EBay continues to hone its fashion offerings with its new user-generated Look Book, linking street style inspiration shots to similar live auctions on the site.
In order to participate, users must upload any old pic of themselves rocking their fall-fashion best on the street, and can then tag up to three items they're wearing, with information on what it is and where they got it. EBay uses that information to link to similar auctions available on the site, in case browsers are so inspired by what they see and want to place a bid on something like it—eBay's fashion manager Miriam Lahage told WWD they've got an average of 20 million fashion auctions up on any given day.
Along with the open forum of street style images is a contest for best outfit submission. Users can vote on their favorites, and then an esteemed panel of judges will pick a winner from the top 25 nominees. The panel includes The City star and budding designer Whitney Port, Lucky magazine's editor at large Elise Loehnen, celebrity stylist and eBay fashion contributor Annabel Tollman, eBay fashion expert Karen Bard and Meredith Barnet, editorial director of the site's digital magazine, The Inside Source.
The grand prize sounds like a dream come true to any aspiring street style blogger: in addition to a $5,000 shopping spree on eBay (vintage YSL, anyone?) as well as features on eBay Fashion and The Inside Source, the best outfit winner will play star for a day, with a style consultation with Loehnen and a photo shoot with Lucky Street Style photographer Michael Waring.
Anyone who's ever browsed the homespun thumbnails in the past can delight in eBay's new fashion-forward direction, and those who think they've got what it takes to impress all those browsers have the chance at something to delight in as well.
