Okay granted, clearing out that wardrobe is not a favourite chore. But if you sacrifice one rainy morning to it, you will enjoy it so much afterwards. That tidy wardrobe will bring new cool outfits to light AND it could earn you a penny. Because don't wear it? Then sell it! In this article, Saskia shares her method: tidying your wardrobe in four steps. It really does take no time at all. I promise!
A tidy wardrobe in four steps
In our lives, we collect a lot of clothes. How about you? Here are some figures! An average Dutchman has 173 items of clothing in his closet, does not wear a third on average and buys 46 new items per year. Do we never get rid of anything? Yes we do, but that's where things don't go quite right either. It turns out that we throw away an average of 40 garments a year. By far the most garments (24) end up in the rubbish and are therefore incinerated. A shame, because many of these unused clothes could be better given a second life. This is important because our raw materials are running out. In short, clearing out that wardrobe is also a very nice sustainable move. Come on, get to work! I'm sharing my roadmap!
Step 1: collect all the clothes
The best result is achieved if you make all your clothes visible: put the entire contents of your wardrobe on the bed. Don't be alarmed, it will probably be a big pile, but it's really going to help you make better choices (see step 2). Really! Have you finished? Then do another tour of the house. Put your shoes there, grab all your coats from the coat rack, maybe you also have some unworn clothes in the attic and don't forget to check the laundry basket and clean laundry too. In short, make sure all the clothes are in one room Often, you have clothes in many more places than you initially thought!
Step 2 of tidying your wardrobe: sort out clothes and make piles
OK, and now the fun part starts. The sorting out work! Make piles in your room (or in several rooms if necessary):
- A pile for clothes you want to keep (these will get a new permanent place).
- A pile for clothes you want to sell (beautiful items ‘your pearls’ that could still fetch a lot).
- A pile for clothes that can be given away for free to a charity, thrift shop, a giveaway shop or The Clothing Loop (This category are nice items that can definitely go another round, but won't fetch much when sold).
- A pile for clothes that really need to be thrown away (e.g. broken clothes). Put this in the textile bin afterwards so it can be recycled. You can read more about the textile bin (and why it's better not to put good clothes in it) here.
Once you have assessed all the clothes, you are left with one pile of clothes you want to keep. You may have also created a fifth pile of doubtful clothes while clearing out your wardrobe. It's hard to accept (been there too), but they are now in the doubt pile for a reason. Why not wear it? Possibly it's not your colour, size or material after all. The little voice ‘but it was an expensive garment’ or ‘maybe I'll wear it one day’ are also classic reasons to hang/put unworn garments back in the closet. A shame, you'll probably never really wear it again. Rather sell it or make someone else happy with it is definitely a better idea! And reserve that spot in your closet for a nice second-hand garment that does suit your taste.
Tip: If you come across broken clothes in the pile that you want to keep, take it to the tailor right away, otherwise it will come off again. You can often agree on a nice total price for all the repair jobs together.
Cleaning out your wardrobe. Don't wear your garments, no matter how nice they are, get rid of them properly!
Step 3: put clothes back and hang them up
Do you already have a good clean-up method? Nice! If you're still fumbling around, I might have a few handy tips for you:
- Do you hang clothes on hangers? Make sure all hangers point in the same direction. Are you wearing something? Then hang it back with the hanger facing the other way. After six months or so, you will see which garments are not being worn. These can then probably be removed.
- Do you fold clothes? Then collect shoe boxes that you can then use as storage for these clothes. (I put out a call for this in my local Facebook group and collected more than 10 shoeboxes.) Fold clothes into square packets and put them upright in these boxes. This way you can always see all your clothes at a glance (see main photo). If you make old-fashioned piles, you will only see the topmost garments, which may still leave a lot lying around unworn. Want to learn this folding method, which comes from Marie Kondo? Then take a look at this video!
- To have extra overview, some people like to swap the contents of their wardrobe twice a year: winter clothes out and summer clothes in (and vice versa). I don't do this myself because I wear a lot of clothes all year round with these mild winters and many cool summer days.
- This is also a good time to check if your wardrobe is complete and balanced. If you have six winter jumpers in your closet, you might want to keep the three best ones and sell the other three anyway. Missing items you can put on a list for your next second-hand shopping adventure.
- Tip from a style coach: take photos of outfits and collect them in a folder on your phone or print them out and hang them on the inside of the wardrobe. That way you keep varying instead of falling back on the same outfits over and over again. You can find more fine tips from style coach Mirjam here!
Step 4 of cleaning out your wardrobe: get rid of clothes
One pile you have already got rid of, the pile of clothes you want to keep. That leaves three piles. Start with the easiest one and take all the clothes that need to be thrown away to a textile container in your area. A lot more textiles are often allowed in there than you think, including broken clothes. Tie shoes that belong together as pairs or put them in one bag. Make sure the clothes are somewhat clean. Never throw wet clothes or clothes with oil stains or paint stains in a textile container, you will contaminate the whole batch by doing so.
Tidying up your wardrobe also involves disposing of clothes properly. Broken clothes go in the textile container.
The pile that passes through your hands after that is the clothing pile that can go away. Take it to the thrift shop, give it to friends, a charity or join The Clothing Loop. So that cleans up nicely! Find out more about our country's biggest necklace swap, with lots of necklaces, then check out my review. I'm a fan! Or organise your own clothing swap. In this article, we share our best tips. Have you found fast fashion clothes you want to get rid of? In this article, we have tips on what you can do with your old fast fashion clothes.
And finally, who knows, you might keep some pearls for sale. That's still a bit of a chore. You can rent a stall at a flea market or try to sell them online, for instance through Vinted. Sales tips for this we also have for you! If you go for Vinted, then I have a tip! Take all the photos on a nice sunny day. And save making the ads for another time, say a boring rainy Sunday or a weekday evening. Sit next to your stack and take all the ads. You will already have the photos, the properties you can copy straight from the labels. It sounds like a bit of work, but it's really not that bad. You can easily make twenty ads in an hour, since you will have the good photos anyway.
Do you have designer clothes you want to get rid of? You have special platforms for that. We have listed those for you here!
Get started with a no buy clothing style
Passing on and getting rid of clothes is great, but discovering other people's clothes is even more fun. We get you started with the No Buy Fashion Guide. Over a hundred pages of cool ideas on how to look nice without even buying anything. Nothing. Nope. Nada. Not even second-hand! For 9.50 euros you will have it delivered straight to your inbox and thus on your tablet or mobile phone!
Will you also join this fun community? Read this guide too and discover lots of original ideas. Because so many cool clothes are already out there! Order the No Buy Fashion Guide from our webshop!
Your tidy wardrobe?
What does your wardrobe look like? Is it tight or could it use a good tidy? If you have a good tidying tip that belongs in this list, please let us know. We will add to the list with love. And if you make stories of your tidying job? Tag @thegreenlist.nl then! We will share and encourage you! Good luck with it!
More sustainable tips from thegreenlist.nl
- Are you in the cleaning mood? Then check out these tidying-up tips for a more sustainable life!
- Selling clothes and other stuff well at the flea market? With these tips, you will have the most beautiful and best dress!
- Nothing left to wear? We have tips for borrowing (and lending) clothes in a nice way.
- Old jeans left over? Make it a bag!
- Coloured clothes left over? Make it a zero waste garland!
Sources: hva.nl, nos.nl, oneworld.nl. Photo credits: Angela de Vlaming.
