Nerd alert! Nerd alert! For a Sagittarian, I’m surprisingly organised sometimes! And one of those cases pertains to my wardrobe. With the amount of clothes I have (and no, that’s not a brag, just a job hazard!) I need to be organised otherwise I would never get dressed in the morning!
One of the first things I tell ALL my personal styling clients is that they need to have an organised wardrobe! If you are a busy lady (which I’m sure all of you are…. and those who aren’t, can you share the secret with the rest of us?!!?) getting dressed every morning is just one of the 50 million things you have to do before heading to work, or study, or dealing with children.
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Having a messy wardrobe means you have to REMEMBER all your clothes when working out what to wear! Even I can’t remember ALL my clothes!
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Why would you ever TRY and remember all you clothes, and shoes, and accessories?!?! This is one of the main reasons why it’s important to have everything in its place. It saves time in the morning when you can go and find all your jeans in the one place, and then all your jackets are grouped together so it’s easy to choose! There are a few simple things you can do to make life just that little bit easier…..
So here are a few tips to help you get your wardrobe into tip-top shape for 2013!
1. GROUP SIMILAR CLOTHES TOGETHER
This doesn’t mean everything has to fit into one wardrobe (I have clothes spread across two rooms!) but all LIKE pieces should be together. This doesn’t just means put all your dresses in one place, this means CATEGORISE them into more specific groups: lightweight summer sun dresses through to your good, going-out/wear to a wedding dresses.
It’s not perfect, but everything is in order in my wardrobe – lightweight jackets through to blazers and coats, then light weight cardigans. All my shoes are neatly stacked on shelves or in clear plastic boxes for easy access
Group tops from short sleeves through to long sleeves, same with skirts – short skirts to long skirts. Lightweight jackets through to heavy coats and try a keep all your shoes together!
2. DON’T PUT EVERYTHING YOU OWN IN YOUR EVERYDAY WARDROBE
There is no use having heavy winter coats taking up valuable wardrobe space in the middle of summer, same with little summer frocks in the middle of winter!
Rotate your clothes seasonally – there is no point creating extra clutter in your wardrobe with things you aren’t going to wear right at that moment! Clear the space for the useful pieces!
Grab some big, plastic tubs like so…… from The Warehouse (in NZ) or Kmart/Target (in Aus).
Handy plastic tubs that stack onto each other in a spare room or the garage are perfect for storing out-of-season clothes!
Store your winter clothes in here in summer, and visa versa. These tubs are pretty much airtight and will keep your clothes clean and protected even in the dirty garage!
But here is the important thing – CULL YOUR CLOTHES BEFORE YOU PUT THEM AWAY FOR THE SEASON! Which leads onto number 3…..
3. CLEAN OUT YOUR WARDROBE SEASONALLY
It’s SO important to learn to be ruthless with your clothes (or if you aren’t any good, call me – I’m awesome at it!). Here are a few reasons to get rid of clothes:
- They are old – ie. pilling, loosing their colour, shape, stretching or stained – THEY GO!
- They don’t fit any more. This is a hard one – but you only should have clothes in your wardrobe that fit you NOW! (unless you are pregnant). Other clothes, the ‘maybe one day I’ll fit them again’ clothes are just taking up space
- They have been replaced: If you have bought a new pair of skinny jeans to replace the old ones that are falling apart, GET RID OF THE OLD ONES! Otherwise, what’s the point on buying a replacement!?
Now by ‘getting rid of’ I don’t mean just throw them in the bin, there are heaps of options – give them to charity (someone will get more use out of them), give them to friends, hold a clothes swap, sell them on eBay, Gumtree, TradeMe or have a garage sale – they are HEAPS of different things to do with clothes you no longer need.
4. BE A NEAT FREAK
Store your clothes in order, but also find clever storage solutions to your accessories! I keep my jewellery in a set of plastic drawers similar to these…. and I use two ice-cube trays to hold all my statement rings so I can see them! (Genius, but I can’t take credit for that – it was my Mum’s best friends idea – thanks Judy!).
Cheap and easy storage solutions are all you need!
Use ice-cube trays to store all your rings for easy access!
All my statement necklaces (because you know how much I love a statement necklace) live in the other two drawers where they can lay flat, and I can see them
Stack jewellery so you can see all your options
I keep ALL my shoes either in their shoe box, or in a clear plastic box so I can see them. The plastic boxes (most of mine are from Pink Lily – click here to visit their website) are great because they are uniform in size, so they stack well, and you can SEE which shoes are what.
Shoe boxes are a MUST if you want to get a long life out of your shoes!
You MUST keep your shoes in a box of some sort – you will totally trash your shoes if you just throw them all in on top of each other, the heels and soles will wreck the shoes they are on top of – definitely a stylist’s no-no!
If you can get hangers that are SIMILAR (you can see that not all my hangers are matching) it helps, and GET RID OF WIRE HANGERS!!!! They are SO bad for your clothes, and they always get caught up in each other, making them tricky to get out!
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So there are just some simple tips to getting your wardrobe organised to kick off the year!! If you need more help, you can always book me for a wardrobe analysis if you are in Auckland (click here for more details).
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Do you have any other ideas for organising your wardrobe? I’d love to hear them! Feel free to share them in the comments below!
Cait xo
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I am an organisation freak! For my jewellery, I found I wasn’t wearing it when it was stashed in boxes out of sight. So in my walk in wardrobe, I placed rows of adhesive light hooks, so all my necklaces can hang within sight. Liked this so much I repeated with rows of hooks for scarves and belts.
Nice work Gabrielle! It really does help having it all in plain sight doesn’t it
My spouse and I stumbled over here by a different website and thokught
I might check things out. I like what I see so now i’m following you.
Look forward to looking into your web page for a second time.
thanks Zachary – glad you guys like the blog! See you again soon
Very good post. I certainly love this website.
Keep writing!
thanks Taren, glad you are enjoying the blog
You inspired me to finally sort through the pile/tangle that should be my closet. I’ve only a small space with limited items but they are now each in their place. My jewellery is sorted on a hanger organiser so I can see everything in two glances. Amazing what I can across that had been completely forgotten. I’m a scatterbrained out of sight – out of mind person. Perfectionist in me wanted to colour-sort accessories but I’d never had got it done, have to settle with it being organised!
You can do it!!!!! Exactly like you said, having everything is sight makes it so much easier to get dressed in the morning! So what may take you an extra hour or two at a one-off time to organise, will save you time long term!
xx