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brokestminimalist · 6 years

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Minimal Clothes

Ah, clothes are tough. Clothes are one way that we express ourselves, and many of us are sentimentally attached to this t-shirt that we got at that concert, or maybe that hat that we were wearing on our first date. Friends, neighbors, have a seat. There is a solution!

Here at Brokest Minimalist, we like to be reasonable. That dress from your senior prom, the one you're never going to fit in again but you can't get rid of because it brings you so many fond memories? It's ok. We've been there. In fact, we're still there. We have a jersey from senior year and a dress we wore to graduation. We are thirty pounds too heavy for that dress, but sometimes we come across it in the closet and it makes us smile. And that's ok. As long as you aren't keeping everything you ever wore, you're going to be ok.

That being said, most of us could stand to throw out about half our wardrobe. We all know you don't wear everything that's in your closet. People tend to wear the same five or ten items over and over again. The ones that are comfortable, the ones that are cut just right, the ones that match easily with other items. So, the end game is to find yourself with a closet containing only those items that you wear over and over again, and donate the rest. Now, you may have your own method of culling unused clothes. If so, go ahead and hop to it. If not, here are a few methods to start out with:

Audit damages: If it's holey, if it's faded, if it's stained, toss it. Don't donate it, nobody wants your ratty old Led Zeppelin shirt with the permanent mustard stain. Put it in the trash. This one should be easy.

Audit sizes: If it doesn't fit, donate it. Don't keep your old skinny jeans just in case you lose that twenty pounds you've been meaning to lose. They haven't motivated you to do it so far, and it's more likely that anytime you come across them you just feel bad about yourself. So go through everything and if you can't wear it comfortably right now, today, then donate it to your charity of choice.

Audit colors: You know you've got that one really loud orange t-shirt that you can't bring yourself to wear, but there's nothing actually wrong with it so you can't throw it out. Yeah, it's there. We see it. Put it in your donation bag, along with anything else that's too obnoxious.

Audit fabrics: Got any stuff that’s tricky to wash, picks up too much dog hair, or unravels easily? For the sake of your sanity, toss it. Stick to sturdy cottons and polyesters, and get rid of anything that needs special treatment unless it’s an item you really, truly love.

Audit unwanted gifts: You know that Weasly sweater that great-aunt Edna got you six Christmases ago that you wore one time to make her think you liked it? Toss it. You know that headband you've got from your old work that they gave you for free at a Halloween party? The one with the company logo emblazoned right there on the forehead? Toss it.

By this point, you should be down to a much more reasonable number of items, and they should all be items that you can and are willing to wear comfortably. Everything is in your size, in good repair, and it isn't ugly/obnoxious. This has been a lot of work, so if you want to take a break at this point, go ahead. Wait a few days or weeks, even. There is no reason not to work in stages. Getting rid of things can be cathartic, but it can be stressful too. Don't use up all your spoons for today on this. Go have a snack and finish your day. This post will still be here when you get back.

♫ INTERMISSION ♫

Ok, so you're back. What we want to do from here is create a capsule wardrobe. A capsule wardrobe is a wardrobe consisting of a relatively few items, where everything matches. You can pull out any top and any pants, and put them on, and you will look put together. You can get dressed while blindfolded, and you will look put together. This wardrobe may consist of say, 6 pants, 10 tops, three pairs of shoes, a couple of sweaters, and some accessories like shoes, belts, scarves, etc.

So, step one here is to choose a base color. A neutral one, like black, navy or khaki. Not one of each, but all the same. That's what color your pants and/or skirts and shoes are going to be, with the exception of maybe one pair of jeans. (Practical minimalism, remember. You don't want to mow grass in black dress pants.) Next, pick some tops in complimentary colors. These can be different colors, but they have to pair nicely with all of the pants/skirts/shoes. Then choose accessories in corresponding colors, or in the base color.

Now, we know you're broke. So are we. Don't just run off and spend money on new clothes all willy-nilly. This can be a gradual process. As the clothes you have wear out, replace them with ones in the capsule scheme you have picked out. Eventually you will have yourself a collection of items that all work together nicely. And they don't have to be fancy pieces. For example, we currently have two pairs of black cargo pants, two pairs of black dress pants (worn to work most days) and one pair of blue jeans. We have a number of well-maintained t-shirts, mostly in blues, two t-shirts from our current work, and two polo-shirts for work. We also have two cozy hoodies for lounging around the house, and a few thermals.

The work shirts are of course reserved for work days, but otherwise any of those items can be mixed and matched. The dress pants are not so dressy that they can't be worn with our Admiral Ackbar t-shirt, for example. We have three pairs of shoes, one of which we confess are not black, which is our base color. However, we are not going to throw out a good pair of shoes just because they are not black. We are going to wear them until they are worn out, then replace them with a black pair if possible. We are too broke for that kind of crap.

Shoes deserve their own post, but let us just go ahead and plant the idea that you do not need 30 pairs of shoes.

Let us discuss underwear, instead. All of our underwear lives in a basket under our bathroom sink. It's there waiting for us when we get out of the shower. This won't work for everyone, but please do consider the idea of freeing yourself from the tyranny of the Underwear Drawer. You need enough socks and underwear to last about a week without having to do laundry. They don't have to match, as no one is going to see them but you. So if you're into fun colors or prints, have at it! Mix and match, we are not here to judge. A word on socks, though: socks should match your base color so they don't stick out loudly at your ankles when you sit or bend over. Next time you buy socks, get a couple of bulk packages of the same sock, in your base color, and throw out all your old ones. Now you'll 100% of the right color and you'll never again waste time in the morning trying to find two socks that match!

Thermal underwear count toward underwear, not toward your capsule wardrobe. You'll likely have to have a few seasonal items, that's understandable. We don't want to freeze for the sake of having a tidy closet. Please look over your seasonal items with a critical eye, though. If you live in Georgia, do you really need snow pants? Probably not. Keep what is practical, but be reasonable about it.

Accessories can be tough, but pare those down too. If you live in a climate with a real winter, you may need a scarf, a hat or two, a coat, gloves, etc. We ourselves have a few bandanas, a couple of hats, and a couple of scarves. We also have a belt, and a small collection of jewelry. Changing up your accessories is a good way to make an outfit feel fresh even if you've worn it a hundred times before. Rotate them in and out, and you'll always seem to be wearing something different. Ladies, if you have a skirt you may find yourself wanting some knee-highs. That's ok, just don't hoard 50 pairs of them.

Now, here is the best side effect of creating your minimalist wardrobe:

This is all of our clothes. Literally. Even the pants are all hanging there. They all fit in this tiny closet. There's no dresser. There's no armoire. Just this closet. It isn't even completely full. (We are OCD here at Brokest Minimalist, so we are compelled to face all our clothes to the left and our hangers with the hooks away. Too much time spent working in a commercial laundry house, we guess.) We never spend time looking for a special top to go with a particular pair of pants, because they all go. We never waffle about what to wear. We never lose anything and spend a frantic morning looking for it. We are never late for work because we lost our uniform in our floordrobe. We still feel like we have too much, but we're working on it.

Way off in the side in there we have our sentimental items hanging nicely so that we can see them from time to time and reflect. Someday, we may be strong enough to let them go. If not, that's ok. Sentimentality is a valid reason to keep something too. If you've got kids, maybe you can hand that old prom dress down to them at a time when it's coming back in style!

#wardrobe #brokestminimalist #nomorefloordrobe

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