The Liz Moody Podcast - The Well-Dressed Man Effect: Feel And Look Amazing Every Day With Style Expert Parker York Smith

Episode Date: November 6, 2024

Looking to elevate your style? In this conversation Liz speaks with fashion content creator Parker York Smith about the ins and outs of men’s fashion, where to shop, how to dress for any body type, and more. Lots of men want to have great style but don’t know where to start. Parker York Smith is making men’s fashion approachable and fun with his videos on everything from men’s jewelry to simple styling tips to basic tailoring. Learn which fashion rules are essential and which should be ignored, how to find your personal style, the best brands for different pieces, and more on this episode of the Liz Moody Podcast. 00:00 Parker’s Introduction To Style 4:09 Men’s Fashion  8:30 Why Everything is Fashion 12:28 How To Find Your Style 18:40 The Importance Of Tailoring 24:17 Handling Insecurity As A Man 33:50 The 10 Wardrobe Essentials 39:32 Jewelry for Men 49:42 Fashion Rules You Can’t Break 52:09 What Stores To Shop At For more from Parker, you can find him on Instagram @parkeryorksmith, Youtube @parkeryorksmith, or on Tiktok @parkeryorksmith.   Ready to uplevel every part of your life? Order Liz’s new book 100 Ways to Change Your Life: The Science of Leveling Up Health, Happiness, Relationships & Success now!  To join The Liz Moody Podcast Club Facebook group, go to www.facebook.com/groups/thelizmoodypodcast. Connect with Liz on Instagram @lizmoody, or subscribe to her newsletter by visiting www.lizmoody.com. If you like this episode, check out Fashion Secrets To Look Good and FEEL Great with Celebrity Stylist Allison Bornstein. This episode is sponsored by: AG1: visit drinkag1.com/lizmoody and get your FREE year supply of Vitamin D and 5 free travel packs today. Puori: go to puori.com/LIZMOODY and use promo code LIZMOODY for 20% sitewide. Cymbiotika: use code LIZMOODY on cymbiotika.com to get 15% off plus free shipping on subscription orders. Osea: get 10% off your first order at oseamalibu.com with code LIZMOODY10. Manukora: head to manukora.com/lizmoody to get $25 off your Starter Kit. The Liz Moody Podcast cover art by Zack. The Liz Moody Podcast music by Alex Ruimy. Formerly the Healthier Together Podcast.  This podcast and website represents the opinions of Liz Moody and her guests to the show. The content here should not be taken as medical advice. The content here is for information purposes only, and because each person is so unique, please consult your healthcare professional for any medical questions. The Liz Moody Podcast Episode 280. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If somebody is listening and they're trying to figure out, what is my style? What advice would you give them to begin to define that? Being as broad as possible as opposed to like, well, I'm never going to find that green jacket. Just be like, that's a casual jacket with some jeans and boots. That looks really nice. I'm going to go to the store and try that. You might as well use every avenue to make yourself feel good, make life a little bit more interesting. There is also a lot of positivity that's going to be coming your way.

And that's going to seep into you and it's going to cause you to start to carry you. yourself a little bit differently. New doors are going to start to open, and it's going to also lead you down these paths in life that you probably would not have gotten to go experience. Hello, friends, and welcome to the Liz Moody podcast, where every week we're sharing real science, real stories, and realistic tools that actually level up every part of your life. I'm your host, Liz Moody, and I'm a best-selling author and longtime journalist. Today, I am joined by Parker York Smith, who is one of my absolute favorite men's fashion creators. I send Zach, his outfits, and his tips all the time. This is a nice.

unique to me since about 4 million people look to him on the internet for style advice. This episode gives a ton of pragmatic tips for dressing better, including the staple pieces that everyone needs to make stylish outfits, how to dress around body parts that you might like less, where to shop and more. But we also go into like, what is the point of style? What can men gain from it? Why is it less culturally acceptable for men to embrace this and other aspects of self-care? It goes deep and it goes light and chatty and through it all, Parker is just an absolute joy.

If you are a guy, welcome. I'm so glad that you're here. If you're not, send this to the men in your life so they can feel as good as they deserve to. Start over what? Why did you move to L.A.? I'm from Cincinnati, so to not be there anymore, just to be in a place that was a little bit more, you know, creative, open-minded. No shade to Cincinnati. I love it there.

It's fun to go back, but it just wasn't for me, especially in 2009 when I moved to way. But I also moved to LA to try and pursue acting, which I had very minimal success at, but in the long run through personal introspection therapy, things I realized I was kind of pursuing it for the wrong reasons because growing up, my dad was an actor. And him and I sort of had a, my parents got divorced when I was five. So he was around, but it was kind of that every other weekend kind of relationship with him. So we weren't the closest, but he was in my life. And I just kind of realized I was pursuing acting to one-up him. I wanted to prove like I can I'm going to be better than you were at this. And like technically speaking, I guess I was. But like, but I mean,

like it just ended up being not truly what I was passionate about or what I really wanted to pursue. Well, and sometimes it's in the achieving of the thing that you realize, oh wait, that's not actually what I wanted. Yes, 100%. Just sort of being here doing it. And, getting a peek behind the curtain of what the reality of that world, especially the acting world or film and TV in general is, it's very disillusioning, if that's a word. It just was not as sexy as I thought it was going to be because, you know, I was of the mindset of like back in the day with entourage being popular. And like, I was sort of like, I'm going to move out there and I'm going to have that life in three months. And I didn't. How did the fashion stuff come in? So I've always been

into fashion. My parents have always been into it as well a little bit. It wasn't what they did professionally or anything, but for whatever reason, I've just always been very opinionated on what I was wearing and how it made me feel and how it allowed me to express myself. And then my now wife, girlfriend at the time, saw me pursuing acting and realized that I was kind of miserable. She had met a couple of people because she was working PR for a small fashion accessory brand at the time. And she met a couple people who were influencing and said, you know, there's these people who just take pictures of their outfits and post them on Instagram and post them on a blog and brands pay them to do that. You should do that. I was like, okay, like sure, that sounds nice.

But essentially we just went out and bought a decent little camera. She helped me on the back end set up a blog like an actual, you know, website that we used to always, everybody had to have in addition to your social media back in the day. One thing led to another of just posting a lot of just constantly being out, shooting pictures, posting outfits. It's been nice to be in LA because I could go to PR agencies and borrow clothes. So it looked like I always had new cool stuff that I wasn't actually having to buy because I was just a broke server for years. As the audience continue to grow as I was able to continue to kind of show my personal point of view with it all and why I was compiling things in the way that I was, why I was dressing how I was. Brands started

to take notice and started to kind of send us things and then from there it just snowballed and continued to grow. Were you ever uncomfortable with your interest in fashion? I ask because, and I hate that I even have to like talk about this, but a lot of people think that it's not like male or masculine to be interested in feminine or it means that you're gay. And not that there's anything wrong with being feminine or gay. They're both like great things to be. But you're married. You have a child, one child, two child, children. One with us, one on the way. Okay. So yeah, you're married. You have kids. When you were growing up, when you were first starting this career, did you ever feel like you were being boxed into something? Thankfully not being in L.A.

