Trying out my first capsule wardrobe

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There is a link to a book about trying a capsule wardrobe because… well, of course, there is!
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Project 333

Having successfully completed a month of the ‘Minsgame’ I have decided to launch straight into another challenge. This time, regarding my wardrobe.  There are plenty of suggestions on how to go about this, particularly on Pinterest. But for this attempt, I will be experimenting with Courtney Carver’s ‘Project 333′, which is available from Amazon.

The house is still being decluttered…

A mass cupboard clearout has had an amazing impact on the house. After two trips to the tip, all of the rubbish is gone and is no longer cluttering up the house.  

After clearing the cupboard, we have been able to move all the camping gear into the space that has been emptied. This, in turn, has opened up the kitchen. It has also further fuelled my desire for a tidy house.

There have been a few downsides; I think we may have inhaled an entire bottle of Cillit Bang Black Mould Remover!  

The boys thought we had built an indoor swimming pool when they came in from school. That’s how strong was the chlorine smell was. (Hannah thought we were covering up a murder – I really need to have a word with that girl).

So the decluttering continues, and I awoke at 6am yesterday with a wild idea. I really wanted to try out the 333 project and have a minimalist capsule wardrobe.

Capsule Wardrobe

An Instagram post I had read the night before had reminded me of the idea; one with which I was familiar through research I had been carrying out for my book.  Having already KonMaried (totally a verb!) my wardrobe to a state where it was fairly reduced by most people’s standards.

For example. I only own four pairs of footwear: Boots/Trainers/Baseball Boots/Posh Shoes. Therefore, I figured that reducing them down further would not be too difficult.  

(There is actually a difference between KonMaring and 333ing, which is also now a verb I intend using. But back to me at 6 o’clock, the other morning…)

The basic premise is to wear 33 items of carefully curated clothing items over a 3 month period.

Making a list

While still sat in bed, I made a quick list, creating headers :

Tops     Skirts     Bottoms       Dresses      Accessories  

There are exclusions as part of the rules – so I needed to lookup Courtney Carver’s website ‘Be More With Less‘.  Apparently, my personal rules were close to hers.  

None of the following are included in your 33 items.

Underwear -I assume this includes socks and tights, but what about vests? Possible loophole!
PJ’s – or bed wear
Uniforms – like my work clothes, or cleaning clothes
Your wedding ring, or jewellery you never take off

I don’t own ‘work out clothes’ or indeed ‘in-home loungewear’ – I have a personal rule to never wear anything I wouldn’t be willing to be carried outside by a Firefighter in. The one thing I do have though is a lack of central heating, so I have chucked in an extra hoodie, just to wear in the house if it gets chilly.

While searching the rules, I was drawn into Courtney’s world and explored her website further. My personal favourite was the detailed how-to of clearing out your closet. – I particularly liked the ‘could take 2-5 hours, brings snacks and stay hydrated’- Purlease! I’ll do it in one! *

Challenge Accepted!

I don’t have the luxury of a closet, or a bedroom…or indeed a bed, so I put all the clothes I own, apart from a few items that are currently in the wash, and a peach jumper that I seem to have misplaced**,  in a pile, on the living room floor.  

Courtney suggests putting the clothes that don’t make it into your 33 away, rather than actually getting rid of them forever – this makes choosing easier if you know that you can always get an item out if you felt you HAD to have it, and it also gives me new options when I do it all again in September. My knitwear, at present, is stored in a large wheeled suitcase that I bought in Tokyo and will be the perfect place to store all of the clothes I won’t be using.

Taking pictures took most of the time as I whizzed through my wardrobe.  Lots of my dresses, while I love them, are clearly a bit too”summery”, so were obvious choices for the suitcase. Much as I want the weather to be good I am not relying on it.

My biggest ‘loss’ will be the black floral culottes that I bought in a mall near Nara – I did lots of shopping in Japan, so much so that I needed to buy a suitcase to bring it all home in. Well, that and the knife issue, but that’s a story for another time. However, they are black, and most of my other clothes are blue and navy, so they will not coordinate, colour wise, with enough of my other clothes to make them a sensible choice.

