August 2, 2026
Yes, I never post on Sundays. But I’ve had an idea kicking around in my head for a few weeks, and I wanted to put it into words. This helps me clarify my thoughts, and feedback from you helps me refine my ideas!
We’re always seeing the same “Wardrobe Clear-out” advice:
- take everything out of your closet
- try everything on
- sort it all into three piles – Keep, Repair or Alter, Donate
And then you’re going to have the perfect wardrobe…
My issues with this are many – who is REALLY going to put every stitch of clothing that they own on their bed (or the floor!) and sort it out? Who’s got time? Who’s got patience?
Further, it worries me that we’re donating clothes that are still appealing to us, but that just aren’t something we want to wear RIGHT NOW.
So my plan for this autumn (probably starting October 15, when true cool weather has set in here in Chicago):
- I’m going to choose a Project 33 Wardrobe – my definition of Project 33, which will be 33 garments. I’m kind of seeing this as 10 3-piece outfits and 3 dresses. This is certainly subject to change!
- Everything else is going to be put into a visual holding area. For me, this will probably be draping a flat sheet over the closet area holding all of the “non-33” garments.
- I’m going to dress from the Project 33 Wardrobe for at least two months. Maybe, by mid-December, I will change out everything, to include more festive clothes. Anything that I want to include in the second “wave” of this project is clearly a core wardrobe item. (I see my black jeans there…)
- If I think I want to buy something during this time, I have to go into my closet, take down the sheet from the “resting” clothes, and look at EVERYTHING.
- Anything in the Project 33 Wardrobe that I haven’t worn within the first 30 days needs to be evaluated, to figure out what’s gone awry.
We’re always told to shop our wardrobes. By keeping a bunch of stuff literally under wraps, I’m going to treat those things like my store.
The most environmentally excellent clothes possible are the ones that you already own…
Does this make sense?
love,
Janice
p.s. What is everybody reading? My husband is raving about The Arrogant Ape by Christine Webb.
Yes! Tastes shift, hobbies change, maybe we travel somewhere we haven’t been before, other (possibly impermanent) life changes happen. If there’s space to store things, even if they aren’t right for this month/season/other period, why not keep them to see if their time comes again? For professional reasons, I’m currently wearing a lot more black and simple outfits (black jeans, black tee, no topper or even scarf) than I normally would, but I’m not getting rid of my more colorful clothing just because I can’t wear it to work at present.
And yeah, I have way too many clothes to put all of them in one place–maybe one category at a time would fit on the bed! But they’re my hobby, and I can definitely “shop” my closet when I feel like going in a different direction.
I have great luck with dressing from what I can fit on a garment rack. Mine has a shelf at the bottom for shoes and a basket for accessories.
I did this at one time, too. Then the decluttering bug hit, and I donated the garment rack. Big mistake. Big. Huge. Now of course I don’t have room for one. That being said, I love Janice’s idea. October 15th is about when our weather changes, too (southeast Michigan), and I love the 2-month idea because I also lean into holiday dressing by mid-December.
This is an interesting idea. If one has already removed the clothes that are worn out, no longer fit or are otherwise unsuitable, then one only has really good clothes left. Is that really a bad thing? And really good clothes can last a long time. So, how to downsize a bit. Sometimes life situations can change. The challenge, I find is to stop getting new stuff. But, for me that too is a hobby…
I love this idea and I think I will join you there. I do have two compartments in my closet, so this will work. And since I have been a carer for the last four month, my summer wardrobe is in complete chaos. But I think I can manage 7 3piece outfits. Maybe reducing the visual impact will make things easier. Thank you for this inspiration.
THANK YOU, JANICE!
I’m currently reading Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari. Your husband’s book will be a great follow up.
This past year I retired from a uniform wearing career. My closet is filled with dog walking/comfy/exercise clothes plus some I loved but didn’t wear often. After a few months of purchasing 2D clothes I loved but looked terrible on me, I hired professional help (style/body shape). Your templates have given me a great plan but I felt overwhelmed starting. This post is perfection! I live in Florida with an eight month summer so can start now with a few months to see how it works.
With much appreciation,
Temara
I’m reading that right now, too.
I’ve been rebuilding my wardrobe after making a huge career change, losing 60 pounds, becoming a grandma, and working on art part-time. My new job has me working some from home and 2 days a week teaching Masters students in person. It has been an expensive makeover, but I’m finally feeling much more settled in my skin and wardrobe (the transition has taken 2 ½ years and my fall/winter wardrobe still needs some size changes. So I will be selectively shopping this fall.