I didn't. That was one of the best things about being here. Truly my favorite thing. thing about Los Angeles is there is a crowd for everyone. No matter what you're into, whatever you like, there are people here that are into that. You can walk out the door in a suit and it's fine. You can walk out the door in a crazy high designer fashion outfit. It's fine. You can walk out the door in a dress if that's your prerogative and that's fine. So being here, I didn't have a lot of that. But I mean, especially my process creatively for years was just to set up a tripod and take pictures. So having gone back to Ohio to do that, or even like we've partnered with a couple of brands in our hometown of Cincinnati, that then having to go do the creative process there,

it would have been a lot harder there for all the reasons you're talking about. And also, you speak to millions of people online and you often, like a big video style you do as you apply to a comment and then you do something based on that comment. I'm sure you get a lot of comments who are like, bro, like, I can't believe you're into this fashion stuff. Like, what would you say to a man listening who's like, I would love to explore this part of myself, but I'm worried about how I'll be perceived as a result of that? Sure. I was into fashion for 20 years before I moved to California.

And yes, I dealt with tons of people commenting about it or, you know, just having little things to say in the sense of, you know, as guys, we are unfortunately societally taught that being feminine is about the worst thing that you can be. It's showcasing those characteristics and fashion and or self-care in general are considered feminine traits in a lot of places. So I think the best thing that I would say is just to be prepared with. For me, it was always either I don't like that or whatever hypothetical thing. It was like a thing I used to say a ton was, well, then it's a good thing. It's me wearing it, not you. You know, just like, and you know, it's also depends on your confidence level in terms of like that could kind of piss people off maybe or just

really trying to diffuse the fact that what you like, if they're not into it, that's okay. But I don't, I don't know. It's hard because there's really not like a, if you say this, it's going to work every time. Sometimes people appreciate you coming back at them with a confident retort. Sometimes that angers them and causes them to tell you to meet them outside or something crazy. You know what I mean? So taking time to be comfortable with the fact that you care about it. That's all that really matters. Which begs the question, what are the benefits to caring about how you look to putting together an outfit to doing self-care in this way?

What are we going to get from it that makes it worth maybe having to defend it a little bit? Sure. The biggest things for me are self-expression, are confidence. That's probably the number one thing because I'm a firm believer that as a confident person, and I say confidence in the true definition. not in like a cocky asshole type way at all, like very just self-assured. Because ultimately it's no different than going to the gym or spending time on your mental health or whatever. Putting in those little bits of attention and intention towards what you're wearing and how you're presenting yourself to the world

is going to cause the people around you to, while yes, you will get negativity, unfortunately sometimes. there is also a lot of positivity that's going to be coming your way, and that's going to seep into you, and it's going to cause you to start to carry yourself a little bit differently. And then for me, I'm a firm believer that new doors are going to start to open, and it's going to also lead you down these paths in life that you probably would not have gotten to go experience had you not spent a little bit of time on the back end, getting dressed in a way that makes you feel good. honestly, just feeling good about yourself as as as as it, you know, can kind of be broken down to, I suppose. I love that you always talk about that in your videos. You're like, this might be a little

crazy, but it makes me feel really good or I feel really good in this. That's something that a lot of men maybe deny themselves. They're like almost like, I don't deserve to feel good in this way. And that makes me a little sad. Totally. I think that the more we can kind of try to step away from the idea that it is a female pursuit to care about your appearance? Because ultimately, another conversation that I will have with whomever is willing to listen is everything is fashion, in my opinion. Like in the sense of like even people who might fit into the stereotype that don't care about these kinds of things are still conscious of the fact that they need to have those certain work boots or they need to have that certain utility belt or they need to have that

specific truck or and I'm I'm being very specific with a demographic that I'm and I'm not trying to be negative towards anyone at all. That's just the first things that are popping into my head. But I think that if we kind of zoom out, everything can kind of be considered this. So just being able to be compassionate to the fact that sure, he cares more about his pants and his shirt, but you also care about whatever it is for you, if that makes sense. That does make sense. It's like we're almost always engaging with things that we are asking people to perceive as our identity in a certain way. Yeah. Yeah.

And also, we can't be naked. Exactly. All the time. Legally speaking. Yes, exactly. We can't be naked. And it's an interesting thing because I have very mixed feelings about the beauty standards, particularly women, have to adhere to to, go into society. I'm wearing makeup right now.

You don't have to wear makeup to appear in a podcast. I am, I don't have to, but it would be very noticeable if I did not, et cetera. But we do all have to wear clothes every single day. And it's interesting because you can either use that as an opportunity to say something about yourself and to make yourself feel good or you cannot. And all choices are valid. But it's an interesting thing that we can't be naked. Right.

You might as well use every avenue to make yourself feel good, make life a little bit more interesting, make your experience on this planet a little bit more unique, I suppose. And again, you don't have to go wear a crazy pair of pink cowboy boots like I wore on a video recently. Like I think that that kind of gets into people's head too of like, I'm not going to wear this crazy thing that these fashion people wear. So I can't be into it. It's like, no, you can absolutely wear the plainest, simplest thing. But if you've paid attention to how it fits and you've really kind of used a couple of accessories to really differentiate yourself,

and it makes you feel good, then you're taking full advantage of the opportunity. I think that it does not have to be crazy complex or overly serious. I think that was a big thing for me, too, starting out, was I always enjoyed fashion, but I hated the old school super gatekeeper-y type stuff of like, we decide what's cool, it's dead serious, don't possibly have a good time. This is fashion. It is capital F, you know, it is very serious. I'm like, no, it's fun.

It's silly. Ultimately, yes, we're apes running around with weird pieces of clothes on our body, weird clothing on our body. So like, have a good time with it. It's also completely easy opportunity to just be silly. I love that. Is that why you do, like, dressing, like, clue characters and stuff like that? Totally.

Show that off. Absolutely. Because to me, I spent years and years kind of educating, and I spent so much. so many tried to come at it from so many different ways of what works for me and how you can be improving your style with these ways or what the best five jackets are for fall and and there's nothing wrong with that kind of content i still do produce that stuff we're going to get into some of that okay cool fantastic and i would love to but yes for me it was in a way kind of selfish because i needed to feel creatively inspired so i that's a big reason why i do a lot of the clue or the

I'm in a Taylor Swift album series right now. I just saw Lover. Yes. Okay. There's a couple. There's a new one coming today. There's one other one. I did one of the other ones.

