire area of the warehouse's main room. The Fab Scrap staff call this Mount Everest.
00:36:42All of these bags are filled with pre-consumer textiles. Stuff like leftover fabric that never
00:36:48got made into clothing, or scraps of sample fabric that brands were testing out.
00:36:52So all of these bags, again, are from our brand partners.
00:36:57That's Camille Tegel, co-founder and interim executive director at Fab Scrap, who's showing me around today.
00:37:03Fab Scrap works with brands of all sizes. Everyone from household names like J.Crew and Macy's,
00:37:10as well as more niche brands like streetwear company NOAA.
00:37:13They get renumbered so that we're able to collect data and assign it to that number. And then it's an easy way for us to provide data back to our brand partners. So that's the biggest thing about what we do is encouraging and educating brands to actually track their impact and to easily analyze the numbers. And so the types of data points we give them are total pounds that they've saved from landfill by recycling with Fab Scrap.
00:37:42What percentage of their total pounds were reused? What percentage was recycled, down cycles? And then, you know, some simple conversion metrics like the equation of CO2, you know, saved, the equivalent to trees planted.
00:38:01Hundreds of fashion brands, big and small, send leftover textiles to Fab Scrap. Tegel says the nonprofit receives 6,000 to 7,000 pounds of material every week.
00:38:13We actually just hit 2 million pounds of fabric saved, which is such a crazy amount.
00:38:19I think a really good visual is if you were to fill every single seat at Madison Square Garden with 100 pounds of fabric, that would be 2 million pounds of fabric saved.
00:38:31Oh my God, that's crazy.
00:38:32Fab Scrap's work is limited to materials that are coming directly from their brand partners.
00:38:37The millions of pounds they've saved from landfills represents just a tiny portion of overall textile waste.
00:38:43They don't take used clothing donations from individuals, for example.
00:38:48And Fab Scrap's operation is focused on New York-based designers and brands.
00:38:53Just think of all the other textile waste happening across the world.
00:38:57Still, 7,000 pounds of material a week is a huge undertaking.
00:39:02And how does Fab Scrap do it?
00:39:04An army of volunteers.
00:39:06On the day we visit, the place is buzzing with people who've come to help Fab Scrap sort through thousands of pounds of textiles.
00:39:14At workstations organized in rows, volunteers dig through black trash bags to divide fabric into different categories.
00:39:22Pieces of fabric, larger than the workstation table, will be resold to the public at Fab Scrap's thrift store.
00:39:29The more complicated process comes with smaller scraps of fabric.
00:39:32Most typically, if something is not sequined, leather, plastic, has no really hard components to it.
00:39:44If it's really just fabric, even if it's a mixed composition, even if it's 100% of a certain fiber, we can downcycle or shred this.
00:39:55All of these smaller pieces of fabric get mixed together and shredded into tiny pieces and made into something called shoddy.
00:40:03Shoddy takes on a bluish color with stray pieces of different fabric mixed in.
00:40:08A streak of yellow or smudges of black and brown.
00:40:11Think of it like a fabric trail mix that can be molded for different uses.
00:40:15Shoddy often becomes different types of insulation.
00:40:18So, you could have them be pretty, like, dense and heavy like this.
00:40:25A lot of times they're used for the automotive industry.
00:40:28So, like, car doors require so much insulation.
00:40:31Like, really, really dense, hard, compact insulation.
00:40:35Or you could have it be really thin and lightweight.
00:40:38Like, a lot of times they're now being used for packaging.
00:40:41You could have it for flooring, for walls and homes.
00:40:46Another bin for sorting is reserved for denim.
00:40:49Denim fabric also gets shredded into pulp.
00:40:52But it gets its own process because it's great for fiber-to-fiber recycling.
00:40:56Using textile waste to create new fabric.
00:40:59Tegel says that there's been a lot of technological advancement for 100% cotton and 100% polyester recycling.
00:41:07Most of our clothing is made from these two compositions.
