FAQ

I have worked with over 400 men and women in my 15-year career as a personal stylist. In order to serve my existing clientele with the level of excellence I demand of myself, I cannot take on any new clients at the moment. To find out when I open up my schedule again (and receive free style advice!) please sign up for my monthly newsletter. While you await your first inbox delivery, head over to one of my acclaimed fashion blogs V-Style for women or V-Style for Men.

No matter how well crafted the articles – I know a fashion blog is no replacement for one-on-one sartorial care. If you are looking for an expert in men’s style, I recommend Patrick Kenger who is based in Arizona, but travels to San Diego regularly and is skilled in virtual styling. For women’s fashion, I recommend local stylist, Andie Sobrato, who is skilled at virtual styling and available for travel. Please let them know I referred you, thank you so much!

I am not accepting new clients at this time and my booking process has changed for my existing clients… I no longer allow bookings more than 2 months in advance. If you see no availability on my online booking system, that means my schedule is currently full. Please set an alert for the first of the next month for when I open up availability again.

As usual, please plan in advance if you have a special event or trip coming up. For instance, if you have an event in mid September, please book 1 session in mid to late July and book a 2nd session in early to mid August. 15-20 days apart is the best timing between appointments.

Fun Tip! Bummed you can’t work with me? Get small doses of my advice via my free monthly newsletter. I also post free shopping advice in my Instagram stories. Lastly, my shopping blogs, V-Style and V-Style for Men are encyclopedias of free shopping and style advice.

A small travel fee is required for areas 15 miles outside San Diego’s 92103 zip code. For travel by car 45-min or more away, my hourly rate goes into effect. Simply give me your address when you email me to find out the travel fee.

For travel by plane, I require reimbursement of airfare and hotel stay. I only charge a small fee for my travel time since I love to travel.

Update: Due to the high demand for my service locally and virtually, I am temporarily suspending service to areas that are more than 40 minutes away by car. Thank you so much for your understanding!

Unfortunately, most of the time, no. If you are running late the day of one of our appointments, texting is absolutely the correct form of communication. Beyond that, email is the best form of communication with me. You will notice I use my cell phone to take pictures, make notes, and contact relevant professionals for you throughout each of our sessions together. I am completely dedicated to you during your allotted time with me, so any texts that are not relevant to our session are ignored. This means if you text me while I am with another client, that text can easily be accidentally opened and missed. Email is the only way to ensure I have received your communication.

Lastly, after 15 years as a personal stylist, I have finally learned to carve out more time in my schedule away from work. Texts from clients can disturb this time reserved for myself. Thank you so much for your understanding!

I currently charge $200/hour with a 10-hour minimum per client that you can use as you please. You pay me at the end of each session, unless otherwise discussed. I accept cash, check, Venmo, Paypal, and credit cards.

If my rate is outside your budget, I recommend stylist Andie Sobrato, who is skilled at virtual styling and available for travel. If you are looking for a men’s stylist, I recommend Patrick Kenger who is based in Arizona, but travels to San Diego regularly and is skilled in virtual styling. Please let them know I referred you, thank you so much!

Fun Tip! For free style and shopping advice from me, sign up for my free monthly newsletter. I also post free shopping advice on my Instagram stories.

I almost exclusively do online shopping now since it is more efficient than going to numerous physical stores that often lack the styles and sizes we need. When shopping online, I utilize numerous online retailers to give you a selection of what we are seeking. Most of the time I use free shipping/free return retailers to ensure no money is wasted. Once I have picked out the items, I send you the links via e-mail for you to purchase them.

After the online purchases arrive we look through the items together at your home. If you are a virtual client, we go over the online shopping via a video call.

First time clients generally need 2-4 rounds of online shopping. When booking me for online shopping, select the “Wardrobe Planning” option on my booking software.

Note: If you would like me to purchase your online shopping for you, I just need your credit card information. If you want me to do your returns for you, it would be my assistant who does that, but I charge you the same hourly rate for her hours. These hours can add up, so I encourage clients to do their own returns if they want to save money.

I am delighted to work with any and all body types from plus size to extremely petite. It does take more time to work with a unique body type though as we do multiple rounds of online shopping, and work with a tailor. Below are examples of unique body types that tend to take a little more time to work with…

Unique Sizes for Women:

• Size 00 or smaller
• Size 14+ in petite sizes
• Size 20+ in regular sizing
• 34-inch inseam or longer
• 25-inch sleeve length or longer
• 3+ size differences between one body part and another
• 10 shoe size or larger
• 5 shoe size or smaller
• Narrow shoe sizes
• Wide shoe sizes

Unique Sizes for Men:

• 35-inch inseam or longer
• 40-inch waist or larger
• Size 29 waist or smaller
• Size 50 chest or larger
• Size 36 chest or smaller
• Size 18 neck or larger
• Size 14 neck or smaller
• 3+ size differences between one body part and another
• 13 shoe size or larger
• 8 shoe size or smaller

I shop everywhere! It all depends on my client and their needs, but here are some stores that I use consistently: Nordstrom, Bloomingdale’s, Neiman Marcus, Anthropologie, Madewell, Zappos, Revolve, Net-a-Porter, Shopbop, Amazon, Farfetch, Matches, MyTheresa, Etsy, J.Crew, Ann Taylor, Banana Republic, Macy’s, Hugo Boss, GAP, and more. Seriously, no store is safe from me 🙂

Note: I occasionally utilize discount retailers like Nordstrom Rack and DSW, but that is rare. Discount retailers lack quality and sizes, so I tend not to use them.