Oh, reputation as well. Okay. So let's get into some of the more pragmatic tips. If somebody's listening and they're trying to figure out like what is my style, what advice would you give them to begin to define that? Sure. The simplest way that I go about this is to break it into three steps. First of all, you need to educate yourself with what's out there.

You have to spend a little bit of time engaging with social media, engaging with Pinterest, engaging with Google in general of just like seeing the different sort of aesthetics that exist. I mean, it sounds more daunting than it is. Like, as long as you just kind of go into a generic men's fashion search, you're going to start to see at least some version, hopefully, of things that you enjoy. So then once you- What are we searching? I just want to make this as easy as possible and as- quick as possible for somebody who doesn't want to spend a lot of time on this. Totally. I would say men's fashion inspiration or like if you want to be a little bit more specific about it, like right now

we are fall men's fashion 2024 or just things that are going to give you current imagery or content in general of what people are wearing right now. And it's going to be as simple as finding stuff that you enjoy so that you can kind of hold on to that, move on to the next step, which would be to just copy it, in terms of as simply as I, right now I am wearing a sweater, a casual shirt, and some jeans. By educating yourself with what's out there a little bit, you're going to be able to start breaking it down into categories a little bit more easily, and then copying those categories as broadly as you can and or even, you know, don't be afraid to take a picture into a store and be like, hey, I really like the way this looks. Do you have stuff like this? Engage with store employees, engage with people who,

at least to some extent, know what they're talking about in the same way you would with a haircut or with any of the thing. You go in with your inspiration and say, hey, I'm looking to kind of create this. Can you help me? It should not be a singular pursuit. It's not going to happen. Or it's going to take a lot longer than it needs to. So then once you are able to copy what you like, start copying a couple different things. So like, for example, copy really casual stuff, copy jeans and T-shirts, figure out what fits you, what makes you feel good, and then copy stuff that's a little bit more dressy or another area that makes you interested that you think is cool. For me, I wear a lot of suits, but that can be difficult for people. It's overwhelming for people, I think, but just trying to copy some

version of what you're seeing and then over time you're able to create something that feels more specifically you by blending all those things together that you've learned. You're giving me a look like this is not helpful. No, I'm trying to learn. I'm trying to learn. I'm just making sure. Okay, cool. Yeah, so over time. And again, I really do, I overuse the gym analogy because I do think that it is so apropos of like you're not going to show up to a marathon and run the full race. You shouldn't, At least, you know, like you're not going to show up to the mall and walk out with a full, perfectly fitting, complete, stylish wardrobe. It's just realistically not going to happen that way.

It's going to take time and that's great because you're going to learn what really works for you. You're going to learn what makes you feel best and it's going to allow you to customize it to yourself a little bit. Where do you think that most men's style falls down? Like when they're trying to put together an outfit and they're like, this just does not look stylish, why do you think that is happening? Fit. Okay. 1,000 percent. I would reasonably say 99% of the time.

A lot of guys think that clothes need to be as comfortable as they possibly can be. And I don't disagree with that, but I think you need to get used to what fits in a flattering way, but isn't ultimately uncomfortable. It might take you a little bit. if you're used to wearing stuff that doesn't fit, it's not going to be super flattering, but it is going to be extremely comfortable. I'll get a lot of questions from people who are like, my partner wears tons of sweats. How do I get them to wear other stuff? And I'm like, well, if you're used to wearing sweats every day, you're going to be used to a certain level of comfort. Wearing jeans is probably not, especially when you're starting out, it's not going to be as

comfortable as sweatpants. Over time, sure, I personally would, rather wear jeans than sweatpants. I know. It's crazy. I'll sit around the house in jeans. Like, it's wild. And I'm not saying that that's what's going to happen. But I mean, it's something that with time, you need to understand that fit is going to change everything. Fit is going to change how it looks. It's going to change how it feels. But that is definitely the biggest detail of, I think a lot of people think that something that fits is too tight. And it's just not. As long as it's staying up without cutting off circulation or like being truly uncomfortable, I think it fits.

Okay. So the test we should be doing in the stores is this staying up and can I breathe? That sounds dramatic, but I mean like, I don't know. Like how do we get to? If we're listening, we're like, oh, shoot, have I been wearing stuff that doesn't fit forever? Our partner is thinking that. How do we get them to a place of great fit? A big thing with pants is make sure it fits in the waist.

Usually for me, like if I can put a couple of fingers in my waistband without them falling down, where I might need a belt a little bit, that's great. Fitting in the waist is huge. And then for the rest of the leg on a pant, if you have super athletic thighs, then the bottom of the pant ends up being huge, go find a tailor in your area that will fix the bottom of your pants for $15. bucks. It isn't as expensive as I think people think it is or as daunting as it is to get things tailored and it will make a world of difference. If you can kind of just start putting it in your head that, okay, I'm going to spend $65 on these pants, but I also know that there's an extra $15

baked in because I'm going to probably have to get them tailored as well. Starting to kind of think about it in that way. And then as you develop a relationship, hopefully with a tailor that you like, And I mean, go to a dry cleaner. Google tailors near me or whatever. Like everyone has a tailor. As long as you don't live in a very, very remote part of the country, everyone's going to have a tailor accessible to them. And they will tailor everything from jeans to t-shirts to suits, everything.

Fit the waist. You can tailor the rest of the leg to fit it how you want to have it fit. And then in terms of tops, the best thing you can be doing is focusing on the shoulder seam. On a t-shirt right now, your t-shirt has seams at the top of the sleeve and they're landing right around the end of your shoulder. Is that good? That's good. That tells you that that fits, that it's fitting you in the torso and that the sleeve is landing

right around where it should. And the same thing is going to go for dress shirts, for jackets, for a lot of sweaters, pretty much everything where the sleeve or the torso of the shirt ends on the end of your shoulder and the sleeve begins, that is a good way to know that it probably fits. And again, you might need to get the sleeve shortened a little bit or shorten the body of the shirt a little bit if you're going to be wearing it untucked or every body, like literal body is different. So you're going to have to maybe tweak things a little bit. But if you can dial in your fit, it does not matter if you're wearing jeans and a white t-shirt, you will look great. I asked recently on Instagram how people found

