When James Yoon, senior, was in elementary school, there was one show always playing on the TV at home: “What Not to Wear.”

“My mom always had it on,” Yoon said. “ It’s interesting. They’re trying to take these people who dress horribly and look like they stepped out of fashion hell and make them better.”

That was where Yoon’s love of fashion first began, a love that ultimately led him to start a men’s style blog through WordPress called Optimal Outfits with three of his friends, seniors Mayur Khanna, Vinay Ragala and Sid Rana.

“A common recurring theme in our conversations is clothes,” Yoon said. “So we were like ‘hey, we like clothes so we might as well share our passion with a bunch of other people’.”

After discovering their mutual interest in fashion, Optimal Outfits took off.

“It’s kind of a hobby of ours, or a side thing that we do. It’s something we love, and we do it because it’s fun,” Rana said.

Yoon and Rana are more of the creative minds of the group, while Khanna and Ragala focus on editing and maintaining the blog, Yoon said. Working together hasn’t been difficult because the four are close friends and all live near each other.

They created the blog in September, but even though it’s relatively new, Yoon said it has been gaining popularity.

In the future, the friends hope to take the blog even further.

“In college we plan on expanding it even more with new friends,” Rana said. “Hopefully H&M will be calling us soon.”

But despite the growing popularity, his main motivation for working on the blog is just to have fun and have an outlet for his passion, Yoon said. Another reason he decided to turn to the Internet to find a fashion community is the lack of a physical one in the area he lives in.

So far, Optimal Outfits has a variety of posts spanning topics such as footwear, confidence and color combinations. However, the editorials don’t focus on a single style, something Yoon said is one of the blog’s strengths.

“All of us have different styles,” Yoon said. “Sid is really into European fashion and I’m more into urban streetwear fashion. Putting this all into one creates a better product for someone who is reading just for recreation.”

Mayur Khanna said his style is more focused on streetwear. His biggest inspiration is Kanye West, and he follows a lot of streetwear Instagrams.

Khanna said he first became interested in fashion last year.

“First impressions matter, and I really wanted to improve my look and have a better impression on people,” Khanna said.

Vinay Ragala said his athletic, comfortable style has grown as a result of his friends’ influence, and he has high hopes for the blog.

“I hope that we get a decent size audience,” Ragala said.

Yoon said the feedback he has received has been overwhelmingly positive, with many readers praising the blog’s humorous writing style.

For anyone trying to improve their own personal style, Yoon advises them to explore until they find a style they’re comfortable with.

“Don’t fall into a norm because you feel like you need to because trends die out eventually,” Yoon said. “You might as well just stick to what you’re comfortable with. Just do you.”