Basic stoopid question re. Gracie fashion checks

[Mayor Butch]

Okay. As in meatspace, I don't care much about fashion. (Too much other stuff to hoard.) I have bought very few clothes in the time I've been playing. So I was utterly unprepared when Gracie first showed up and demanded to see me in an "official" outfit by the end of the day.

I really want to do this, but I have no idea how to begin. The problem is organization! It bugs me that so many things are not labeled in AC and that there's no way to label drawers, etc... things like the size of each fish you catch, and things like the TYPE OF CLOTHING something is. That might give me a prayer of figuring out how to organize outfits for Gracie checks, but right now I'm floundering.

How do y'all even START to do this? Do you buy up every piece of clothing you can get your hands on, and store groupings in drawers (after looking up what *type* they are in a guide)? Do you empty out a room, and group types/outfits on the floor? (Do you keep a NOTEBOOK to keep track of what you've put where?) I WAS given a mannequin yesterday, but have no idea how to use it. Seems like enough mannequins to hold a complete outfit of each type would be helpful, but I don't have that option.

Again... how do you guys even START to put this together? I'm completely bollixed. It can't be as bad as I think, since people seem to get through it okay. Thanks in advance.

 

[J087]

Putting a label on clothes would make it less of a "knowing fashion" thing imo. The only labels I know of are male/female/unisex which is what Labelle mentions when you buy a hat or accessory. I think you'll just need to consult the AC fashion guides. There are several lists that mention what type a clothing piece is.

Unlike pokemon games you won't have enough space to store every single piece of clothing. Many people store furniture and clothing in the exhibit rooms at the museum, which can be hired once Blathers suggests to upgrade the museum as part of a Public Works Projects. Another option is making a second (or more) character in your town and use them to store items.

Mannequins can be dressed with every piece of clothing that you can wear. There are only 4 of them in the entire game and you can't get any extra's (not even by trading or dropping). So take good care of your Mannequins. They are used to display a set of clothing that you like, or often wear. By "talking" to a mannequin you can dress them, remove clothes, or choose to wear everything on them which exchanges all of your clothing items with all items on the mannequin. It's kind of a fast way to get into a different set of clothing rather than having to put everything on one-by-one.

 

[PandaBerryInSpace]

What I did was, I bought everything I could find at the Able Sisters and Kicks every day. I bought it all, and then just sold it to Re-Tail. When Gracie showed up, I would ask for a theme, and then order pieces from that theme from the catalog. It would come at 5:00 PM, and then I would put on the clothes and do my fashion check. I don't know if that'll work for you, since I don't know your play schedule... I have no tips on how to organize clothes.

However, I will say, it is possible to figure out the theme of the clothing whenever you buy it. When purchasing something from Mabel, I think she tells you what style it is, and I know that Kicks does. Labelle is a little more difficult -- you have to try on the accessory first before she will tell you what theme it is. However, it can be a lot to remember, and there are LOTS of clothes in the game, so if you're still stuck, here's a guide that should help you. http://www.thonky.com/animal-crossing-new-leaf/gracie-fashion-check/

Honestly, when organizing an outfit, don't worry about whether or not it actually looks good. Gracie is only programmed to notice the overall theme of the clothes, regardless of whether or not it's actually stylish. Just put together pieces that are classified as "official" and you should be fine. I believe you need at least three pieces from the theme to pass a fashion check, and Gracie counts hats, accessories, tops, bottoms, socks and shoes. Also, make sure that you don't put anything in that clashes with official, as she will auto-fail you.

 

[J087]

I have no tips on how to organize clothes.

My dresser used to explode with clothes, and those were only shirts, so I definitely don't recommend wanting to physically posses every piece of clothing in the game. Rather, as suggested by PandaBerry, buy the things you like or might find useful in the future and sell them again. When the time comes that you need them (for Gracie for example) you just order them before 9am or 5pm and get them by mail. Use your storage room for clothing (sets) that you really like and often wear, and for clothing that can't be re-ordered (such as Gracie clothes or fortune cookie items)


I only own 3 sets of clothing now, and have stored some extra caps.
The extra storage space feels soooo good.