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And the number one thing they were trying to dress for was masking things on their bodies. I was surprised by how many men were insecure particularly about their stomachs and they felt like they couldn't be fashionable because there was no way to be fashionable if you had a larger stomach. Do you have thoughts on that? I mean, I completely disagree, to be fair. I think that there are plenty of examples out there. my friend Nick has handles coastal flicks. He's who I point all people to. If they are a little bit of a bigger guy, he's naturally, he played lineman in college, like he is a big guy. And he is one of the

most stylish guys that I know because he just knows how to dress for his body type. I think that if you're willing to, if you carry a lot of extra weight in your midsection, something you can do that I'm a big fan of is there's another guy William Reiker that I love who's a bigger guy. He wears his pants. He wears them at his true waist and he is a bigger guy. So he buys his pants to fit over his entire midsection like you would traditionally wear your pants at your waist and it looks fantastic. A lot of guys aren't really into that because it can be a little bit more uncomfortable, cutting them right in the middle of the stomach. If you're more into wearing your pants a little bit lower underneath where you're, you know, carrying extra weight in your stomach, something that you

can be doing is really working to get all of your shirts hitting right around the waistline. In the sense, what I'm saying is like, go buy a button-down shirt, take it to the tailor, and have them tailor it so it lands a couple of inches below the top of your jeans. So it's not showing your stomach, but it's also not requiring you. Because especially if you are carrying extra weight, you're probably going to be sizing up a little bit, which is fine. But understanding the intentional ways with which you can tailor pieces to fit different bodies and flatter them is a huge opportunity for people to not feel like they have to be boxed within this specific. because if you are a bigger body and you're wearing even bigger clothes to try to hide that bigger body, all is doing is making you look even bigger than you actually are.

Wearing things that fit you, I don't care what size you are. There is stuff that fits. If you can find what truly does fit in a flattering way, your options are as open as anyone else is who has a more sample-sized type body. like I have. I definitely will get a lot of comments of like, sure, his style's fine, but like, it's just because he looks the way he does or whatever. And 100% it helps. Of course, I can usually go buy things and they fit me right away. I'm very, very fortunate in that sense. But I also don't want guys to feel like they can't have access to all these benefits of style because they are a certain

size. Understanding proportions is another huge thing. The rule of thirds where If you break your body into your torso's one third, your hips to your knees are one third, and your knees to your ankles are another third. Fill two thirds with your pants. Fill one third with your shirt. And it will break you in a way. It will elongate your proportions to make you look a little bit slimmer or just be a little bit more of a flattering aesthetic, if that makes sense.

Yeah, I think it's just so important to even be having the conversations about those things because I feel like women know that women feel insecure about our bodies. Like it's something we talk about a lot. We talk about the problems that are inherent to that, how we need to fix it, how we need to fix societal conversations, all of that. But I think men are insecure about their bodies in a way that women are not even aware of. 100%. On a mass scale.

Yeah. And I think this kind of all feeds into exactly back to the point of like as we've progressed with men being more, quote-unquote, allowed to care about this kind of stuff, we are realizing that there are massive groups of men who have these concerns that never really had to because appearance wasn't as focused on as it is now. You didn't have to be as appearance forward, I don't think, in the past, as you do in a lot of areas nowadays. Like, there's so many professions where you have to be on social media, where you have to be presenting yourself in a way that was never necessary before. Or there are all these other contributing factors to guys not

feeling great about themselves. And my husband says just scrolling on social media, he's like, he's interested in workout routines. So then he gets fed all this gym content. And then he's like, well, does every single person have like an eight pack? And should I be going out to get an eight pack? And it makes you insecure, even if you feel healthy and strong. Yeah. 100%. It's definitely one of the probably many downsides to social media is seeing all these very difficult to achieve results. That's why I'm trying to always remind people that it is a process. This is not something you are going to go fix tomorrow. This is going to be something that will likely take years. There will be many small victories within the journey, but it is definitely

something that I promise is worth it, but it will take time. Even someone who has no problem finding clothes that fit or has a giant room full of clothes, there's still plenty of times when I'm going to get dressed and I'm just like, ugh, hate this, hate this, don't want to wear that. It happens for everyone. So I mean, giving yourself a little bit of grace, giving yourself the understanding that it's hard for everybody. Even the people that present like they're perfect and never have issues, that's fake. Well, and I wonder if it keeps a lot of men from even trying with fashion because it's easier to not try and say, I don't care about that, than to try and feel like you've failed in some

way either because you don't feel like something looks good on your body, you don't feel like you've achieved the look you're going for, et cetera. Yeah, it's easier to not care or to pretend like you don't care and then make fun of it. Yeah. Because it actually makes you very self-conscious because you're not able to reap the same benefits because you don't perceive that you look the right way or whatever. What would you say to the woman listening who wants her partner to care more, who wants her partner to dress different, but they feel like when they say anything, it's perceived

as criticism or critique? I think that one of the best ways that you can go about it is to, be delicate, of course. The thing that I've kind of recommended to people in the past is sort of similar to the process that I was talking about earlier. Like for the woman or whomever the partner is that wants their partner to change, bring some idea of, hey, I saw these pictures of this outfit, don't make it anything about the model wearing the outfit. Or I found this brand that I think is really cool. Would you be open to? maybe trying it out or do you like the way that this looks trying to involve them as much as possible

as opposed to like you're always wearing your cargo shorts and flip-flops like can't you dress like Parker York Smith sometime or whatever that is not the goal it's just so individual because I know that some guys are going to take more offense to it well and there's two camps too I feel like there's the guy who's like not really interested in style and you're like trying to kind of get him to go in that direction, but then there's also the guy where he feels he's wearing cool things, but you hate everything he's wearing. That is a whole separate conversation. I would need time to even, like, think about that one, because, I mean, I really feel like

there needs to be space for people to be themselves, but we also have to... Look at each other. Yeah. Coexists, you know? But I do think that's, like, it is important to realize if they truly feel like that is representing them in some way. You don't want to squash somebody's self-representation of their identity. Yeah.

If it's something that you know that they are really passionate about, like really, like, they think that they really put in the effort to, like, do it. And if it's just, like, really not working for you, you can try to sit down and have a real conversation about it, but also, like, maybe being able to recognize that going back to that idea of, like, we're just monkeys and pieces of, you're just monkeys and pieces of cloth, like trying to maybe make it a little bit less of a thing, but it's not really the type of thing where it's like a one size fits all. So being delicate, but also understanding that, hey, I know you love this. I love how confident it makes you feel. I was also thinking we could

try this. Or I was wondering what if this might also make you feel confident, because as much as I love that you love this, this to me is also something that's really interesting. And you would hope as a healthy partner, they would be at least receptive. It doesn't need to be a full shift. And just like giving the full scope of it. Like I'm not asking you to change yourself 100% of the time. But on my birthday when we go out to dinner, what if we dressed you like this? Starting very small and hopefully making it an open conversation.

