One of the things I commit to doing fairly regularly is going through my closet and reorganising. However one thing I commit to at the start of every season is doing a big decluttering session. That means I go through everything to properly reorganise and take stock of what’s in there, and I’m constantly surprised at what a small percentage of my wardrobe I end up wearing simply because I’ve forgotten about pieces I own.
With a little extra time up our sleeves at home right now there’s no better time to do a complete wardrobe overhaul. I’ve always found there’s something quite cathartic about cleaning out one’s closet as it allows you to take stock of what you own and pinpoint what might be missing from your wardrobe. So, are you ready to clean?
Take out everything
Firstly in order to thoroughly do a thorough stocktake make sure you take out everything in your wardrobe so you can inspect every single garment. This process will obviously take quite awhile so be prepared to devote plenty of time to it in order to do it properly (I promise you’ll feel better afterwards!).
Be ruthless
My husband is notorious for hanging onto things like t-shirts that he never wears with a million holes through it and I’m always the one who says it has to go! I don’t have a very big place so space is a big commodity and I know the importance of a good edit as far as my wardrobe goes.
I have one basic rule I stick to: if I haven’t worn something in over a year then it has got to go. I think that’s a really good indication of how crucial something is to your wardrobe; if you’ve made it through all four seasons you haven’t once taken it out once then there’s usually a 100 per cent likelihood that you won’t wear it again.
Also if something is damaged and beyond repair or is looking really tatty it’s probably time to say goodbye to it. You want your wardrobe to be filled with pieces that you love and are functional.
Divide and conquer
As you’re decluttering separate your clothes into piles: one to keep, one to donate to charity and one to alter or fix. Take the time to try on everything and be brutally honest about its place in your wardrobe. Don’t rush this part as this is often how you will end up hoarding things rather than parting with garments that aren’t getting used as you’re not thoroughly going through your closet.
Organise and categorise
I will pair like with like so skirts with skirts, dresses with dresses, t-shirts with t-shirts and so forth. I also have a small section in my wardrobe specifically for the clothes that I wear all the time so things like my jeans, favourite leather pants and go-to tees. This is so I don’t have to rifle through everything else each time I’m looking for something and mess my wardrobe up.
See what needs fixing
Now is also the time to check out your shoes to see if they need resoling or fixing. Along with your shoes gather all the garments that need to be altered or fixed and do it all in ONE go. It’s important to do it at once because if you try to do it gradually it will become quite a tedious process and what should be an easy exercise will just drag on and you risk ending up with a pile of clothes that you’ll get to eventually and it will in turn just eat up valuable space. The upside of doing this is that you’ve essentially got new pieces in your wardrobe.
Rotate your wardrobe according to seasons
If you have the luxury of other space in your home then pull out pieces that currently aren’t in season and store them away. I pop things in space saver bags and stack them up in another closet. Once it’s time to bring them back I pull those clothes out and replace them with other clothes that are no longer in season. This helps free up space and also means I don’t have to wade through super summery dresses in order to get to my winter jumpers.
However if you’ve got no space to do this, I would recommend just reorganising so that the current season’s clothes are more accessible. Put all the things you need to access easily at the front and move the things you don’t currently need towards the back. This will make figuring out what to wear so much easier in the morning.
What are some of your tips for doing a wardrobe spring clean?