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College Guys Attempt the Outfit-Selection Process

This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Wisconsin chapter.

We have all had at least that one guy in our lives that has complained day after day after day about how long it takes for us to get ready. But girl, you and I both know it’s not an easy task— you’ve got to make sure that the outfit is on point and that the brows are on fleek. After all, it is this tedious process that deprives us from the beauty of hitting snooze one extra time every morning. But fear not ladies. To make sure that guys shut their pie-holes about us taking that extra 10 minutes (or 30…) every morning, I resolved to put them through this traumatizing experience. You can thank me later.

I challenged two brave souls to create an outfit for three different occasions: lunch date, movie night, and girl’s night out. I allowed them to use my designer closet—aka, a broke college kid’s wardrobe of Forever 21 and thrift shop clothes. On top of that, one of the two will take on the challenge of doing my makeup. You may be wondering why I didn’t have both of them test their hand at cosmetics.. As it turns out, having a completely inexperienced guy do my makeup was an equally terrifying an experience for him as it was for me.

So without further ado, let’s see how they did…

Jimmy Grove

 

Allow me to introduce you to Jimmy Grove. Hailing from El Segundo, California, Jimmy asserted his expertise in girl fashion simply by saying, “I get it, I have a sister”. However, as far as his experience with cosmetics goes, he claims that he “saw people doing this before, in Macy’s.”

Jimmy started off as a fashion police. He was being very particular about the pieces of clothing that he’d like me to put on. But after a tiring 10-minute trial and error process, Jimmy gave up his fashionista-esque sense and just picked up what he saw in the dresser first. He relied on the help of leggings, which according to Jimmy, “goes with everything.” Well, he’s not wrong…

Here are the results:

Outfit #1: Lunch Date

                  

Outfit #2: Movie Night

                  

Outfit #3: Girl’s Night Out

 

Not too shabby, am I right ladies? Good work Jimmy!

Moving on to makeup, Jimmy vowed to give me Kylie Jenner lips and to “wing the sh*t out of my eyeliner.” Well, he certainly succeeded.

 

“Maybe she’s born with it, maybe it’s Jimmy,” the confident makeup artist says—and I will have to semi-agree with that statement. I was expecting it to be much worse, but I ended up being fairly happy with Jimmy’s work. The only exception was when he used mascara for my brows and used the powder brush for foundation and concealer. I decided to let that slide, considering he just transformed me into the Cleopatra of the 21st century. Someone needs to hire this guy (*cough* Vogue *cough*) because he could make some serious bank with some training.

After the whole ordeal is over, Jimmy said, “This is so stressful. I thought it would be just as easy as it is for guys.” Uhh, no Jimmy, it’s not. Now you get it!

Mitch Laken (and crew)

 

Mitch Laken was the second brave soul to accept this challenge. Amid the process of picking out the first outfit, this Wisconsin native slowly became appalled by the difficulty of the challenge that us girls have to face every day and decided to call for help. “I don’t know what to do,” he said, “let me get Liam.” Enter Liam Wilcox, from Newton, Massachusetts. His presence is sure to spice things up— nothing wrong with a little Coastie-Sconnie hybrid sense of fashion, right? But that was not enough—Liam also needed to call for help. Enter Charlie Kirsh. Liam claims that this Wisconsin native “has a girlfriend and will know what he’s doing.” Well, I guess he was right…

 

Mitch and his entourage putting deep thought into their outfit choices.

The three were very aware of the fashion trends and the do’s and dont’s. The awareness is made evident by their comments:

  • “Tall boots are very in now”
  • “Belt matches with the shoes—always. Are you even human if it doesn’t?”
  • “[The jean jacket] really pulls things together, it’s like the glue”
  • “I like that green and brown combination, it’s woodsy and crunchy.”

I can’t help but wonder if I’ve got some serious What Not to Wear fans here. Let’s take a look at the results: 

Outfit #1: Lunch Date 

              

Outfit #2: Movie Night

 

Outfit #3: Girl’s Night Out

 

Absolutely amazing. I’m not quite sure if I could have put together outfits like this myself. They knew exactly what to wear at the right occasion. Low key, I proceeded to wear outfit #1 to school the next day. Despite their success, the three agreed that this was a “difficult assignment.” Liam admitted afterwards, “this is harder than the SATs, I really respect the process. I had no idea it takes that long!” #Retweet. We certainly deserve all the respect!

This was as much a learning process for me as it was for the guys. Perhaps we should not go in with the predisposition that guys have no fashion sense at all—as you can see, some of these outfits slayed. Plus, how many of us can truthfully say that we know how to pick out a proper suit or how to tie a bow tie? All is fair in love and war (of the fashion world). So Dear Jimmy, Mitch, Liam, and Charlie…

Haidee is a sophomore from Hong Kong at University of Wisconsin- Madison pursuing majors in Journalism and Sociology. Inspired by the humor and kindness of Ellen DeGeneres, Haidee aspires to be a journalist who dedicates her talents to human interest story or lifestyle story reporting (aka. someone who eats for a living). On top of being a die-hard Patriots fan and a New Girl addict, Haidee is also the ultimate foodie.
Madison is a senior at the University of Wisconsin pursuing a major in English Literature with minors in Entrepreneurship and Digital Media Studies. Post college, Madison plans to complete her dreams of being the next Anna Wintour. In her free time, Madison enjoys listening to Eric Hutchinson, eating dark chocolate, and FaceTiming her puppies back home. When she isn't online shopping, or watching YouTube bloggers (ie Fleur DeForce), Madison loves exploring the vast UW Campus and all it has to offer! She is very excited to take this next step in her collegiette career as Campus Correspondent and Editor-in-Chief for HC Wisco. On Wisconsin!