So what do you like are going together to shop and figuring out like, what do you like? What don't you like? okay, let's build upon that and go forward. Because ultimately, something that I've been very surprised about over the last couple of years, I've had a lot more female people joining my audience and how much they say that my tips are applicable to them as well, and them styling themselves, which is kind of opened my eyes to the fact that just because your partner's a guy and you don't buy men's clothing because you're a woman doesn't mean that it's really that different.

Ultimately, casual pants go with casual shirts really well. Or just the things that you're probably at least accustomed to, a skirt, if it's a dressier thing and it works really well, you can combine it with a casual thing. So like a pair of dress pants and a casual shirt could kind of be interesting. You know, thinking about it in a way that relates to what you already know and extending that information to them, I think could be helpful as well.

I also find that complimenting a lot when you like something that they're wearing works so much better than criticizing when you don't like. Yes. Compliments. Oh, my gosh, I love you in this color. It's so, so good. People remember that forever and they will start wearing that color a lot. They will start wearing that fit a lot. We are evolutionarily designed to remember negativity as well.

When you do come at it from a point of, oh, I hate when you do that. that's going to stick in their brains in the same way that I could read 100 positive comments. You, I'm sure, have had many of the same experience. You read 100 positive comments, and then there's two negative ones, and all you can dwell on are the negative ones. Because it is our brains telling us, watch out for that. There is potential danger there. If you can keep it positive almost exclusively in this world,

if you really do want change to happen, I think that that's going to reap rewards for sure. A hundred percent. Could you describe a basic go-to outfit that every man could have in his wardrobe that would just feel really fashionable and feel a little bit elevated but work for every day? 100%. Get some jeans that fit well. I think a dark wash pair are the most versatile because they match with everything or like a midwash, you know, is great too. A simple basic t-shirt, if you're okay with white, that's my favorite just because it

matches with everything if you prefer something black or darker because it's more slimming or more comfortable for you, that's fine as well. And then you can literally just use that as what I would call just a classic base layer and then start going crazy with what you layer over it. You could wear a sport coat over it for a nice date and your shoes as well. Get a simple pair of white minimal sneakers. All white leather, classic. Easy to clean, easy to look nice. They're nice enough to go to most dinner restaurants. These aren't like workout sneakers. These are like...

Fitness. Yes. These are not running shoes. Okay. I do not want to see your running shoes with your jeans. If you're wearing running shoes, wear some running shorts, please. But yes, a simple, classic, easy white sneaker. I prefer a dressy boot as opposed to like a dress shoe, especially if you're trying to

keep it minimal, like you don't have a lot of money to spend or you don't feel like having lots of things. A dressier, nice Chelsea-style slip-on boot, no laces, easy, or a classic leather lace-up boot. Switch between those two things. Wear the sneakers if you're being casual, wear the boot if you're trying to be a little bit more dressy, and then load up on shirts and jackets. You could do a short sleeve button-up shirt layered over the T-shirt for a warmer day. You could do a denim jacket or a bomber jacket if you're being more casual. You could do a sport coat or even like a long overcoat style thing if you're trying to be more dressy. So just understanding, starting very simple with well-fitting jeans and a t-shirt or if you need

to be a little dressier, go one step above a t-shirt with a sweater polo or a button-down white shirt or whatever. Like just being able to dumb it down as much as possible to understand, okay, if I put on my simple jeans and my simple shirt, I'm going to be able to layer all kinds of other things around this to create tons and tons of different vibes. I can get dressy if I need to be dressy for a nice date night. I can be super casual. Depending on your office environment, if you are a nine to five or going into an office, you could swap your jeans in for a nice pair of chino pants and those same button-up shirts, maybe even a t-shirt depending on your office environment. Yeah, just keeping it very, very basic. I mean, ultimately I think there are like maybe 10 to 12 pieces.

you really need if you want to, like, have everything covered. Okay, you know I now need to ask. So we've got jeans, one, we've got sneakers, two, we've got boots, three, we've got basic teas. We'll make that a category as opposed to just like one piece. Four, like a button-down style Oxford dress shirt is classic and works with a tie or whatever. Five. I would get a suit because inevitably you're going to need one for a wedding, or a funeral or whatever the case may be.

A classic dark gray is fine or navy blue. Those are the most versatile. That's six. You can also use those dress pants from the suit as dress pants for your other outfits. And the coat. It's one of my favorite things you do is you'll take apart suits and you'll use the pieces. And the coat can get yourself a pair of chino pants as opposed to dress pants just because they're a little bit of a dressier version and that you can still wear it to the office.

What is a chino pan? A chino panties. khakis are, I know, kind of have like a old dad vibe to them, although that kind of style is very much back, which is funny. But yes, they are cotton, very comfortable, lightweight pant that a lot of people, once they kind of start getting more into style, like them even more than jeans, because they're very lightweight. What color? I like a classic, like, stone, which would kind of be like a lighter khaki color. But, I mean, if you like gray, that's great. If you like navy blue, if you like black.

Another piece of advice that I really like to give is if you have jeans that you love, whatever color those are that you're already comfortable styling, get like a chinopan in the same color because they're automatically going to present like they're a little bit dressier, but they're not jeans. Because there's going to be cases in your life when you're not going to be able to wear jeans. So chinopans, I think it was seven or eight, and then just get a couple jackets. I love a denim jacket. That can be a little uncomfortable for people.

but a chore jacket is really... Or what? They're called a chore jacket. It has classic pockets on the front. Just a super versatile, easy. If you're someone who's more drawn towards neutral colors, get a bunch of neutral colors like blacks, gray, dark navy blue. If you're someone who likes a bit of earth tone color,

I'm that way, dark blues, oranges, greens, browns. So that way you can literally mix and match every one of these 10 pieces. You can get super dressy in your suit with your dressy boots, your button-down shirt. You can wear your dress pants with a T-shirt and the casual jacket in your sneakers for like a cool little mix outfit. You can wear your chino pants with the dress shirt and your casual jacket and your sneakers for like an office-appropriate outfit.

There's just tons and tons and tons of ways that you can mix these 10 pieces. And then once you have those and you start to understand, okay, I'm really gravitating towards these chino pants and sneakers a lot. get a black pair of sneakers, get a blue pair of sneakers, get a green pair of chino pants. Start to differentiate those things that you're already comfortable using and understanding how to mix into your outfits and you're going to be able to sort of just start creating all kinds of different aesthetics being appropriate. Because for me it's like I like to feel good, but I'm not someone who likes to show up to something in like a flan, if it's a crazy fun event,

I like having crazy fun clothes. But for the most part, I'm like, I want to be dressed at the dressier side of the scale for whatever it is that I'm doing. Yeah, I feel like that feels respectful. Yes, exactly, where I can still feel good. Or like right now I'm wearing like a fun sunglasses ring. Little small touches like this are fun for me because I know I paid attention and like most times no one will even notice or maybe one or two people will and it will be a conversation starter or something. But for the most part, I'm attempting to be very respectful, ensuring that it fits me well, because if I know it fits me well, then it's going to make me feel good.