00:41:10So, recycling 100% cotton and 100% polyester fabric is a way to get the biggest impact in the industry.
00:41:18Denim is the least varied fabric when it comes to composition.
00:41:21And it's an easily recognizable fabric for volunteers.
00:41:25From one of the black trash bags, Camille pulls out a piece of cardboard with little pieces of fabric stapled onto it.
00:41:32Each piece is just a few inches big.
00:41:34These are called headers.
00:41:35Headers are swatches or essentially sales tools that mills will use to market their fabric out to designers.
00:41:44And it's how designers are shopping for their fabric.
00:41:47So, a lot of times there is a lot of information that's really helpful for placing an order.
00:41:52So, it'll say the fiber content.
00:41:54It might give a range of colors that that fabric's available.
00:41:58It'll say, like, maybe the minimums required to purchase that order.
00:42:01So, it's really a tool for purchasing, for sourcing.
00:42:07But after they've placed the order for that fabric, these swatches become a little useless to designers.
00:42:14In order to downcycle or recycle the fabric on headers, you have to separate out all the stuff that's not fabric.
00:42:21The cardboard, the staples, the tape.
00:42:24The problem is that every header looks a little different.
00:42:27Some fabric has stickers on it.
00:42:30Some doesn't.
00:42:31And headers are all different sizes.
00:42:33So, that does make the sorting a bit tedious.
00:42:35And one of the reasons why this can't be easily mechanized is because all the formats of headers are completely different.
00:42:44It's one of the reasons that all of this human labor is involved in the sorting process.
00:42:49There's no standardization of headers.
00:42:50It's just a tiny piece of the fashion industry, but shows how wasteful or inefficient it can be.
00:42:59All of those small cuts of fabric that were sorted by volunteers eventually get compressed into a giant cube using Fabscrap's baler machine.
00:43:09The baler kind of resembles an elevator.
00:43:12There's an open area inside that is loaded up with fabric by a Fabscrap staffer.
00:43:17Close the front of the baler, hit the button, and the machine compresses the fabric down.
00:43:27The baler creates giant blocks of mixed fabric, weighing between 350 and 380 pounds.
00:43:35And they kind of look like a closet threw up all over.
00:43:38I'm just, like, fascinated to see what's in each of these.
00:43:41Like, it's, like, kind of fun.
00:43:42Like, this looks like maybe, like, a sweater.
00:43:43You can examine the bales and find hints of what kind of fabrics were being downcycled.
00:43:50In one cube, I found part of a knit sweater with a slashed Ralph Lauren tag.
00:43:55Elsewhere, there were chunks of a puffer coat and soft, fleece-like fabrics.
00:44:01These 350-pound bales will get sent to South Carolina, where they'll be shredded by a Fabscrap partner.
00:44:08That's how you get shoddy, that fluffy fabric trail mix that's used to make insulation.
00:44:19One of the most exciting things about Fabscrap, at least for me, is a thrift store.
00:44:23This is where the pieces of fabric too big to shred end up.
00:44:28Tucked in a corner of the warehouse is a room filled with reams of fabric, big cones of yarn of every color, buckets full of zippers, and so much more.
00:44:39And all of it is for sale to the public.
00:44:41The amount of things are so random.
00:44:43Like, these are bag straps.
00:44:45Okay, this is interesting.
00:44:46It's not fair.
00:44:46Anklein clearly came from that brand.
00:44:51There's a bunch of them in here, actually.
00:44:54These look like maybe elastic or, like, undergarments.
00:44:58More elastic.
00:45:00Metal, like, um, I don't know what these are, actually.
00:45:06Some buttons in here.
00:45:08Oh, these are, like, zipper pulls.
00:45:13Belts, maybe?
00:45:14Or buckles?
00:45:15Some of the thrift store offerings verge on the absurd.
00:45:19There's a bucket filled with mutant swimsuit pieces, some of which are only half-constructed.
00:45:24Another bin has jeans and various states of completion.
00:45:28They might be missing chunks that were cut out by designers, perhaps in the development process.
