Get ready, I’m about to eat my words.
Chalk it up to my rebellious streak, or that I’m not very good at following rules, but I’ve never really wanted to try, or liked the idea of, creating capsule wardrobes.
I don’t believe minimalism is about numbers.
I don’t want to “hide” half of my clothes for a season or two.
There is no one way to be a minimalist.
I still believe those things, but I’m starting to see the wisdom in the idea of seasonal capsule wardrobe.
What capsule wardrobes are good for:
Separating out items that work for only one or two seasons at a time
Keeping the clothing you actually wear available and visible all the time
Restricting choices, which actually gives you more freedom to choose…
Ah – and there’s the rub, why we become minimalists in the first place: having fewer choices actually makes it easier to choose, and frees up our thought processes and time to focus on other things.
Even with my wardrobe drastically pared down, I still have to think about what I’m going to wear each day. And sometimes I go through multiple outfits/looks before I decide on something. For my simple life, this is unacceptable; I don’t need to change 5 times before going to get my hair cut.
But this is it. I still have too many options available to me. If I want to wear slouchy pants one day, I have at least three dark, slouchy pants options: Eileen Fisher harem pants, Hope news trousers & Black Crane carpenter pants. Theoretically, one pair should be sufficient for a slouchy pants day…but not for me. Each pair projects a slightly different “look,” depending on what I’m going for that day.
This frustrates me. I know I don’t need that many options. I don’t WANT that many options.
I am ready to purge quite a lot of my fall/winter wardrobe now that I’ve had a chance to wear some things, and conversely choose NOT to wear some things, but there are still some things I’d like to hold on to, and some things that even though I COULD layer with them now, I probably won’t, so I should put those away.
So, with this additional purge, and reflections on what’s left in my closet, I am going to create a capsule wardrobe for the rest of the year.
Creating my capsule wardrobe
I’m not going to hold myself to a specific number of items.
I am going to be reasonable about the numbers of similar-but-different-enough items I keep in my closet and which ones I should put away for now.
I will keep only one “type” of item out (i.e. long dress, long skirt, jeans, black pants, etc.)
I will box up and put away (from sight) everything not in my capsule
Overall, I will use this as an opportunity for growth, not punishment, or restriction. I will not let this exercise overwhelm me, or make me anxious. I hope it will help me stick more to my “gut” when it comes to getting dressed, and not be overly concerned about the look I’m trying to portray. I think it will encourage me to go back to my “whatever I put on stays on” method of dressing I practiced a couple of years ago.
at the end of the day, I think the amount of things we CAN acquire (and DO acquire) is overwhelming, and leaves little room within ourselves for spiritual and personal growth.
For me, as with most of us I think, the more choices I have, the more overwhelmed I get trying to choose. I appreciate that we in the Western world have so many choices available to us, but at the end of the day, I think the amount of things we CAN acquire (and DO acquire) is overwhelming, and leaves little room within ourselves for spiritual and personal growth.
Our material possessions crowd out room for stillness, for reflection, and for just being. Mine do anyway…
Some excellent capsule wardrobe resources:
The Ten Item Wardrobe by Jennifer L Scott
Project 333
Do you implement capsule wardrobes? Have you tried a capsule wardrobe? What has your experience been?
See The Minimal Closet in the WSJ! Then read more in The Minimal Closet series (new posts on Thursdays):
A few things I have found about trying several outfits on before you are good to go:
If you have a small closet, it’s easy to visualize one/more options for the day’s activities (I work from home like you so most of my outfits are casual with occasional dressy events). I pick something out in my mind, put it on, and if I decide to change my mind, wonder what that might be telling me about the item: mentally (before dressing) it seemed to be a good idea, but now physically (the act of dressing) it doesn’t seem such a good idea- maybe that;s telling me something about the item: fussy? too tight? no longer feeling the love?
I call it the “perfect occasion test”: if the items work for what I am going to do, and I choose to wear them, but then no longer want to wear them, maybe they should go?
I had been doing what you do, but since reading the KonMari Method book–Marie Kondo’s Japanese “tidying” book, I pared my wardrobe down to only the pieces that “spark joy” and hung them from long to short, dark to light from left to right in one closet (except for really dressy clothes that are in the spare closet) and folded tops so they can be stacked vertically–I can open a drawer and see the top edge of every top, also sorted from light to dark front to back. I am wearing more items, and no longer buying duplicates. Anything that is too much trouble to work in obviously doesn’t “spark joy” for me, and gets purged. We have such changeable weather in SC after it stops being unrelentingly hot, that I only packed away my shorts and bathing suits for the duration. I have very few wool items left, and they will get stored in April, with bars of scented soap to keep away moths.