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and I don't feel like enough men wear jewelry. Can you like PSA jewelry for men? Wear jewelry, guys. I have a thing called the one-one-two rule that is one watch. Obviously, I hope we're not going to ever wear more than one watch. One necklace, one bracelet, two rings, not including your wedding band. If you want to wear a bunch of jewelry, keep it to that formula and you will look great. if you don't have to worry about matching metals and materials and like all these rules, forget all that,

figure out a combination. Like, I have this necklace. I wake up in the morning. I put it on. I take it off before I go to bed. And I almost exclusively wear this necklace at all times. But it really elevates your outfit. Like it really, it's just if you're not watching, if you're listening, it's like just a ball chain necklace with an initial at the end of it.

And it's not huge, but it really like brings it together. And I can tuck it under my shirt. if I'm wearing something that's like a little bit tighter to my neck. So I think a necklace is huge. You'd be surprised by how masculine a necklace can make you feel, even though it is a piece of jewelry. Do we have like the mob to think for that? Maybe. I don't know.

I never thought about it. There's an intangible feeling that a necklace provides for me, that I can't really categorize. I don't. There's just something about feeling it there or seeing it if I do have a couple of buttons on my shirt undone and just filling that area. I think a necklace is something that everyone should experiment with. Well, it's an interesting thing because jewelry draws attention to body parts, right? And so if you're a man and you're like doing all your chest presses and you're like trying to work on your shoulders, your necklace is drawing attention to those areas.

Similarly, I think men's hands are so hot. You have rings, you have a watch, you have bracelets that's drawing attention to your hands. It's like saying, come look over here. Yeah, absolutely. And the same thing with rings. A lot of times guys will hear rings in their head immediately. goes to like an engagement ring or a wedding ring or something like that that is very feminine traditionally. I know even a lot of guys don't even wear a wedding band or they'll wear like the rubber

ones or whatever, which is fine, whatever you're comfortable with. But I do think that a classic like Cignaz style ring or even just like a simple band ring that is additional to your wedding band, I usually wear one on my opposite ring finger like I am right now. Even a jean and t-shirt outfit, I'll definitely have my necklace on. I'll usually probably also wear a watch, and I might even throw on a ring as well, just to kind of, like I said, be at the dressier side of the spectrum for my most casual outfits. And the more you do it, the less self-conscious you're going to feel about it, and the more comfortable it's going to be to just exist as that person,

and you're going to start to, you know, feel the way other people notice it in a good way, I hope. Something I noticed you did not mention that is a staple in a lot of male wardrobes is a baseball cap. Oh, yeah. How do you feel about baseball caps? Can we style them more fashionably? Are they okay for all occasions? I think that if you are into hats, that's perfectly fine. And I would say keep them in your casual outfits.

Like if you're wearing jeans, maybe even chino pants, a hat's okay. If you're dressing up, don't wear a hat. I think that hopefully goes without saying, but I never know anymore. If you're a big fan of a certain team is great and also they're functional. A lot of guys don't pay enough attention to their skin either. That's a whole separate conversation that hats can help with in guarding you from the sun and keeping your face shielded at least somewhat. So if it's a really hot day, you're going to be outside, by all means.

Yeah, I think hats are great. I love that you say that because I do feel like something we're sort of dancing around. We talked about a little bit at the beginning is that this is an entry point into self-care, which is an entry point into saying I deserve to be cared for. I deserve to not get skin cancer. I deserve to have my skin feel really good for me long term. And I just, I think it's such an important part of the conversation that is often missing, that this is your entry point to say, and I am worthy of being cared for in this way. 100%. I think a lot of times I take an avenue of trying to appeal to guys in the sense of like reward. I think we're very reward driven a lot of the time,

whereas like if you do this, it could get you this. You know what I mean? It could get you your partner you're looking for. It could get you your promotion. It could get you your more money or whatever it is. Sure, I'm certainly guilty of caring about those things probably too much as well. But at the end of the day, yes, ultimately this is about you putting in time for you. yourself. You feeling like I am worthy of attention. I am worthy of feeling good. And I think that so many people make the assumption that because I'm not six three and, you know, slim, I can't reap those benefits. I've seen it time and time again with people sending me DMs or whatever of like with a picture of them at the mall wearing an outfit that fits and being like, I never thought I was this

person, I never thought this was for me and you've shown me that it can be and I'm just so grateful for that and that's so touching to me. But I'm like, good. Like finally, go tell your friends, tell everybody. This is exactly the point. It's not about being elitist. It's not about being cooler than other people. It's about you feeling good so that you can focus on other things and not have to necessarily be so worried about what is everyone thinking of me or what is happening, I don't know. I don't know. I'm getting carried away with it. But like it's important, though. It's important. And I also think that it's funny that we're like, bro, I don't want to like look good. I don't want to look like a girl. When it's like, girls think this is hot. Like at the,

if we're talking about the rewards, like at its most basic, women think that well-dressed men are hot. It will make you get more attention from women if that is your goal. 100%. Yeah. It's like wild to me. My husband values comfort over all else. What are the best ways to be comfortable, the most comfortable possible, let's say, but add some elements of style. Materials are a huge thing when it comes to comfort. We've gotten into a big thing now with like stretch materials are very popular. And like I get it. They are very comfortable.

