Read below to discover the Homefulness guide to cleansing and organising your wardrobe to create your most stylish and functional space to date!

You’ve finally decided it’s time for a wardrobe cleanse and you’re wondering where to start? Keep reading and in four simple steps we will show you the best method to slim down your wardrobe and have it looking and working its best! By cleansing, planning, and reorganising your wardrobe and learning some simple tips on how to maintain it all, we promise that you will go into the new year feeling lighter and more in control.

Cleanse

If there’s one thing that prevents people from organising their wardrobe, it’s the initial cleanse required. Clothing is something with which you can form a sentimental attachment; outfits can be linked to happy memories or significant stages in your life, and this can make cleansing your wardrobe a tricky task! We know that even if you haven’t worn an item in years, it can still be hard to let go; but sorting through your clothing is the first and most crucial step in creating a functional system from which to choose outfits going forward.

To begin with we recommend that you work through your clothing one category at a time; start with t-shirts, jeans, then dresses and so on. By working in this way, your cleanse will not only be thorough, but you will also be able to see an inventory of each item in your wardrobe, making it easier to decide what you do and do not wear.

From there you will find it much easier to decide on which items can stay and which items it is be time to bid farewell to. Plus, there can be a bonus to all this cleansing; by selling on any items that are in good condition, you can earn some extra spending money, which could be used to purchase organisational products to help maximise your wardrobe space, examples of which will be discuss in the next step.

Plan

Now that your items are categorised, before placing anything back inside your wardrobe, it is vital that you take some time to plan out the space. Regardless of whether you have a large walk-in space or a beautiful antique standalone wardrobe, planning the space is a really important step in ensuring your wardrobe is efficient for your lifestyle needs and will make it so much easier to maintain your organisation in the months and years to come (more on this later on!)

To being planning, it is a good idea to imagine yourself using your wardrobe on a daily basis and figure out which items you need to be most accessible and which ones can be stored in less accessible places, for example on high shelves or in low drawers. Depending on how much hanging / drawer / shelf space your wardrobe provides, you may also need to take some measurements if you decide that incorporating bins will help you maximise your space.

We love these Muuto bins, which look great on wardrobe shelves, for storing file-folded clothing or miscellaneous items. You may also wish to invest in some drawer dividers to aid with categorisation, a shoe rack if you have many pairs of shoes to house or a new set of matching coat hangers, all of which will come in very handy in the next step!

Organise, Contain & Style

Now that you have planned out the set-up of your wardrobe, the real fun can start. This is your opportunity to place everything back into your wardrobe in a stylish and functional way.

We like to start with hanging items; within each category of items e.g. dresses, top, skirts, we like to organise by length; from long to short and also by colour; from dark to light. Labelled dividers between each hanging category will aid with organisation whilst changing all items over to matching coat hangers with ensure a cohesive flow amongst your hanging items.

Next you can move on to folded items. Having decided where each category of folded items will be stored, for example t-shirts and underwear in drawers, jumpers in bins, you can use the file-folding method to uniformly fold the items in each category. The huge benefit of file-folding is that no item is ever ‘hidden’ under another, thus you will never have to rifle through your folded items to find that t-shirt you can’t seem to locate! If you choose to use bins for some of your folded items, now is the time to fill them and position them on the shelves. You may wish to add labels onto the front of each bin, allowing you at a glance, to identify the items contained within each.

Finally, it is time to place any miscellaneous items including hats, handbags, scarves and other accessories into your wardrobe. We recommend that you keep similar items grouped together and make use of drawer space or bins to keep these neat and tidy.

If shoes are being stored in your wardrobe too, they should be placed into categories such as heels, boots, trainers, sandals; you might find that using a shoe rack ensures the most efficient use of your space.

With everything now neatly put away, it’s a good idea to take the opportunity to check that you are happy with the layout and make sure that you can access your most used items easily.

You should end up with an organised wardrobe that is not only functional but aesthetically pleasing too!

Maintain

After all the hard work you’ve put in to getting your wardrobe looking so beautiful, of course you will want to want to maintain it. This can be easier said than done but just follow these three simple rules and we know you will do just fine!

1. Get into the habit of consciously placing items back in the spot you took them from; we know this sounds simple but it is something that can be overlooked in the rush of daily life and neglecting to do this can quickly set you on the slippery slope back to disorganisation.

2. Take the time once per month to conduct a mini tidy of your wardrobe. It will help to remind you of all the lovely items you have and act as an opportunity to review any items that are not being worn.

3. Try to stick to the ‘one in one out’ rule. If you continuously add items to your wardrobe without cleansing along the way, you can easily end up back at square one… and we don’t want that! The ‘one in one out’ rule is a simple and effective way to cleanse as you go and in our opinion it’s the best way to maintain a fresh and inspiring wardrobe.

And that’s it! We wish you the best of luck with your wardrobe cleanse and organise and if you feel that you might need a helping hand with any or all of the stages, don’t hesitate to reach out, Homefulness is here to help!