On the rare occasion I do in store shopping, I generally stick to Fashion Valley Mall in San Diego unless my client requests otherwise. I arrive 30-45 minutes prior to the shopping appointment to pull all the clothing my client will be trying on. Billing begins when I arrive. The session is 2-3 hours and we do 1 – 2 stores.

 Yes, I make commissions on most online purchases I recommend. I am partnered with virtually every single online retailer in existence through affiliate marketing programs, like Rakuten and RewardStyle, so no store is favored over another.

I do not make commission on your purchases when we shop in physical stores and I do not work for any of the stores that we shop in, nor am I affiliated with the mall in any way. The sales associate that assists us in the store makes the commission. 

With that said, I want to emphasize, whether shopping in-store or online, every store and garment I recommend is based entirely on what I think is best for you, my client. Honesty and ethics are of utmost importance to me.

If you are looking to remodel your wardrobe, anything less than $4000 is inefficient. $5,000+ is best for a new core wardrobe. Another way to look at it is, on average, a quality garment costs $200. This average takes into account more expensive items like cashmere, silks, coats, and boots as well as less expensive garments and items on sale. For clients with high-end interest, suit needs, or a varied lifestyle a much larger budget is needed.

I no longer work with tight budgets, but here are some stylists that do:

1. Andie Sobrato
2. Radmila Dolokhanova
3. Patrick Kenger

Please tell them I referred you, thank you so much!

Fun Tip: For free style and shopping advice from me, sign up for my free monthly newsletter. I also post free shopping advice on my Instagram stories.

All my clients need some tailoring. For particular body types, many items we buy will need something taken in or hemmed. This can add to the budget, although absolutely worth it. Another surprise can be the extent of clothing you are lacking. Most people need/want much more than they realize, which adds up in both the cost of clothing and my hourly rate.

The closet purge generally takes 1.5 – 3.5 hours, although I have had a closet purge that lasted as little as 20 minutes and as long as multiple, lengthy appointments (10+ hours). It all depends on how much clothing you have. Yes, you will be trying on most things.

You don’t need to do anything before the closet purge. I can show up and do my job no matter what situation your closet and wardrobe are in. But if you want to enhance efficiency, here are a few things you can do:

1. Have all your clothing available. This means make sure you have all your clothing back from the Dry Cleaner and your hamper for dirty clothes isn’t full of garments we would want to work with during our session.
2. Have all your clothing, shoes, and accessories in one room. Again, this is not a big deal, but it does make the closet purge more efficient.
3. Having your wardrobe somewhat organized is always helpful, but again, not necessary.
4. We often dip into the far reaches of your wardrobe where dust lies. Any sort of dusting before we dive in there can be nice for us 🙂
5. Feel free to do a pre-purge without me. Identify unusually old, seriously outsized and unneeded items before I come over to get those easy to purge items out of the way.

If you want to keep it simple, donate everything to your nearest thrift store/donation center or schedule a donation pick up with VVA (so easy!). For those who want to put more effort into this…

1. Donate overworn, ruined and stained clothing to For Days (do not throw it the garbage)
2. Take Dry Cleaner hangers back to your Dry Cleaner (do not throw it the garbage)
3. Donate gently worn clothing, accessories and proper hangers to Amvets or Father Joe’s
4. Consign mid to high-end clothing and accessories to The Real Real (how to sell here)
5. Consign high-end bags and jewelry to Fashionphile, (how to sell here)
6. Send in mid to high-end clothing to sell on Thredup (how to sell here)
7. Sell vintage and mid to higher end clothing at Buffalo Exchange (in person – how to sell here)
8. Sell mid to high-end clothing and accessories on Poshmark. This is too much effort for most people. (how to sell here)
9. Donate new and gently worn shoes to Soles 4 Souls
10. Donate sneakers to a Nike store
11. Donate coats and jackets to One Warm Coat
12. Donate jeans to Madewell
13. Donate formal gowns to Princess Project
14. Bring Eileen Fisher clothing to Any Eileen Fisher Store, or Mail It In

My assistant routinely makes donation, recycle and sell runs, so I am happy to take a bag or two off your hands free-of-charge. If you want me to transport more than two bags of donations, or if you have a specific location you want your donations to go, I do bill you for that time. With this in mind, most clients handle their own donations/recycling/selling.

Note: my offer to take discarded clothing off your hands free-of-charge is to ensure no clothing ends up in a landfill. I am passionately anti-waste. On the rare occasions my assistant sells something from a client’s donation bag, we put the money towards recycling fees and my assistant’s time. 

You can find a list of all my recommended tailors and other professionals here.