There's like a whole kind of environmental proponent that is not great with those because they get into the water and things like that when we wash them. So I would not say don't wear them. that's just not realistic. 100% cotton things that are really made of these classic soft materials, the more you wear them, they're going to form to your body. The oils from your skin are going to secrete into them fabric and it is going to break down around the shape of your form. Getting nicer things that will do that in terms of cotton, linen, wool,

these more natural fibers are a really good way. if you are getting staple wardrobe pieces that you're planning on keeping for the long term, it's really smart. We all have those things with that certain T-shirt that's just like the perfect shirt. Being able to have that with more things in your wardrobe is entirely attainable, and I don't think people necessarily realize that. Focusing on materials. Give it time. Which is like a great tip unto itself. That sweater might not feel really good initially if it's made of these natural materials, but it's really interesting that you say it will feel good over time. Yeah, absolutely. When I get a new shirt that I

really love that's a little stiff, I'll go wear it on my morning dog walk. I'll find excuses to wear that thing to make it more comfortable because I know I'm going to love it, even though it may not be the most comfortable thing I have right now, understanding that over time with intention, it will be. Or the same thing like we were talking about with if you're really accustomed to wearing sweats or shorts all the time and your partner or you are really into the idea of wearing some jeans or dressing up a little bit more for yourself. And you get that pair and they're a little bit just different or they feel a little off. Just wear them around the house. Like just literally put them on your body and go live. And over time, you're going to forget, hopefully, that they were

uncomfortable because they're going to form to you more comfortably. But they're also just the simple act of doing the thing more regularly is going to take your mind away from the fact that this is new. This feels weird and it's just going to become more normal and comfortable and easy. Where should we be spending more money and where should we be saving on our wardrobe? Spending money on those 10 classics that I mentioned. A good pair of jeans will with care last. Only wash your jeans when they're visibly dirty or they smell. You can spot treat them.

Spending your money on those core essentials and then if there are statement pieces or things that you like, there's a weird jacket or whatever it is that inevitably are an interesting shoe that you kind of have your eye on. I would wait until sale season and hopefully be able to grab it at a discounted price if it's out of your price range. Give yourself the gift of it every once in a while. Trendy pieces as well. If you see something that's really interesting to you, maybe wait until it goes on sale and if it's still available for you, it can be a little bit more like meant to be and you can grab it. but keeping it classic investing in quality for your essentials the things that you're going to be going back to time and time again because overall if you go really cheap on the stuff that you're

going to be using a lot you're going to be washing it more it's not going to hold up and you're more likely to end up needing to reinvest in another version of it and then you've ruined your whole process of like breaking it down and and making it more custom to you in the in the like wear process like we talked about too. Do our shoes need to match our belt? I'm not a rules person, but this is one where I say yes, but only in the sense that like if you're wearing black shoes, wear a black belt. If you're wearing brown shoes, wear a brown belt. Otherwise, match the vibe of your outfit. If you're wearing green shoes, I don't expect you to own a green belt. If you're wearing green shoes with blue pants and a blue shirt or what hypothetically, that's more of

an earth toned outfit. So I would wear a brown belt because that's more of an earth tone to match the earth tone vibe of the outfit. If I'm wearing green shoes with gray jeans and a white t-shirt, I'm probably going to wear the black belt because I'm wearing more neutral colors in that sense. So if you're able to match it with black or brown, I say do just because it's cohesive. It, just kind of compliments. It's sort of, you know, I don't know, it breaks up the outfit in a nice way, but also is coordinated together in a good way. That's one of the very few rules. Do you have any other ones? The bottom suit button. Are you familiar with this? No. Okay. So anytime you're wearing a suit, the bottom button of your suit should be unbuttoned, of your jacket. Okay. It's silly. There's a whole

historical reason that I could go into with the king of England many years ago, but they're designed for that to be open. They are simply a visual feature nowadays. They are not meant to be buttoned. By closing it, you are actually making the suit fit improperly. You are making it fit tighter around your waist in a way that is both unflattering and less functional. So if you're wearing a suit jacket, you should not be wearing the bottom button closed. It should always be open. So if the jacket has two buttons, button the top one. If it has three buttons, you can button the top two. If you want, never button the bottom one. If it's a double-breasted jacket, still leave the bottom one undone. Wow. Okay, hot tip. Okay, we're going to do a quickfire round where I'm just going to

say a thing and you're going to tell me your favorite place to shop for that thing or where you most recommend people shop for that thing. Okay, cool. Jeans. Levi's are classic. That's a timeless brand. If you want to go a little bit more affordable, but it's still quality. Uniquello's great.

Elevated sneakers that can be worn day and night, those sneakers you were talking about earlier, that are not running shoes. Some of my favorite brands would be great. Side of New York. Coyo is super high-end Italian if you want to spend some real money on them because you're wearing them a ton. Good Man brand. Nothing new is a great brand as well for simple.

Converse. Vans. are classic for a reason. And you can weightlift in them. Very much so. Chinos. Dockers. Let's see, Buck Mason.

I'm going to stick with those. Those are my two favorites. Dress shirts for work. Charles Tierwit does a fantastic three-for-100 deal, and their shirts are wonderful. Basic T-shirts. Buck Mason, again, fantastic. I have a ton of basic T's from Coles that I like a lot. Calvin Klein, classic.

T's are kind of one of the few ones where I don't. necessarily think you need to invest a ton of money in them because they are going to inevitably get stained or messed up in some certain way, especially like basic t-shirts. So if affordability is more your approach there, I respect that. Do you like the t-shirt to be quite fitted? Because I kind of like when it hangs a little bit on a man. I personally like to have both. Okay. It's like a different vibe. Yeah. If I'm wearing something that is a little bit more relaxed or I'm in that mood, I like to have a boxier, bigger one, made well is another great brand for boxier type t-shirts, whereas if I'm wearing some slim jeans and boots and I want to really embody that classic Marlon Brando vibe,

I want something more fitted for sure. Suits. Indochino, great made-to-measure brand that will essentially allow you to customize exactly what you want. If you're looking for super affordability, suit shop is another one that's one that's, wonderful. They're like $200 suits and they're great. Suit supply is a little bit on the higher end. And then classics, polo, Brooks Brothers. The old school brands are, again, they've been around for a reason. Dress shoes. Dress shoes. I love Alan Edmonds for high end for something more affordable. Blake McKay is a great brand. You can get those like a DSW and stuff like that. Blazers?

Or are we always just taking our suit jacket and wearing that as a blazer? Well, technically a blazer would be a suit jacket. A sport coat, if we're going to get, yeah, I know, I know, it's obnoxious. But a sport coat would mean that it does, that it does not have accompanying pants. Okay. But in general, can we take our suit jacket and kind of wear that for the blazer look or no? You can. It's just, they are usually cut a little bit different. A blazer is typically going to be a little bit longer.

The fabric of a suit most times, like the classic wool suit is a little bit different than a sport coat fabric. wearing your suit jacket with jeans is not going to look as good, in my opinion, as wearing more of like a slightly shorter cut, maybe like patterned sport coat or something like that. Okay, so where does one get a sport coat? Same places as the suits. Okay. It will just be a little different. Indochino. It will just be cut a little bit differently.

And yeah, you could go with more of like a slightly bolder pattern that you might not feel super comfortable having a full suit in. What about other places to get fun jackets? Uniclo is always a fantastic option for simple. Going back to basic teas, I could have said them too. Fun jackets. Like you mentioned a bomber. Yeah. Buck Mason is another just like, it's a L.A. based brand that just does really, really great classic wardrobe staples.

