if you're starting and growing a brand chances are you're looking into creating a lookbook for
your marketing materials or perhaps to show off your new designs but perhaps you're wondering is
this something that you even need is this really necessary so in today's video we're going to be
diving into some points and some things that you may never have heard of so if you're a new visitor
to this channel make sure you hit the subscribe button and turn on those post notification bills
to be alerted of future video drops because on this channel our mission is to build brands that
impact the world from the ground up and in today's video we're joined by the one and only mike who's
going to be diving into these details so let's jump right into it hey what's up i'm mike leisure
i'm an artist and i'm an art director you might recognize me from the why brands fail video and
other ones where we made music videos and talked about merch and stuff but today we're gonna be
talking about lookbooks you may have heard the term you may not know what it is and we're gonna
answer the question and also do you need one what is it why where does this come from i don't know
so what is a lookbook historically fashion brands would create these to help explain the story they
would use it to expand on what the collection is and i think that that was something that was done
in large at the time but as we've moved they've gone from print to digital and i think that's
where the lines are blurred now we're asking what does the lookbook mean in the digital age
as we've said lookbooks essentially add to the story right you can pick environments and
models and things that tell more of a story lookbooks can help add dimension to your
collection by changing the environment the colors the textures the design of it all that really can
accentuate what you've done within the actual physical clothing themselves i think at the end
of the day it's about using a lookbook to inspire your customers inspire them on how to wear them
inspire them on where the clothes go after you take them home so here comes the big question
you're learning about what it is you might be hearing it from you know somebody who's in an
industry or somebody else who has a small brand and they're like yo you need a lookbook or have
you done a lookbook maybe you've seen an article that says why your brand needs a lookbook i i
think the the thing that we're really looking at here is how big your brand is and how big your
collections are for you to even have a lookbook okay so let's say you want to do one anyway
how do we make the most out of it whether you need it or you don't need it
i think what you need to do in order to make one successful is plan well and i
say that for everything you've seen it in the other videos i'm all about
planning and organizing you have to think ahead if you're not planning on what the lighting is going
to look like or where you're going to be shooting it how many looks you have who's styling it
what photographer you're going to use and why these things will start to fall through
unless you just so happen to be lucky and you get all the best stuff just out of nowhere but chances
are probably not these things take a lot of effort and they take a lot of time from my perspective as
an art director i think one of the biggest things where people fall short on these lookbooks is
styling i think a lot of people just think i have some sweats i have some shirts i'm just gonna put
that in an outfit and then put these into photos and then i'll just throw them up i think that
the lack of styling doesn't actually inspire people i think that so many brands exist today
that if you just saw someone in a full sweatsuit of whatever you created it's just another person
selling like a sweatsuit like little thing you know i mean it's a little combo same exact colors
it's it's not inspiring so it's like how do you then look deeper into that and make that a little
more elevated in the past when i've done different look books i'm going to tell you right now we had
multiple stylists uh we had different people styling for different types of looks we had
different people come in specifically for accessories and i think that these things are
so important because it's really down to the details if you get into this situation where
you're trying to create every single detail is important down to the rings the watch the chain
not wearing a chain who is that type of person what shoes are they wearing are they dirty are
they clean it doesn't have to be so pristine and brand new but it really depends on the collection
itself so these are things that you definitely need to pay attention to when you're styling and
you're putting it all together so as i was saying with the accessories this is the collection we did
454 and we called it the wave and when we were doing this it was like the hat is important the
belt and if you notice on these other ones that the belt is folded in a specific way like that's a
specific detail that says who's going to wear this and why because the guy who wears his belt like
this is not going to be like the other guy or even the person who wears this chain and this shirt
is like completely different and these are the ways that we can inspire people to wear this
clothes maybe you see yourself as that guy they're all so different so this collection in particular
and this lookbook could be fitting for a multitude of people as opposed to something where it's
styled specifically for one type of guy or person the other thing that i am so keen on and i really