By the way, Everlane has some interesting clothes in interesting shapes with flat-lie pictures that might fit your developing wardrobes.
I recently went through a mini bedroom remodel so I had to remove everything from my closet and dressers. I took that as an opportunity to go through as much as I could. I also had to create a capsule to use while I had limited access to my clothing. It was eye opening. I had multiples of some things and items that hadn’t fit in a while. I even found a few items I had been looking for online! I was able to donate many items I couldn’t identify an opportunity to wear that item- blazers, dress p ants etc. When in doubt I focused on age and quality. Older but high quality cashmere stayed, older lower quality blends went. When I finally added things back into my closet it was methodical by item type and color. I love going in the closet now, and I can shop my closet when I need to. The closet is fairly large, and many non clothing items had migrated in, so I made sure to re home those elsewhere. I still have more clothes than I need or can use so it is still a work in progress, as am I 😁
My wardrobe clear-out last weekend out was data driven – a first for me. I’d kept a record of my June/July outfits for fun when playing with some new, Japanese stationery. Quick analysis of this and my 2026 diary turned it into a treasure trove of insight.
There are whole clothing categories (e.g. skirts, button cardigans, formal shoes), patterns (florals, small geometrics, paisley) and colours (greys, pinks, purples, lighter blues) and fabrics (denim, terry, sequins, lace) that I never wear. My life is 55% working from home, but my shopping tends towards fantasy lifestyle buying for travelling and attending dressy occasions!
As a result, I’ve let 20+ bin bags of (often very lightly worn) clothes, shoes and accessories go to family, friends and the local . I can’t properly explain how much ‘lighter’ I felt after doing this and I feel better equipped to refuse the lure of beautiful but ‘wrong’ garments in future. I’ve still got way too much stuff, but that stuff now looks much more coherent and feels far more me.
OH, if you can sort out the fantasy life clothing and realize that this is what you tend to do – that’s enormous. I’m still doing that:
https://www.theviviennefiles.com/2013/05/i-am-not-movie-character-hard-but.html/
love,
Janice
It can be surprising what helps to focus the mind on a wardrobe clearout. A local community law centre put out a call for donations of professional-type clothing for their clients (who are low-income people, and many are refugees with very little) to wear when going to court. I now work from home almost all the time, and my husband’s current job is a much more casual environment than his previous one. We are both planning to retire in a couple of years. The call for donations pushed us to get rid of lots of suits – and in my case, formal dresses – that were literally clogging up the closets. My husband is very pleased that he can now SEE what he has, meaning that he actually wears more of his wardrobe than he did six months ago.
In his case it was pretty close to the ‘take everything out and try everything on’ model – I had to catch him while he was motivated ;-)
My test for whether I want to keep something that I used to wear for formal meetings or conferences is whether I would wear it with jeans or running shoes. If so, it still has a role.
Doh – don’t comment in the morning without enough caffeine in the system! That should read ‘and the local charity shop we support’.
This kind of concept has been rattling around in my brain for a while as I’ve realized that (for me), menopause drove major body shape changes, just as puberty did (and no, going to the gym a lot does not work!). I simply need new cuts now. It’s been heartbreaking to watch my old favorites fall out of fit, but it’s also been liberating to recognize what’s really going on, finally. I’ve been starting to track what I’m really looking great in and it’s a rather short list… Time to get out that sheet and designate a holding area!
I can’t believe I just saw this post. It’s a great idea! Last year, I was out of my ‘just sold’ house in June and couldn’t move into my ‘being built’ house until November 1. I did have more than 33 pieces, but I did follow your guidelines. I used two base colors of navy and light brown (along with denim). I then added in coral, pink and red as accents.I followed your advice with created clusters, after the colors were set.
I was renting a very small cottage with my sweet 90 year old Mama and our two immense German Shepherds. We had just moved out of a 4000+ sq. ft. house on the water into this 800 sq. foot cottage in the middle of a Maine village. My mom and I both love clothing and fashion, so cutting down was tough. But, we did it. I had to make sure I had clothes that were appropriate for moving boxes into storage and into the cottage, hot summer days with lots of dog walks since we had a micro-yard, appropriate for my first 2.5 months back at my teaching job that would start with warm weather and end in cool weather. All of this with during my time with a broken vertebrae…so all clothing had to be wearable under my awful clamshell brace.
I was grateful for your lessons! But, I must say, I’m very grateful for my room sized walk in closet in the new house. :-)