00:45:34In another area, we find fringed leather jacket sleeves, detached from the rest of the garment.
00:45:39It's a crafty person's paradise.
00:45:41If you sew at all, or if you've been to a fabric store, this is exactly what a normal store looks like.
00:45:46This is how they sell fabric.
00:45:49And it is kind of wild to imagine that all of this otherwise would just be thrown out.
00:45:54Because there's, I mean, like, look how beautiful this is.
00:45:57Without Fab Scrap, where would all of this stuff be?
00:46:11Oh my gosh.
00:46:12I mean, that's kind of the hard thing to understand when you walk into this room, specifically, is that when you look around the room and see how many things are so easy to work with, realizing that before Fab Scrap existed, all of it went to landfill.
00:46:28I think that's where that realization of, oh my gosh, like, this, like, Fab Scrap was able to help divert this material, but...
00:46:37Fab Scrap doesn't exist in a vacuum.
00:46:39The textiles that come to Fab Scrap are upstream from the things we buy in stores.
00:46:44During the height of the pandemic, for example, Camille says they saw less evening wear textiles and lots of athleisure and knits.
00:46:52Fast fashion has no doubt contributed to waste in the industry, but Camille points out that those problems exist at smaller brands and other companies that people might not consider, quote-unquote, fast fashion.
00:47:05It's not just companies like Shein or Zara that might throw away bags and bags of materials.
00:47:11Through its recycling program, brand education efforts, and community thrift store, Fab Scrap, to me, embodies what change in the fashion industry might look like.
00:47:22Camille and the Fab Scrap team challenge us all to reset our relationship with the clothing we buy and wear.
00:47:29And I think that's what's kind of amazing is that it's all built around this passion for textiles and understanding that fabric is such a valuable resource.
00:47:39And it's only because of fast fashion and all of these really absurd societal things that our perspective has changed on fabric, and it's become less recognizable as something to protect.
00:47:53And instead, there's been this twisted perspective of it being really easy to discard.
00:47:58From consumers to big fashion companies, everyone has a role to play.
00:48:04When I buy something, I want it to be made out of materials that are kinder to the environment.
00:48:09I want the craftspeople making my clothing to be paid fairly and treated with dignity.
00:48:15I want my clothes to last.
00:48:17And I want the ability to repair them.
00:48:19And I believe the fashion companies have a responsibility to strive for excellence in all these areas, even if it means producing less.
00:48:28Fab Scrap is small, but unbelievably scrappy.
00:48:31No pun intended, and I really and truly did not mean to make that joke.
00:48:35Camille hopes the organization will continue to grow and expand.
00:48:39The next 10 years hopefully looks a bit more robust in terms of having more team members, being able to reach other cities maybe, calling more people to the cause and having them either do that work through Fab Scrap or as a volunteer or as a shopper.
00:48:58I think just really building this community and really establishing ourselves more in other cities would be amazing.
00:49:05We're going to one more break, but when we're back, we'll have V-Song to talk about the clueless closet.
00:49:12This is The VergeCast.
00:49:15Support for The VergeCast comes from LinkedIn.
00:49:18As a small business owner, you don't have the luxury of clocking out early.
00:49:22Your business is on your mind 24-7.
00:49:24So when you're hiring, you want a partner that works just as hard as you do.
00:49:28That hiring partner might just be LinkedIn Jobs.
00:49:31When you clock out, LinkedIn clocks in.
00:49:33It makes it easy to get qualified candidates that you can manage all in one place.
00:49:38LinkedIn can help you write job descriptions and then quickly get your job in front of the right people with deep candidate insights.
00:49:45You can either post your job for free or pay to promote.
00:49:47And they say promoted jobs get three times more qualified applicants.
00:49:51You can also let your network know you're hiring and even add a hashtag hiring frame to your profile picture and get two times more qualified candidates.
00:49:59Based on LinkedIn data, 72% of SMBs using the platform say that LinkedIn helps them find high-quality candidates.
