Begin with Clothing!
The Stats:
Category: Clothing
Hours: 8
Days on site: 2
Total spent: $50(ish)
Items purchased: Jewelry organizer, huggable hangers
Marie Kondo recommends starting your tidying journey with clothing for good reason: it’s high-touch and therefore high reward, yet at the same time it’s a fairly easy place to begin. Precisely because the items are so highly used, most people have a good sense of what sparks joy and what doesn’t. The discarding process goes quickly and it also helps them hone their sense of what sparks joy… which comes in handy when completing the rest of the tidying journey! Because here’s the thing: when your closet looks like a bomb has hit it, it’s enough to make you go crazy. And since we start our day in that space, whatever feeling your closet (or dresser) imparts on you affects the rest of your day.
It’s easiest to imagine when you envision a peaceful, joy-sparking closet. Really… imagine walking (or peering) into your closet and every item your eye lands on makes your whole being feel uplifted. None of those hand-me-downs you never wear but feel bad about because they’re so nice. None of the clothes that make you feel guilty about your current body because it isn’t what it used to be. Nothing you bought because it looked good on the hanger but actually doesn’t flatter your shape. NONE OF THAT! Because each time we see those items, they take our joy-factor down a notch. How about we don’t start our day by LOWERING our joy-factor, right? So yes, clothing is a good place to begin.
When this client told me she wanted to blitz her home this year, of course I told her that clothing was the best place to truly begin. Before I came over, I asked her to gather all of her clothing into one room. Here was the closet when I first arrived.
A couple things that weren’t working in this set-up:
Workout clothes weren’t folded or sorted, they were all shoved onto one shelf so the client had no idea what her options were at-a-glance and if she wanted something particular, she had to take everything out to find it.
The shelves were put in by the builder at standard heights, so they weren’t being utilized to their full extent.
Almost everything was hanging on the bottom of the two clothing racks, which makes the clothing harder to see (as opposed to when it is at eye-level) and there was no room for the items to breathe since they were all shoved on the one rack together.
The client didn’t know how to fold her clothing KonMari-style (vertically) so the drawers and shelves were impossible to keep clean; every time she needed something at the bottom of the pile, she had to un-do the entire pile to find it.
I wish I took more between pictures but, what can I say, we were on a roll. (pun intended, ya’ll. It’s always intended). But, like always, we took ALL of the clothing out, categorized it, and then started the discarding. Through the process, the client realized a couple of patterns:
She likes flowy fabric.
She likes, as she called it, pirate-y clothing (like oversized shirts and long skirts). How’s that for specific?
We were lucky because this closet was already outfitted with a bunch of organization tools like drawers and baskets and shelves. We purchased new hangers,— the quickest way to uniform a closet— and a jewelry organizer. We also adjusted the shelves so they fit exactly what they held and we repurposed some bins the client already owned. And with that, here is the finished product!
Raise your hand if you love an empty shelf (top right)!
And here’s the thing… this clarity happens every time. By reviewing each item of clothing, our true style emerges. When that becomes clear, it makes shopping for clothing so much easier because you’ve narrowed your focus! Sure, that bright green dress looks awesome on the model, but shift dresses don’t flatter your figure. It also becomes very clear where the gaps in your wardrobe are (if there are any) so you can fill those as you find the right item. But one thing that is crucial is to recognize that you will be okay if you don’t have every single item you think you need. The universe will provide. You will figure out something else to wear. (And when you have an entire wardrobe full of pieces you love, it’s not hard to find a different outfit.)