want people to understand is that the models do matter if you've had the opportunity to shoot with
or be on set for when there's a real model and a real photographer you'll see it's night and day
from shooting with your friend unless your friends happens to be a model or they know what they're
doing or they're an aspiring model um but you'll see it's like they're very professional that's
they literally get paid to do that so they come in they know how to pose they know how to work
the camera they know how to work literally the clothes themselves because they'll put it on
and they understand like already okay dope this has a pocket here i'm gonna stand this way whereas
your friend might do this and it's like now i don't know there's pockets on the vest there's all
these little things that people don't understand all the my new details that you should be paying
attention to so picking a good model and picking somebody who understands what they're doing
is going to make this look so much better so this is kind of the tricky part though as we talk about
like if you need it or not i think getting booking a real model is going to be fairly expensive so
if it makes sense for you go ahead and do that if you can't then you have to work with what you have
but i mean if you're going to start trying to look for models you can look for agencies within your
area and then you can send out emails go ahead and ask them what they have available ask for a
catalog and then look through see who fits your look and who fits the clothing who you imagine
to be wearing this then you're going to get your quotes and then you're going to have to
pay your fees and do your thing do remember if you do book a professional model make sure you
are professional or if the model shows up and you're taking a long time to set up and they're
sitting there for three hours before they start shooting you don't have any food or water for them
that's gonna get back to the agency and you're definitely not getting another model anytime soon
especially from that agency i don't know so as i talked about before planning is so important
you really need to look ahead of time and see how many looks you're planning because if you
plan on shooting five looks that's cool if you're planning on shooting 10 or 12 looks make sure
you're prepared set those things up ahead of time like iron them out if you don't have a steamer
steam them roll everything because you can't be on set trying to figure these things out and trying
to do it because if you're booking models you're booking photographers you want to make the best
of that time and then the other thing is that if you have props if you have furniture on set
if you want to be shooting in a studio pick your backdrops pick your furniture everything ahead of
time make sure it's delivered or you're taking it there have one of your pas bring everything
like you need to have this stuff tightened up get your production schedule on because you want
to show up ready to go and you want to knock this out to the best quality that you could do
um and if you're worried about these little things while you're on set it's definitely going to throw
off your creativity so this collection is called uh the common thread another one we did for five
four and you know location is like super important so when we shot here it was great for us because
it was cheaper and it was one location but just the simplicity of it all allowed us to be creative
and showcase the clothes and sometimes you want a really simple background sometimes you want it to
be more in the environment for this one we chose to be in the studio and have it be very clean
and then as i was saying here there's chairs and things like that that's
stuff that we had to bring in ourselves but we had to make sure that we had it in on time and
we had to pick out which models sit down which looks are sitting which looks are standing
and you have to think about that as well because it's like if you have pants or a jacket that
wants to show certain details you can't really have them sitting or you need them standing and
you have to think about these things so this one is from our five four winter 16 collection
and i think this one was really cool because we're actually able to take you into the uh
city and show you everything that was like there it really puts the person into the environment
and that inspires them to see themselves in this kind of city life and how that person's living
i think this one was also really cool because we were able to design it in such a beautiful
way and have little pieces about the clothing and about the city so a lot of fun ways to be able to
work with and create lookbooks all right so how much does it cost to create a lookbook and this
is a crazy question because it can literally cost you zero dollars and it can cost you as
much as you want it to be it could be a million it could be 5 million it could be 500 000 could
be 200 000 could be 6 000. it all really depends on how crazy you want to get some companies are
throwing out ridiculous amounts of money because it makes sense for them because they're known
for their lookbooks because they're gonna do the next craziest thing they're expected to do that
some companies are hitting the same mark of where they need to be and they don't need to
outdo themselves every time it's just consistent good looks and good clothing and then there's
the companies that are starting out and you're trying to hit a certain mark so it all depends
