Wardrobe and Inspiration

[Images: Totokaelo, ornithes, Orla Kiely, Totokaelo.]

I recently packed up 3/4 of my wardrobe to sell or donate. It felt great. I haven’t actually hauled much of it out of the apartment yet, but I haven’t gone digging back through any of it either. I realized I didn’t love the majority of the clothing I owned and that I had too much of it in general. For the last few years, I believed that I needed to have an extensive wardrobe, that I should be able to go weeks without ever wearing the same thing, and felt pressure to never repeat an outfit in its entirety.

This never suited me. I guess I already knew something wasn’t right but didn’t really get it until I read this post by Dead Fluerette in which she pretty much perfectly describes how I feel about my clothes. I have shoes that I’ve never worn and others that hurt my feet. I have dresses that make me feel awful and tops that never fit right. I’ve held on to things thinking they’d fit better someday, that my shape would change or my weight would go up or down enough to accommodate them.

This is contradictory to the rest of my life where I make careful decisions and wait patiently for exactly the right thing. The apartment has been without a coat rack or hooks of any kind in the entryway for a year and a half because I simply haven’t found anything that’s exactly right.

So I’m putting the money I get from selling the majority of my wardrobe toward beginning a new wardrobe. I’ve kept enough of my clothes to get by because a girl has to have something to wear to work. I’m going to go for quality over quantity and I’m only going to buy things that fit me perfectly. This is a chance for me to figure out exactly what my style is, something I’ve never been able to pin down. I’m going to be okay with having to save up to buy one article of clothing, because I’m going to know it’s the right one, and it’s going to make me feel great every time I wear it. Getting rid of everything was easy but rebuilding, or even taking the first step toward rebuilding, is going to be a huge challenge.