There's a brand from Sweden, I think, called a day's March that I really love for jackets. A lot of the chore jackets that I talked about that you'll have to check out. Yeah, I think that's good. There's so many. There's so many brands, God. Sweeters? Sweeters, I love, especially because I'm not washing a sweater so much. I don't necessarily always think investing the most money into a sweater is that important.

If you do want to invest some real money into one, polo is timeless and great. There's a brand called Sonoma Goods at Coles that I have several sweaters from. The one that I'm wearing right now is from them. Very affordable. And again, because I'm not dry cleaning or washing my sweaters very often. I'm okay with them being a little bit more affordable because they're going to last longer. Jewelry? There's a Korean brand that I love and work with a lot called Lupin, L-O-U-P-N.

They do a lot of silver. It's all-silver. Highest quality that's like it's not cheap, but it's not crazy expensive by any means. Then there's really fun brands, like if you want to get a little bit bolder with it, Vitale or Crafted London or Little Rooms does men's and women's that I really love. if you like really quirky stuff. My Conquering is a brand from my hometown Cincinnati that I love. This is my sunglasses ring.

They're like fidget rings because I'm a very fidgety finger person. What about workout clothes? And is there any way to look cool, more cool while we work out? Wear black. Okay. All black. If you are conscious of wanting to look good at the gym, which I fully respect, I think it's the same thing as anything else.

Approaching it with intentionality, you're going to have a better result. if you go to the gym wanting to look good, you're going to feel good and you're going to work out harder, I think, you know. No, there's research behind the concept of dressing for the activity that you're doing. Yeah. It's why I think some schools will do this during like finals week. They'll say like, dress up because you actually do perform better on tests if you dress up. Okay, good.

I'm happy to hear that there's, that's been studied because I recommend that to people a lot. Or, you know, like just having those things for a presentation or those random or the wedding or the things that don't necessarily happen all the time, but when they do, you're not like scrambling, like, oh my God. Workout clothes Nike. Allo is nice. I like their stuff. It's comfortable and holds up.

There's like ASRV or Jim Shark for guys stuff that I think people are pretty into as well. Roan. Roan is a big one that I like, R-H-O-N-E. Viori, another one that I really love. Do you have any other little tips that are really actionable that would help any man listening just really begin to elevate their wardrobe and feel really good. Just always be paying attention. Being interested, I think is a huge thing.

I'm constantly just like, oh, I like the way that they did that. Or I never thought about styling jeans with that type of combination or layering those two pieces together or whatever. Just starting to be able to distill it down to categories in your head of being as broad as possible as opposed to like, well, I'm never going to find that green jacket. Just be like, that's a casual. jacket with some jeans and boots. That looks really nice. I'm going to go to the store and try that. I have things that fit within those categories. I'm going to dinner with my wife on Saturday.

Let me try that combination. She'd probably really like that. Just being intentional about it. I'm very guilty of like when things aren't easy for me, I just like discard them. This is hard. I don't want to do this. I get it. But just being open to the fact that with little bits of intention over time, you're going to start seeing major results because it's just going to be a normal everyday thing that you care about how you look. And it doesn't even need to be overly cautious in that care. This is not a quick tidbit. But yeah, just being able to be paying attention on a regular basis, I think is going to make huge impacts. And then we love to end with one homework assignment, something that people can do as soon as they're done listening to the podcast to begin to

see real results. So what would you assign us? Go follow some men's fashion creators. Oh, any, any, you're like, have you heard of this great one? As I've talked about earlier with education, you don't need to sit down with notebooks, just regularly exposing yourselves to these things, seeing what people are doing, how they're doing it, understanding what kind of combinations can work. So yeah, just follow a few people. And inevitably with tech nowadays, it'll show you more. It'll show you more. Yeah, honestly, if people just follow you after this episode of, we'll start to probably shop in their feed more. Go follow me at Parker York Smith and, you know,

are there any other ones? I know you mentioned two earlier. Yeah, Nick at Coastal Flicks, definitely check him out. Gosh, there's so many. I don't want to like leave out a friend. I mean, my friend Rashad, Mr. R. Little is fantastic. Trey Bryant style is great for like dressier type stuff or even like younger. If you're like looking to style your teens and things. Like I'll start to get questions a little bit about that too of like how do I get my teen away from what everyone else is wearing into something that makes them feel more individual or stuff like that. Trey's great. Marcel One Dapper Street. Marcel Flores. He's a German guy that's been in America for years and is super stylish. I love Instagram because you can kind of like you can go to my profile and then click

the little button it. It'll show you similar accounts. Just go click through five or ten of those and follow two or three of them and just slowly start engaging with it, you know, even if it's not something that you care a ton about, just having it kind of on the periphery for you every once in a while might teach you something new. I love that. So you're at is Parker York Smith. Do you want to take a second to talk about what you do and anything else that you want to highlight? Yeah, totally. At Parker York Smith, I'm very much fashion inspiration. I like to do anything and everything. If it's casual, if it's dressy, I talk a lot about what to wear to weddings. I talk a lot about what to wear to specific events or a big, I think you mentioned it briefly, but a big area of my

content is just directly answering questions. So if there's something specific that you're curious about, just start regularly commenting it into my content. And if I see it, and it's something that I feel like could be applicable to a large number of people, I will definitely make a piece of content showing you my interpretation of how you can be doing that or what combinations would work for that type of scenario or how you can style that one specific piece in a way that might feel a little bit more approachable because I have tons and tons of style hacks that I have in my brain that are really easy to use. I feel like we got a lot of them here though. Good, good. I hope so. Yeah, I feel like we got a lot of them. I love your whole account. I think I follow you on YouTube

and on Instagram, which I maybe don't need to, but like it's. Please, no, I follow you or I'm, yeah, I follow you too. So I like likewise. You're so. warm. Your content's weirdly calming. I don't know why. I get that a lot, which I love. It's not intentional, but I'm happy to hear it. I'm just like sitting there watching them and I'm like, I'm not a man. I'm not going to use. But like you said, a lot of the tips are applicable too and I send stuff to my husband all the time. So thank you for the work that you do and thank you for this conversation today. Yeah, absolutely. I hope it was helpful and I appreciate the opportunity. If you loved this episode, you will love the episode where I speak with Alison Bornstein. We dive deep into the

exact exercises that you can do to find your personal style, including her internet-shaking three-word method. We found my three words. It's really interesting. I will link it for you in the show notes, so you can go and listen next. Oh, just one more thing. It's the legal language. This podcast is presented solely for educational and entertainment purposes. It is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, a psychotherapist, or any other qualified professional.