because the moment you start booking models that's the cost booking photographers is a cost booking
locations is a cost and you as you know all of these are going to change you've probably been
on pure space or been somewhere looking for a studio sometimes hourly is 25 sometimes at 60
and i think these are things you need to assess ahead of time and then look into because that'll
help you determine the cost write them all down excel sheet them out and then you can really
gauge how this is going to hit you and then does it make sense for you to create
if you're only going to make x amount of money from the collection you've made and those
like that many pieces or that quantity that you've created so keep that in mind it's a matter of your
resources who you can tap your location really like literally where you live geographically
sometimes have more resources and sometimes you don't and then if you need to you might have to
fly out to be where you need to be to do that or ship your clothes to someone who can create that
vision for you these are things you're going to have to assess so how much does it cost open-ended
question can't really tell you all right so when it comes to designing lookbooks and putting it all
together this is actually a very fun part if you did your work if you put in the time to prepare
and you know exactly what your assets are going to be like coming in the design part is going
to be so fun because low key you should have already planned for how you're going to design
it picking that aesthetic as i say i always like to find things that accentuate what the clothing
is going to be so if if there's a lot of fun textures like i'm working with some corduroy
or something like that i might take a photo of someone wearing the pants and then overlay them
on top of corduroy because as i'm looking through the lookbook i can see the photos of the person
and then i can also really get this in-depth look at the texture which inspires me of like kind of
gives me like that that neural like feeling of like i can feel that almost just by looking at it
then maybe you're moving into something where the graphic tee has really cool lines and it's like
how do we get that into like work that into the photo shoot maybe we're shooting these cool lines
in a really minimal space that has like nice shadows then you work that into something with
some really clean architecture in the back there's so many fun ways to uh engage with people visually
and try to get them to to see more in their mind and like connect with the clothing so many ways to
design you can find a lot of good inspiration on pinterest you can even check google there's a lot
of good articles out there and blogs that you can check out and i think a lot of time too looking
through magazines and understanding how people lay it out and then transferring those same ideas
to your lookbook key things to note though when you're designing that'll make things interesting
for you is again i've mentioned texture patterns prints lines colors the background could be white
it could be the same color as the shirt you can use those things to really like enhance
how something looks and i actually love that about it because it's like so open but also um
kind of tightens up on and focuses on the actual vision that you have so this is another one and
you'll notice a lot from 5'4 i did a lot there it was really fun and they allowed me to be creative
uh this one is 5 4 desert oasis and each one of them comes with the lookbook video which was
really fun to do here this entire collection was about uh something that inspired people for like
festival so i wanted this desert oasis vibe and i had these monochromatic elements in the
back like the cactus and then the story that i was telling here was actually from sun rise
to sunset so you'll see the yellows are moving here and then as we go into it this is daytime
we're actually in the pool but if you look at the textures in the back you can actually see this
water from the pool and then if you look we actually set this pool chair that's standing
up there's a lot of weird things that you can do it was fun it added to the the like composition of
it all and so then once we're done with the pool and you've had your pool day we go to the sunset
and i picked this color because it was just like this beautiful red and it allows me to think of
like just that like fiery sunset you know what i mean and if you look to the looks actually start
to transfer into nighttime uh during the day it might be or morning time might be a little
colder but then as you move it's going to be hotter and then depending where you're at you're
going to want to maybe bring a jacket and then later as you get into the night you can wear it
and this one was just really fun because we got to play with so many colors and play with so many
textures and i had a lot of fun working with the uh the props okay so you've seen a lot of examples
that are inside and in studio here is kind of like a hybrid because it was it's like an outdoor
studio for the summer prelude and this one one of my favorite campaigns we've done and we were able
to link that with the lookbook uh as you can see the textures are just amazing it's like summertime
right but man look at these walls look at the shadows everything's just so beautifully put the
lines the oh god and then the reason why we picked this place is because you can tell by the clothing
i wanted to inspire this like feeling of being maybe at a resort or something and it's like