I only use capsule wardrobes when travelling, but I should do it at home, too. You continue to inspire me to pare down. I have a bag of clothes ready to donate to a charity shop tomorrow. Thanks for this series and congrats on being featured in the WSJ!
Noooo, not you too, Grechen! ;-P I was holding on to you as maybe the last somewhat minimalist blogger that I follow who isn’t all about the capsule wardrobe! 🙂
In all seriousness, I look forward to hearing your thoughts on this experiment. I have not seriously considered the capsule wardrobe or going truly minimalist because I like variety, and I have a closet that is full of things that I like and wear, and–the most important part perhaps–I have nowhere to store them out of sight (we have very limited storage space). I regularly clean out my closet, but I don’t see the point in actually getting rid of items that I love and/or are “good enough” (quality, function, aesthetic). By the way, “good enough” is a point that you made in one of your posts and that I really appreciate; searching for the “perfect’ item to create the “perfect” wardrobe was making me totally crazy, like obsessive crazy. So I had to stop that and I can thank you for some of that. 🙂
haha!!
i’m exactly the same way, which is why i haven’t done a “capsule” so far…but i’m increasingly frustrated with still having too many things, and not being able to easily see them all at once. like, i keep my jeans/pants/fancy leggings in a separate drawer and sometimes forget what i even have in there…so i’d like to get them all in my closet somehow, which will require another pare down. and honestly, some things can go. a lot more things can go, actually. i just haven’t been ready to part with them yet, so those are the things i’ll relegate to the guest bedroom (again) until i’m ready to let them go, or have determined that they aren’t what i want in my closet anymore.
but you’re absolutely right, “good enough” is a hard concept to really come to terms with. i think i’m mostly there 😉
thanks laurel. you have been an inspiration to me too!!
ok. now i must read this book! it sounds very interesting, if quite regimented 😉
my problem is that ALL of my items spark joy; i love them all, and love to wear them all, but i just don’t. or can’t because of my casual lifestyle. or i just don’t have the time to wear everything…
oh, this is so good pam! i should spend a lot more time consciously dressing, instead of just getting frustrated and throwing things on the floor…
thank you for this, i’m definitely going to try this exercise.
This is a great post Grechen! Good luck with pulling together your capsule wardrobe!! I have a capsule wardrobe and it works well for me, at least it does most of the time. I find that having fewer clothes enables me to make decisions about what to wear far quicker than it did when I had a wardrobe stuffed with clothes. I see my wardrobe in a very different way to how I used to about 8 years ago. I used to buy lots of clothes that didn’t cost much, without considering what I already had, and I didn’t look after them either so they never lasted more than a few wears. Now I know that it makes sense for me to spend more on fewer items, and to look after them well so they last. I add new pieces each season so I’m continually building and developing my wardrobe and style. I have the foundations, the staple/key pieces that form the base of my look, and then I have introduce on trend items to update my look. I make a real effort not to duplicate items too much as that’s when things start to move into the ‘I’ve got lots of clothes but nothing to wear’ territory, as outfits start to look the same.
It sounds dull but it’s not, as a result my wardrobe is now full variety, of things that I love, that fit well and that go well together…my wardrobe is my dressing up closet! If you like, you can check out a post that I wrote about developing a capsule wardrobe here: http://www.stylestudsandlace.com/2013/05/build-your-own-capsule-wardrobe.html Niki x
Just read your comment policy….so sorry, feel free to delete the link to my post! Niki
Niki´s last blog post ..Weekend Style Guide : Preparing And Packing Your Wardrobe To Move Abroad
no! it’s fine niki, it’s the context 😉
Sorry I’m so behind in my comments. I always save your blog posts if I don’t get a chance to read them right away (The ONLY blog I save!).
I create capsules when I travel, but that’s really the only time. I realized that I haven’t been putting a lot of thought into what I’m wearing….I tend to grab whatever is clean and in front of my nose. (Depression will do that to you.) I think that’s one of the main reasons it would be helpful for me to complete the task that I’ve begun with whittling down my wardrobe. I want to dress in a way that brings me joy and take pleasure in what I own. Hard to do when you have so much you don’t even know WHAT you have.
You’ve nailed it again: Spiritual and personal growth. That’s what I desire more than clothes.