 

[PandaBerryInSpace]

Also, on the subject of mannequins... One of the four you get, comes from Gracie... After you make your first clothing purchase at her store. XD So, there's no way to get it before passing all your fashion checks, anyway.

 

[Mayor Butch]

Yeah. It doesn't sound like there's a good way to pre-organize this. Mabel does tell you when you're looking at a clothing item that it's "sporty" or "official" or "cute" or "basic" or whatever (those are the labels I meant, and that's what Gracie's looking at)... it's just that there's no way to be reminded of which is what, later, unless you look it up online (or could drop it in a room/room section/drawer you set aside for types), so preorganizing in piles in an empty room would be a huge hassle, even if I *had* any empty rooms, plus gawd knows how many different categories there ARE and she's only gonna ask for 4. (I've got all the museum rooms, which are full, and several alts but none with big empty rooms.)

Guess I'd better just start buying/selling tons of clothing in hopes of having access to enough stuff via my catalog to assemble the right outfit before 5pm on Gracie days -- and be prepared to check the online guides when I have to try to piece together whatever she asks for. There's no way you can "know fashion" enough to know that one pair of shoes is considered cute and another pair is considered sporty or whatever, so you can't tell by looking, and you're in danger of clashing and failing if you don't use a guide. Bah. This is the one part of AC so far that I'm NOT enjoying at all; I don't mind looking up fake/real art or how villagers like their coffee, but this fashion-stuff just seems like work. (My characters tend to wear the same clothing all the time, until they find something they like better.)

I used to feel sort of cheated when a villager would give me another ugly shirt I'd never wear as a reward for something. Now, guess I should be glad to have had my mayoral mitts on so many of 'em.

 

[VioletsTown]

I dont keep any clothes in my storage unless its not orderable. I usually buy, wear then sell. When gracie shows up, you order your theme from catalogue and it comes by 5. I used thonky as a guide. I passed all for checks by wearing at least 2 items of the theme. I always wore shoes, a top and bottom (or dress) and one accessory or hat. So 4 items. And make sure it does not clash using the thonky guide.

 

[Mayor Butch]

You guys make it sound so easy, lol.

 

[VioletsTown]

Gracie checks are a pain... worse comes to worse, the day of, you post on forums, I'm buying anything "official" or something like that, and someone should help you out.

 

[Rendra]

The way I orginized my clothes was I used the "C" section of my storage. There are 10 themes and 10 spots in each drawer and there are 6 different items you can wear at a time (if you do top & bottom & not a dress). So what I did was in drawer #1, I put hats for each theme. #2 was accessories, #3 tops, #4 bottoms, #5 socks & #6 shoes. The 10 spots in each drawer was each theme (alphabetically) Basic, Cute, Flashy, Historic, Iconic, Modern, Official, Ornate, Rock-n-Roll & Sporty. So if Gracie gave me "Cute" for a theme, I would just grab the 2nd item in each of the 6 drawers. If you don't have all 6 pieces of the same theme (Gracie likes it when you mix it up a bit) just put something in that spot that doesn't clash with that theme. When buying hats & accessories, try it on and Labelle then will tell you what the style/theme of it is.
This worked like a charm for me.
Good Luck.

 

[Mayor Butch]

Rendra, I'm gonna start that tomorrow, once I ruthlessly empty what's in my C section (ha ha). That's brilliant. I just need to grab what you wrote and keep it as a legend, on my desktop, to remind me what's what. Then I *could* go through all the clothing in my catalog, use the Thonky guide to categorize what I've got, and see what's left to buy and concentrate on that. This will leave less to chance than waiting for the day and then running to the catalog to see if I can obtain what's needed before 5pm. It appeals to my need to be ready for this nonsense, and get it over with!

And after this, I'm hoping to go back to wondering WHY there are five thousand different kinds of shoes and socks you can barely SEE for your little people. I really never quite understood why Kicks even existed.

You have all been very helpful. I no longer feel like this is completely hopeless.