resort where and then you have all the water but like the clean lines actually match up with how
the clothes are designed i think that within each brand there's a certain market of people right and
then within that demographic there's only a small percentage that actually looks at these lookbooks
if you're known for that and that's what you do people tend to look at them and they're looking
forward to what you have coming out seasonally if you're dropping one collection a year if
you're dropping just a few pieces it's kind of hard to do a lookbook for that specifically
and to kind of put the resources into it i feel like doesn't always add up to what you want it
to be this one is issue 1017 and this was really fun to work with because this particular month we
wanted to just experiment and do something that was not so glamorous we took this plywood and
decided to shoot against it and there's like these cool graphical lines on the back
and then we played with color and desaturating some of these things and i had a friend of mine
design this and put it together and i think he did a great job actually pulling from different colors
and then mixing the backgrounds and it's cool because like that's the way the clothing actually
is and it's like the mixture of textures and patterns and the outfits are reflected
within this entire style guide really good info man you always come in here bringing in the fire
but one of the big things that we have because you know we're also collaborating on some content and
some launch as we start to launch the ftgu march is should we make a lookbook for what we're doing
man so that's like that's the question right it's like do i need it um i think that it
makes sense right for a lot of these smaller brands if you're gonna do it kind of tie it to
your campaign i think for me the campaign imagery is a lot more effective because you can actually
use those photos for your banners and for social media and for ads and things like that so if
you're doing that and you have those photos and you can make a lookbook from it it makes sense
but to shoot just a lookbook by itself i don't think it's feasible i don't think it's worth
the money unless you have that in your terms what is like the true essence of a lookbook
like what would it really be for it so some people think say it's for styling to show people how
they're going to style it but does it have other meanings behind it or like other purposes other
than just the visuals that look cool it's for styling it's to inspire people uh like how to
wear it how to pair it um what environments you should be in uh sometimes it's left blank for
you to really just imagine that and it doesn't force you upon a certain location or anything
but i think in my perspective i think that it's a huge flex like when louis vuitton drops on
balenciaga drops a lookbook it's like a holy [ __ ] what are they going to do next i think that's if
you get yourself into that zone and you are able to create that kind of like buzz it makes a lot of
sense for you to do it but uh i think for for that to me it's a flex got it so then so then lookbooks
in today's age especially during because you say you could repurpose it for for instagram for your
banners for promotion so a lookbook in today's age is similar to like a runway digitally right
people are coming in there with some crazy stuff to like really stand out and and have feed on
the hypebeast forums or i know they used to have ips forums but now it's the just the blogs that
they pay posts for right right but yeah i think essentially that it's like a look how crazy we
can be right and if your clothing's not that crazy i don't think it makes sense to do it it's like
how how crazy you're gonna be with a graphic tee you know what i mean and i think if you're
in that zone that's where you're at if you start making some crazy clothes run that up
dude that's amazing info where can people find you that are watching this video where can they go to
to learn more about what you do and perhaps get get inspired by the content you guys are putting
out because you guys put out some amazing content on instagram really really visually educational so
like where can they find you you can find us at proper worldwide on instagram you can also find
us proper worldwide on youtube and we're going to start posting again soon so come on over check us
out mike's been a very busy man like it took us a few months to coordinate this shoot so i hope
you guys really appreciated this video we're doing some amazing work together with them
and their team from the design to the marketing to like some really cool stuff that's dropping on
this channel so if you guys are watching this make sure you guys are checking out the links
in the description as we'll be linking mike's information their websites instagram social media
and we'll also be linking some of the links that we have to the launch of what we're working on so
i know you guys are gonna really appreciate that info that insight the content the uh a lot
of cool stuff to really help you guys continue to elevate your brand but also your life and business
so make sure if you guys are a new visitor to this channel hit the subscribe button hit
that like button share this video with a friend that needs to know this because there's a lot of
brands out there that are interested in wondering should they put the money and time into a lookbook
so i hope that this kind of gave you guys some clarity and we'll see you guys in the next one