00:50:06Find your next great hire on LinkedIn.
00:50:09Post your job for free at linkedin.com slash track.
00:50:12That's linkedin.com slash track to post your job for free.
00:50:17Terms and conditions apply.
00:50:18Support for this show comes from Shopify.
00:50:23Starting a business is exciting.
00:50:25But once the excitement wears off, you might realize it also means juggling a thousand tiny tasks.
00:50:30Shopify gets that.
00:50:31Shopify is the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world.
00:50:35In 10% of all e-commerce in the U.S.
00:50:37From household names like Mattel and Gymshark to brands just getting started.
00:50:42And they want to help with everything from sales to design to marketing.
00:50:46Can't code?
00:50:47No problem.
00:50:48Shopify's got slick, ready-made templates that actually look good.
00:50:51If you need help writing product descriptions or touching on photos, they've got you covered there too with their built-in AI tools.
00:50:58And if you hit a wall, their 24-7 support team is right there for you.
00:51:02If you're ready to sell, you're ready for Shopify.
00:51:05Turn your big business idea into reality with Shopify on your side.
00:51:09Sign up for your $1 per month trial and start selling today at shopify.com slash vergecast.
00:51:16Go to shopify.com slash vergecast.
00:51:20That's shopify.com slash vergecast.
00:51:31Hello, we are back and let's get to the hotline.
00:51:34As always, the number is 866-VERGE-11 and the email is vergecast at theverge.com.
00:51:41We love hearing your questions and we try to answer at least one on the show every week.
00:51:45And today I have Victoria Song to help me answer a very fun question from James.
00:51:51James says,
00:51:51In the last episode, the Clueless Closet was mentioned and Mia talked about their spreadsheet system.
00:51:58That's me.
00:51:59I've been looking for a solution to the same issue since I can never make up my mind.
00:52:04I'd love a deeper dive in the system used or an app.
00:52:07Maybe the AI ones if they're good.
00:52:09Sincerely, James.
00:52:11James, thank you for this question.
00:52:12To catch people up if they didn't hear the last one, we were talking about all the fake movie and TV tech that we would love to steal.
00:52:19And I mentioned the Clueless Closet, which is sort of like a computer system that inventories all of the characters' clothing pieces and then she will like match it and the computer will say if it's a good match, if it's a good outfit or not.
00:52:35And I mentioned that I have something that's like kind of halfway there where I basically have this giant Excel spreadsheet that I have logged every single article of clothing.
00:52:45I love that. I love how meticulous that is.
00:52:48So if you knew my closet and my living situation, you would understand why it's essential.
00:52:54For context, I think there are probably about like 300 lines, rows on the spreadsheet, each containing an item.
00:53:01Oh my God.
00:53:02And I will say like it doesn't include shoes, bags, belts, hats, a lot of outerwear.
00:53:08But in my spreadsheet, I have like what the item is, descriptions, what season it's good for, whether it's short sleeve, long sleeve, sleeveless, tube top, whatever.
00:53:18If it's a dress, if it's like long, short, somewhere in the middle.
00:53:22Oh my God.
00:53:23Colors, like predominant colors, whether it's vintage, whether it was a hand-me-down from my mom or a family member.
00:53:30And I also mark where in my apartment I've stored it.
00:53:33Because that's crucial.
00:53:35That's crucial marking where it is.
00:53:36Yeah, I have boxes under my bed, in my closet, in my bureau, in the like front hallway closet.
00:53:43So like I need to know where things are if I need to pull something that's like out of season or whatever.
00:53:48This is amazing.
00:53:49Yeah.
00:53:49This is dedication.
00:53:50It's no clueless closet, but it gets the job done.
00:53:53And I'd be happy to include like screenshots or an image of like what the spreadsheet looks like.
00:54:00But yeah, it's partially just like practical, you know?
00:54:04Like I live in New York.
00:54:06I live in a small apartment.
00:54:07And if you know anything about New York apartments, you know that they never come with enough closet space.
00:54:11I know you know.
