How To Get Clothes Under Control

I have a big closet, I'll admit it.  I'm a girly girl who likes her clothes, shoes, and makeup.  My temptation to shop could easily get out of hand if I didn't constantly employ a few tricks I've learned over the years.  These tips will help curb your shopping habits and control your clothing clutter if you feel the same way about clothes as I do.

The first step is to go through your closet or dresser drawers and weed out any item of clothing you haven't worn in the last year or simply no longer love.  A good tip to determine this is to turn all your hangers in your closet backwards and as you wear and wash an item put it back on the hanger and turn it to face the right way again.  At the end of the year (or month if you choose to work a season at a time) you can easily see what you have worn and what you haven't, what you should keep and what you should think about selling or donating. 

The key here is to downsize your closet to a manageable size.  Manageable means you can actually close the door when you are done and the clothes are all on the hangers fitting comfortably in your closet.  If it's not manageable keep working on it until it is as this is one of the most important steps! 

The second step is to simply divide your clothing into sections.  The photo below is a portion of the south wall of my closet which houses the majority of my clothing.  My clothing is divided into summer tops (top left corner), shorts and skirts (bottom left corner), dresses and slacks (middle section), winter tops (top right section) and jeans and leggings (bottom right section). 

If you don't have a built in closet like this don't fear!  There is still a way you can do this.  The easiest way is to separate your clothing into similar categories and buy different colors or styles of clothing hangers for each category.  For instance use pink hangers for your summer tops, blue hangers for your winter tops, black hangers for your dresses, wooden hangers for your denim jeans, and clip hangers for your shorts.  

The last step is to determine how many items in each section you want to limit yourself to.  If it's ten pairs of jeans then you can only utilize ten wooden hangers in your closet.  Donate or give away any extra wooden hangers so you are not tempted to buy more jeans in the future.  And if one day you do buy another pair of jeans that's okay too, but be prepared to give up one of your older pairs first.  If you're not ready then maybe you don't love those new jeans as much as you thought you did. 

If you don't have hanging space use this trick for dressers.  Separate your items and only keep what fits in the drawers.  If all your summer tops can't fit in one drawer then you need to purge.  Draping them over your hope chest or throwing them in a laundry basket at the foot of the bed is obviously not working for you.  These things need a home out of sight so your house looks more organized! 

This system has worked for me for years so I want to pass on the tips and tricks I've learned along the way.  I only have clothes in my closet I absolutely love and no room for "stuff" or "clutter" taking up my valuable space in my small house!