Tag Archives: clothes

Color-coordinating my closet

Hello, my name is Jenna. This is my closet.

Oh wait–that’s the futon covered in a mess of clothes.

Wait a sec . . .

. . . let’s see . . .

. . . okay, here’s my closet!

Yes. My achy-breaky closet. There is no rhyme or reason to it. When I first moved my apparel into it two years ago, I had a plan: skirts were on the left. Then came pants. Shirts and sweaters to the right, and dresses to the far right. But as time progressed, the organization became haphazard. One might say it came under the Rule of Misrule. Here’s the left side:

(love that grey sweater with the cable pattern down the sleeve, by the way–one of my finds at Plato’s last year that’s been a faithful staple)

And here’s the right side:

Skirt? Flowers? Stripes? Sweater? Orange! Electric blue! Whoop de doo!

Complete chaos, I’m telling you.

On a totally unrelated note, check out these shoes:

They’re from Target. They’re my favorite. After years pretending I hated pink, I finally matured and started admitting that I like pink. I’ve found new freedom in being a girl, and liking the things that sometimes girls like.

But shoes are not today’s topic!

So some things you may not know about me:

1) I really like clothes.

2) Clothes are pretty cool.

3) I like to wear them and not be naked.

4) I like to feel pretty when I’m wearing them and not being naked.

The problem is, if I happened to have a particular item in mind, I couldn’t aways find it in a timely fashion. So on one hapless Saturday when my husband was out of town, I decided to change my life. My sister Heidi had a lovely closet with all her clothes hung in an ordered rainbow of colors, which I had gazed up with wonder in Alaska–so why couldn’t I?

I started by flinging things around. That’s a good way to start any project. Hence the futon covered in stuff.

Yep, there it is again. Flinging things around makes one feel so dang productive, doesn’t it?

My next step was to start rehanging everything. I decided to start with black on the left, followed by grey and white, and kind of work my way into a spectrum of color.

This took about 2 1/2 hours. It would’ve taken much less, but I also used this time to purge (which requires trying something on 5 times before finally putting it in the discard pile), and to figure out how to combine my fall clothes. See, I forget how to layer in the June-September span and have to re-learn how to put everything together.

Down to the last few things . . .

It was fun. It was especially fun because no husband was around to enter the room and exclaim in horror “You have too many clothes! Burn the whole lot of ’em!” or something extreme like that.

We wouldn’t want that. Nope. Not that he would ever do or say that–but I don’t know if he realizes how much is actually in my closet.

Here’s the finished product!

A closer look at the black to white spectrum on the left side:

And a closer look at the more colorful spectrum on the right side:

Now when I open my closet I feel like I’m shopping in some kind of posh store. Opening the closet has become much more exciting. Finding that one dusty blue colored cardigan has become a cinch. I highly recommend this process.

Which brings me to this: what does your closet look like? If any of you are inspired to color-coordinate your closets and want to send me before and after pictures (or already have color-coordinated closets and want to share the beauty), I’ll put together a post with all the pics.

Hooray for organization! Hooray for clothes! Hooray for being a girl!

The spirit of 111 lives on!

So last month I wrote four posts about the 111 things in 1/11 project, initiated by my friend Jenny, that involved a weekly purging throughout the whole first month of the year. Many things were thrown away, or put in bags to give away. I had 4 pretty heavy bags of stuff to bring to a Goodwill or Salvation Army–but not having a car, and not being close to either of those fine establishments, the stuff sat in a closet for a while.

I could sense the stuff lurking in the shadows of our coat closet, just waiting to somehow infiltrate our house again with its clutter–I had to find a way to get it out of there before it outsmarted me.

I soon realized that I had to enlist the help of a friend with a vehicle. So about a week ago, my friend Carrie offered up the trunk of her car, and we drove my purged stuff and her purged stuff out to a Salvation Army. Of course, a thrifting expedition ensued in which we also shopped at Salvation Army. And Plato’s Closet. It was inevitable–the call of Thrifting is powerful, and no one tied me to the mast to prevent it.

Since Salvation Army didn’t have a dressing room, we ended up in front of a mirror in the corner (curiously the place where the highest traffic was occurring), throwing clothes on and peeling them off again under a hideous set of fluorescent lights, jostled by passerbys, employees and children, all while trying to keep an eye on our purses, which were in a heap on the floor. There was a strange smell in the air that clung to all the clothing, but when a shirt costs $1.56, who’s complaining? What smell? We’re all friends here!

And the trip to Plato’s was a smash hit–how I love that store. Definitely pricier than Salvation Army, but I’m willing to pay a little more for the comfort of a dressing room and the quality of the clothing. Every other dress on the 3 + racks was calling my name.

Anyway, I came home with some adorable dresses and three cute tops. And a multicolored scarf that looks either funky/cool, or like a crocheted afghan your granny knitted. As I rifled through my purchases with the satisfaction of having found great deals, it suddenly ocurred to me that I couldn’t just welcome these new items into my closet with open arms.

There were going to be strings attached. Conditions. Terms. A notarized agreement between us.

The terms: I determined to get rid of 1 clothing item for each new clothing item coming into the rotation. I couldn’t in good conscience participate in the 111 challenge and then just buy 111 more things! Then, my existence would have proven meaningless and void of purpose. I would be discovered and called out as a fraud. My friends and family would shun me, and I would have to go live in a cellar on bread and water, with the rats of Chicago as my only allies.

Having just gone through my closet and purged the undesirable items contained therein for the 111 challenge, this wasn’t the easiest of tasks. But I did it! And here’s the pile:

I also realized that my style is becoming much less edgy these days. I used to thrive on wearing shocking combinations: a hippy skirt over jeans, scarves wrapped around my head; layers of sheer fabric under regular shirts. Weird transparent black things over other things. But this lacy number seemed a little too emo for me. Goodbye, wild days of my youth!

And welcome, adorable yellow vintage-type dress.

Welcome, filmy blue hippy-Grecian-classic light and airy summer number!

I love the brown detailing along the neckline:

And hello, little racerback dress with the flounces!

I plan on wearing you over jeans with a little cardigan tossed on top. I love the texture of the silk and lace layers.

I’m going to challenge myself to keep this up this year–when an item comes in, an item must go out. On one hand, this will keep tabs on my shopping, because unless I truly love an item I won’t want to sacrifice another for it. And it will keep the bounty in my closet to a dull roar.

It’s a plan.

Happy Tuesday, friends!