00:54:12I know that they never come with enough.
00:54:14You know, I moved to Jersey for a house.
00:54:17That place still doesn't have enough closet space for all the – and I like I finally have a dream walk-in closet that I have to share.
00:54:23But it's still not enough space.
00:54:25And I still don't know where all the clothes are.
00:54:27I still have to have a different dresser.
00:54:29So I get the impulse behind this, but oh, my God.
00:54:33It seems like a lot of manual work as well.
00:54:35It is.
00:54:36It's so manual.
00:54:37And so like what I do basically is twice a year I rotate my wardrobe.
00:54:43So I put away winter things and take out summer things.
00:54:46So right now all my winter stuff is in the spreadsheet logged where I've stored it.
00:54:51But it's like inaccessible to me unless I go digging for it.
00:54:54And I was just sick of having to try to find where I put things.
00:54:58And so that's like a big reason for the spreadsheet.
00:55:00But, you know, it doesn't do a lot of the things that the Clueless Closet does, like combine outfits or give me feedback, which honestly, like, I don't want feedback.
00:55:11But there are a lot of apps and things that people have built that kind of mimic the Clueless Closet.
00:55:17I think we have a couple clips of some solutions, both like techie and very lo-fi.
00:55:22So there's one version of this that is very DIY kind of crafty that is like basically a flip book where someone has, you know, printed every article of clothing they have and put it in a little three-ring binder.
00:55:37So let's look at that first.
00:55:51So this seems like a lot of work.
00:55:52I don't know how you feel.
00:55:53It's a lot of work.
00:55:54Like, I love journaling.
00:55:55I have all the tools necessary to make that.
00:55:58And I feel like I need to lie down because that is a lot of dedication, a lot of work.
00:56:03And I kind of do a capsule closet because I – that's just – if you don't know what a capsule closet is, it's you kind of have a bunch of basics that you've figured out how to mix and match.
00:56:14So you maximize the stuff and reduce closet space.
00:56:16I said try because you can try and do the – I don't know anyone who's successfully done –
00:56:23A for effort.
00:56:23I don't know anyone who's successfully done a capsule closet.
00:56:26Yeah.
00:56:27But, yeah, I think – I think I sent also another TikTok to you over the weekend.
00:56:31I went, oh, my God, is this –
00:56:32Yeah, let's look at it.
00:56:33Be real.
00:56:35When was the last time you wore the t-shirt that's crumpled up in the bottom of your dresser right now?
00:56:38I know for me, the shirts that are down here have not been worn in a very long time.
00:56:42And some of those are shirts I used to wear every single day.
00:56:44I just forgot that I own them.
00:56:45I was tired of this, so I created the solution for it.
00:56:47And this is the solution.
00:56:49It's an app I made called –
00:56:50Also, I'll note this man is not wearing a shirt right now.
00:56:52Your photos are closed, the background gets removed, and then they get tagged using AI.
00:56:55Immediately, right here in the Pieces tab, I can see every item of clothing that I own, whether I wear it or not.
00:57:00And I can go to the Fits tab, and I can start creating outfits.
00:57:02Again, very manual.
00:57:03Very manual.
00:57:04So this is integrating everything in my entire closet and making outfits with them.
00:57:08Especially these pants, the only pants that fit me.
00:57:10This right here is the key to wearing the clothes that you don't normally wear, or wearing the clothes you forgot you own.
00:57:14Of course, you find an outfit you like, you can save it, it shows up in your safe fits with all the rest of them.
00:57:18Absolute game-changer.
00:57:19It's basically like the visual version of my spreadsheet.
00:57:22But I promise you, once you have them up there, it is the best feeling in the world.
00:57:24Go download Fitted now.
00:57:26Okay, interesting.
00:57:27I mean, yeah, I will say that this type of app has existed for a while, where you basically like digitally log all of your clothing.
00:57:36I find the like taking a photo of it, cropping the background, like all of that work to be very tedious.
00:57:43It's extremely.
