Capsule Wardrobe for Fall 2017

It seems like the latest trend I've been seeing on Pinterest is capsule wardrobes.  If you haven't heard of them, they are basically a small collection of clothes that can all be mixed and matched so you have lots of different options to choose from without having an overflowing closet.  

I've been hearing about capsule wardrobes for at least a year and I always thought it was a neat idea.  Who wouldn't want more outfit options with less clothes?  And why wouldn't I want every piece of clothing in my closet to fit me well and make me feel good when wearing it?

Like I mentioned in my last post, a few weeks ago I decided to give this idea a try.  Before I started, I went through my closet and counted how many pieces I had hanging up.  There were 114 hanging items in my closet!!  This blew me away because the majority of the clothes hadn't been worn in 6 months or even longer.  So why was I wasting all this closet space with clothes that I wasn't even wearing?  

By the time I was done weeding out the unnecessary clothes, I had a much sleeker looking closet with a grand total of 27 items (including pants & shoes).  It was a huge sigh of relief!  Every time I open my closet I can clearly see every piece of clothing to choose from.  I know that everything fits me and that I have many different combinations to choose from for my outfit that day.

If you'd like to give this a try in your own closet, keep reading to get the step-by-step process for creating your own capsule wardrobe.

This is what my closet looked like before I created my capsule wardrobe.

First, let's look at my closet before I cleaned it out.  You can see that the clothes are all squashed in together and there's not a lot of room between the hangers.  In fact, I was starting to have an issue with needing to steam most pieces before I could wear them because they were getting wrinkled by all being shoved together.

Here are the steps you can follow to clear out your own closet and create a capsule wardrobe for this fall & winter:

1.  Empty out your closet so you have a clean space to work with.

• In order to do this, you'll want to pull out all the clothes in your closet that you haven't worn for the last 6 months.  
• Next, remove any items that don't fit or don't feel flattering at your current weight.  
• Also, take out any pieces that are worn out, stained, or torn.

My two cats decided to "help" me with the process of sorting through all my extra clothes.

These are the stacks of all the clothes I took out of my closet.  Some of them went into a bag for donation and a few pieces were put in the trash.  The rest of the items are now hanging in a closet in my second bedroom.  

Since going through this process a few weeks ago, I've gone back to the second closet and removed even more items.  

Don't be surprised if once you start getting rid of clothes you begin to feel like you're on a roll.  Chances are it will be even easier to keep letting go of items you don't wear.

2.  Hang up the clothes you are going to keep.

• There's no specific formula for how many pieces you need in your capsule wardrobe. If you work in an office, you may need more business clothes than someone who works from home.  
• In general, try to get a sense of the main colors you wear the most.  It helps to have items that all tend to go with each other.  If you notice in the picture of my capsule wardrobe at the top of the post, my color scheme tends to be neutrals (white, gray, and black) with accent colors of blues & maroons.  I plan on adding pops of color to my outfits with scarves.​

Here is a breakdown of the 27 pieces in my fall capsule wardrobe:

• 6 Pairs of Pants: jeans, colored denim, leggings
• 5 Tees: white short-sleeve & long-sleeve, black, gray, black & white striped
• 5 Tops/Blouses: button-up chambray & flannel, plaid blouse, short-sleeve maroon blouse, blue tunic top
• 5 Sweaters & Cardigans: gray & navy cardigans, sweaters in pink, gray, and maroon
• 2 Outerwear Pieces: quilted vest & black fake leather jacket
• 4 Pairs of Footwear: black & gold flats, brown & black boots
• Plus miscellaneous accessories: colorful scarves, feather necklace, etc.

​

Pants

​Tees

​Tops/Blouses

Sweaters & Cardigans

​Outerwear
Shoes/Boots
​Accessories

3.  Figure out if there are any items you are missing from your closet.

• Keep track if you tossed some worn out leggings or decided to give away your white button-up shirts because they don't fit any longer.  Start a shopping list to keep track of the items you want to buy so you can fill in the gaps of your wardrobe.
• Try to focus on buying staple pieces that won't go out of style in 6 months.  Also, be realistic with yourself about your current size.  Personally, 80% of the clothes that were in my closet didn't fit me or look flattering any longer because I had gained weight since buying them.  It might be tough to let go of the emotional connection to the clothes that didn't fit, but in the long run it will feel so much better to look at a closet full of clothes that look good and make you feel good.​

4.  Create outfits with the remaining pieces so you have multiple options  to choose from.

• The easiest way to do this is to start with one item and work around it by finding all the items you can wear with it.  For example, pick out your favorite pair of jeans and then grab all the shirts and sweaters you can wear with those jeans.  Chances are you've already found 2-3 outfit ideas!
• Don't be afraid to get creative!  Try on a shirt that you've never worn with a specific pair of pants before.  Or take a sleeveless shirt from summer and see how it looks with a cardigan over it.  Voila, you have some new outfits to choose from.​

Here are some outfits ideas that I put together using the Stylebook app.  It takes some time up front to load all of your existing clothes into the app, but once you do it is really easy to mix & match pieces without having to try them on together.  My favorite feature is the shuffle option that randomly pairs items into outfits.  I found some really cute ideas just by letting the app do the mixing and matching for me!

(Tip: if you do buy the Stylebook app, I would highly recommend using the Shop option to find pieces similar to the ones you own.  The process of taking pictures of your own clothes is pretty tedious, so just search for a similar item and add it to your closet.  It will still give you an idea of the item without you having to take pictures of your whole wardrobe.  Plus, the pictures from the online stores can even show you how the item fits if you choose a picture with a model wearing that piece.)

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And that's it, you now have a capsule wardrobe in just 4 steps!  Remember, this process doesn't have to happen overnight.  Once you have a list of the pieces you need to buy, just keep an eye out on sales or coupons at your favorite stores so you can get great deals.  Also, don't be afraid to buy a favorite piece in multiple colors.  If it looks good & feels good, that's all that matters!

Now you just need to prepare yourself for the amazing feeling of getting dressed in a fraction of the time & feeling amazing in what you are wearing!!