There is also the issue of the floral design, which will clash with a number of my patterned tops.

Making choices

Whittling down the clothes was like being Simon Cowell on X-Factor.

“You are all great shirts, but only 1 of you can go through to the next round”.  

I eventually pared down the clothes to my “winners”; my final 33 items that will comprise my wardrobe for the next 3 months.

Can we, at this point, take a moment to note how impressive it is that the remainder of my wardrobe ALL managed to fit in one suitcase?  Also, can we take a minute to note the extreme irony that all of the things I DON’T really want will now be protected in the event of fire or flood…

So why the 333 method?

There are a number of ways of reducing your wardrobe, and following the Kon Mari method has served me well.  I am currently in a position (financially and spatially!) where I really need to STOP buying more clothes, and if I limit myself to just 33 pieces, even if just for a few months, I’m hoping I will be able to take note of what I wear, and what pieces I can look to invest in in the future.

To this end, I have created an excel page matrix (nerd alert!), so that I can measure which pieces, or outfits get used the most.  While I haven’t officially started on my ‘sartorial slimdown’ at the time of writing this blog post, from looking at the spreadsheet, I notice that I may have overestimated the number of shorts I will need.  

These are also only on the list because I always wear ‘safety shorts’ under my dresses, and my 2 pairs of shorts and 1 pair of navy leggings, will never be worn alone, and are therefore taking up a disproportionate part of my “bottoms” selection (See! The nerdy spreadsheet matrix works!)

I have also decided to swap out one of my patterned blouses, for a plain, one colour, long sleeve top. Blue, of course! (Further consultation of the nerd-sheet has seen me swap out a number of dresses too, and I have done something I thought I would never do again. I got a pair of jeans.  We shall see how that goes!)

Tips for your own capsule wardrobe

If you are looking to reduce your wardrobe, and think a capsule wardrobe might be for you, these are my top 3 tips to help get you started:

Pick a base neutral colour

Whether it is a dark colour, like navy or black, or a lighter one, such as beige or even white, all capsule wardrobes need a unifying colour theme. Consider what you already own and wear, the idea is not to go out and buy new pieces if you can avoid it.

Pinterest is a great place to see capsule wardrobes of all styles if you want to get some ideas about the kind of colour range you want to opt for.

Consider your lifestyle

Are you a stay at home Mum? Do you work in an office? Is most of your time spent outdoors? You need to take the everyday practicalities of your life into account when reducing your wardrobe. There is no point in your capsule being full of flouncy skirts and lace if you spend your days up a ladder painting walls or cutting down trees.

The clothes need to be practical for you, the pieces need to work together, and hold up to whatever punishment your lifestyle throws at your clothes – be that food spills, mud or ink.

Avoid crazy patterns

A few basic patterns are fine; stripes, spots, a nice floral perhaps. But remember that you need to be able to match the pieces with everything else in your wardrobe.

If you are going to go for patterns, limit it to just the tops. Or perhaps a dress. That way they can pair up with jackets, cardigans or plain trousers.

Another aspect is that if your choice is too ‘striking’ it will certainly be noticed if you are wearing it twice a week. No-one notices when you wear the same jeans for a week straight though…hmmm.

Over to you

This method, indeed the entire concept of a capsule wardrobe is not for everyone.  I have never been a big ‘clothes’ person (as opposed to someone who has to wear ‘big clothes’, but I am also working on that aspect of my life too!)

Getting you to ‘hide’ your clothes away is probably not a great way to encourage decluttering, but if you can work with a reduced wardrobe for a small amount of time, it may give you pause. Then when you eventually retrieve the rest of your wardrobe, it may give you an insight into how many clothes you actually need, and what you actually want to wear.

 It is said that we wear 20% of our clothes 80% of the time. If this is truly the case, then I should be able to manage 3 months with 30% of my actual wardrobe.

Is it something that you would consider trying? What number of pieces would be your ideal? Let us know in the comments below

* Actually took 57 minutes, and that was because I had to set all the clothes up for photos!

** Panic over! The peach jumper has shown up.