00:57:44And they usually lose me there.
00:57:45I think the problem that we're coming up against is the actual logging of the items that you have.
00:57:53Because there's no way AI is getting around that either.
00:57:56You have to manually take a picture of all of this sort of stuff.
00:58:00And like, I don't know if they still do this, but like lookbooks, I think, might be kind of.
00:58:05Polyvore.
00:58:06Do you remember Polyvore?
00:58:07Oh my God.
00:58:08That's a name I haven't heard in 84 years.
00:58:10I know.
00:58:10But yeah, so, you know, I think maybe one way around it for those of us who are not particularly adept is to do a lookbook, which is you just create a little.
00:58:22I started in my camera roll of going like, this outfit is fire.
00:58:27Let me take a picture of it and add it to an album called Lookbook.
00:58:31Yeah.
00:58:31I also have an outfits album.
00:58:33Yeah.
00:58:33Of just photos.
00:58:34There's like three in there.
00:58:36Right.
00:58:36I'm so lazy.
00:58:38Yeah.
00:58:38I mean, it's pretty, in terms of like logging things, the easiest thing is like you snap a photo of your outfit before you leave.
00:58:45And actually, I did do something that I can share a screenshot of or just a quick clip of what I did.
00:58:51But basically, there's a feature where you can, if you have an iPhone, which I guess I shouldn't assume.
00:58:56But if you have an iPhone, you can take a photo of your outfit, open a notes document in the notes app, and then like long press on your body in the photo and copy it, and then just plop it into the notes app.
00:59:12And it's like a little sticker of yourself.
00:59:14Oh, my God.
00:59:14That's so smart.
00:59:14It removes the background.
00:59:16It does everything.
00:59:17And so I have a notes app full of just like little miniature stickers of my outfits, of myself.
00:59:24And it kind of needs to be cleaned up a little bit.
00:59:26But I have just like a general feed of all of them.
00:59:30You can also click into them to see it bigger and then like swipe through it like a photo album.
00:59:34But crucially, what I use this for is outfits that I have worn to work things because that is like, I don't know about you, but women's professional wear is so, it's like, it's a curse.
00:59:49It's an absolute, it's just so, one, it's either not fun or it's not comfortable.
00:59:54Yeah.
00:59:54Or it's just like people notice if you wear the same thing too many times.
00:59:58And I've had some Verge commenters and other commenters when I was at Gizmodo that were like, does she have another shirt?
01:00:05And I was like, oh, my God.
01:00:06That's so rude, first of all.
01:00:08That's so rude, but also point taken.
01:00:10Yeah, well, it's really hard to like calibrate your personal style to the setting.
01:00:15And like the tyranny of women's work wear is something that I just will never, ever, ever surrender to.
01:00:24And Taylor is a menace.
01:00:25I'm not wearing that.
01:00:26I'm sorry.
01:00:26I'm not wearing the like little blazer and pencil skirt vibe.
01:00:31I need to feel comfortable.
01:00:33Also, like this video, this podcast, I need to find something that like looks kind of normal on screen that also I'm not having to go buy like a new wardrobe.
01:00:43So, yeah, I have a section in my notes app that says work outfits.
01:00:46And when I don't know what I'm doing when it's a night before and I'm freaking out because I have nothing to wear to this conference or whatever, I will just like pick a little Mia sticker outfit to just recreate.
01:00:58That's genius.
01:00:58I highly recommend.
01:00:59I am going to do that because like to your point, anytime there's like you're going to be on camera, you need to take a photo.
01:01:05And I was like, oh, God, what do I have that is solid, that is not white, that is not, there's just like so many considerations that you have to think of.
01:01:13Not green.
01:01:14That's how you'll come up on camera.
01:01:16Yeah.
01:01:16Yeah, green, you might just be a floating head.
01:01:18Yeah, exactly.
01:01:18So, yeah, if you see us wear repeat outfits.
01:01:22Don't say anything.
01:01:23Don't say anything, but that's the reason.
