One Third Less Clothing

The limiting factor in my closet was how many hangers I had. I knew I had too many clothes when after doing laundry I had a hanger deficit. Then I would force myself to reduce what I owned to fit the number of hangers (I have a lot of hangers). Then I started to double things up.  I thought to myself, "These two sun dresses can be on the same hanger."  My side of the closet was crammed full. But no longer!

I set out a little reluctantly to reduce my clothing by one third.  It was surprisingly easy. I went through each category: clothing, pants, short sleeves, long sleeves, socks, coats etc and took out one third. In about three hours I went through the closet and dresser drawers.

How to Choose What to Keep 

My goal was to reduce the clothing I own by one third by:

1. Keeping only clothes that fit well.  I tried every thing on. If it was too tight, too long, too anything that was grounds for dismissal.
2. Getting rid of high maintenance clothes that require ironing or dry cleaning.  Why have clothes that need special attention when there are clothes that can simply be washed and dried?  I did keep my wedding dress and a second fancy dress along with two pairs of dry clean only pants.  I am considering getting rid of those as well. 
3. Giving preference to clothes that have a wide range of use.  The Kelly green top with appliqued strawberries that only works with the white skirt, those were both easy items to discard.  However the black top with the boat neck which can look dressy or casual was one of the first things that went back into my closet.  

Here's the things that "might be worth something" and the cat
 who thought rearranging the closet was great fun. 

The items that didn’t make the cut were divided into the “too far gone” and the "might be worth something” category.  Those items that had stains, starting to fall apart or were showing signs of wear went into "too far gone pile" and were taken to Goodwill.   I asked what would happen if an item was not good enough to sell.  The lady there told me that items that are considered too damaged to sell are recycled when possible and that almost all fabrics can be recycled. 

The items from my closet which might be worth something are going to go to a consignment store where perhaps I will earn a little without investing much of my own time.

Now that all is said and done I love that my closet has more space.  I even freed up a whole drawer in the dresser for cat stuff.  Now all the miscellaneous cat things that used to live in a bucket in plain sight are tucked away.   

What the Future Holds

One third was easy.  I am sure I could even reduce my clothing by two thirds and I just might. I’m seriously considering Project 333 for the New Year. The premise of this project is to reduce your wardrobe to just 33 items for three months. Check it out - Be More with Less: Project 333.

Do you think you could limit your clothing and accessories to just 33 items?