01:01:25It's because that's, it's, we don't have an infinite budget.
01:01:29Yeah.
01:01:29We don't have, we don't actually have Cher's closet.
01:01:32I wish.
01:01:33Which is gigantic.
01:01:34I wish.
01:01:35But yeah.
01:01:35Also, do we look like we're wearing the same outfits?
01:01:38It's because we pre-taped some of these things.
01:01:40So what are we going to do, bring half of our closet in and switch out and all of that?
01:01:45No, that's just, although I have done that on certain occasions for certain videos, so
01:01:51that's just dedication.
01:01:52Yeah.
01:01:52If The Verge wants to create a closet for me in the Vox Media office, I will not say no.
01:01:58Jim Benkoff.
01:01:58Jim Benkoff.
01:01:59Neelai.
01:02:00Neelai.
01:02:00Neelai.
01:02:01Can we, can we have a Cher's closet that we share?
01:02:03Can we take over your office while you're on leave and make it into a closet?
01:02:07Yeah.
01:02:07What if we have a Cher's closet that we can all share?
01:02:11Huh?
01:02:12Eh.
01:02:13I like it.
01:02:13I like it too.
01:02:14The last point I'll make too is like the AI-ification of this type of feature or tool.
01:02:23For me, it probably wouldn't work because so much of clothing is like tactile and sensory.
01:02:31And even though things like a shirt and then pants separately, like when you slide them
01:02:36next to each other, on top of each other, it looks normal.
01:02:39There are so many like nuances to how clothing falls on the body that doesn't mean it will
01:02:44work.
01:02:44That's why you need to like try on outfits to see.
01:02:47That's the thing I have about that one guy in the TikTok, the Fitted app.
01:02:51It's like you're taking pictures of the clothes but not on you.
01:02:54Yeah.
01:02:54There's just certain ways that it's like, oh, theoretically, this crop top and this pair
01:02:59of jeans would look good.
01:03:00But actually, that's not a high enough rise jean for me.
01:03:03So when I put it on, I don't like the way it looks, that sort of stuff.
01:03:06So, you know, AI is not always going to be able to distill what you like and what your
01:03:12personal style is.
01:03:13So, eh.
01:03:15Yeah.
01:03:15I don't know.
01:03:16I think kind of diminishing returns on something like that.
01:03:18For all the work that you would put in to logging all of your clothing, me personally, it probably
01:03:25would not be worth it.
01:03:26Maybe you're different, though.
01:03:27But I do really like the just like take a photo of your outfit and throw it in an album
01:03:31for when you really cannot be bothered to decide what to wear.
01:03:35Lookbooks.
01:03:35Lookbooks are the answer.
01:03:37Go old school.
01:03:39I like it.
01:03:41Okay.
01:03:41That's it for the Verge cast.
01:03:43Thank you to everyone on the show and thank you for listening.
01:03:46There's a whole lot more stuff from this conversation at theverge.com and we will drop some links
01:03:52in the show notes, but also go read theverge.com.
01:03:55You can find our bylines there and maybe even subscribe to The Verge.
01:03:59As always, if you have thoughts, questions, feelings, you can email us at vergecast at theverge.com
01:04:05or keep calling the hotline with all your great questions.
01:04:07That number is 866-VERGE-11.
01:04:10I sound like an infomercial person.
01:04:11That number is 866-VERGE-11.
01:04:15We love hearing from you.
01:04:16Send us all your thoughts and questions and ideas for what we should do on this show.
01:04:20And we do a hotline question every week, so keep them coming and we'll answer them.
01:04:24This show is produced by Eric Gomez, Brandon Kiefer, Travis Larchuk, and Andrew Marino.
01:04:30The Verge cast is a Verge production and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.
01:04:34Jake will be back on Friday to discuss all the news from the week.
01:04:37And thank you, as always, for listening.
01:04:39See ya.
Recommended
1:09
|
Up next
1:27:59
6:25
7:40
1:38:37
1:45:43
1:22:27
11:22
14:37
1:13:34