Let's Clean Our Closets Together

Starting with New Years Eve and continuing through Lunar New Year, Nowruz, and Eid, I have been constantly thinking about how to move old energy out to make room for the new . I have been a bit overwhelmed between life and work in the past few months, and while I’ve been dealing with issues both complex and exciting, I’ve been waiting for the weather to switch over in earnest so that I can tackle my twice-yearly free time project of switching out my wardrobe.

In my smallest apartments, in my busiest seasons, I have always made the time to do this once at the turn of spring and once at the turn of fall, because beyond the love I have for the clothing I’ve collected over the years, it helps me take care of my possessions, which I think imbues them with good energy and luck. But critically, beyond luck: taking good care of what I already have means I buy fewer new things, and less frequently. It’s what my health coach calls “crowding it out”. She’s referring to unhealthy habits, and so am I really. When my closet is packed and disorganized, I forget about things and accidental buy their replacements, or they become damaged, or everything gets too crowded and it’s not fun to get dressed anymore. And something this dark and difficult winter has helped me to remember is that I truly, truly enjoy getting dressed.

I also have found this winter a renewed desire to tend to my own personal responsibility in sustainability, a concept I realize has been thoroughly sullied by corporations like BP suggesting that the fate of our planet lies in personal carbon calculators.

But I also find that when the world starts to feel very out of control (or, more accurately, continues to remain feeling very out of control), practical organizational practices like caring for my clothes are a comfort, and make a difference to the way I shop and consume for the six months that follow. To the outside, it may feel like a very small drop in a very big bucket, but to me it’s exercising responsibility over what I can control.

You may have already swapped your closet out, or maybe you’ve only just started, but in an effort to bring my own personal sustainability practices to an accessible place, I thought I’d document it here. At worst, anyone reading this is about to confirm their long held suspicions that I attended Montessori school and have high functioning anxiety. At best, I hope this series helps you with your own process, whether it’s new or old! Here’s how the posts will go:

1. Prepare

2. Edit This Season’s Wardrobe

3. Assess and Repair

4. Gift, Sell, Donate, Repair

5. Storage

6. Living With Your Things

And today I’m offering you the first installment, Prepare.

Preparing for this switch out means preparing for two things; first, the process of the switch itself, and second, storing the things you are planning to put away.

First things first, envision the space you plan on performing this in so that you can stage it in your mind beforehand, and won’t be as surprised when you run up against space constraints or unhappy family members in the process. Unless you are a wizard, this process will probably take a few days (meaning a little time from each day, not a marathon packing event), so the idea would be to perform this switch in a space that doesn’t threaten to ruin your life if it’s a little cluttered for a while.

Next, supplies. Here are the basics I try to include in this process:

• Sweater bags: such as these, these, or these. Long lasting storage bags are one of the few places where I am fine to use plastic, and particularly vinyl, because this is the kind of use this material is made for. You want something impenetrable, durable, and hopefully that you’ll still be using in 40 years.

• Garment bags: such as these, which are optimal for storage, or these, which are more run-of-the-mill. This is another product that I will buy in durable impenetrable materials, because this is the purpose for which those materials were designed. Also, when our house flooded with inches of water from the ceiling directly above where my garment bags of clothing were stored, this is what saved everything. Again, you should still be using these in 40 years.

• Cedar sachets: this is the kind of thing I like to buy from Etsy, because there are so many nice makers out there that make great ones. Here’s one, and another here. It’s best to buy these again each year if you want actual moth protection.

• Garment rack: for some people this is an insane suggestion, but for me it’s been hugely helpful to have a collapsible garment rack in storage that I can rely on during this process so that I’m not using my own closet’s bars for clothing that I am packing away. You can buy one of these here. Or, if you have a Facebook account try looking for a secondhand rack on their marketplace. This is another item that you should still be using in 40 years, especially if you bought one made of steel.

  *note: I normally try to recommend the most responsible purchase option for any product I recommend, and a lot of the above links are from Amazon. In my research, Amazon>ULINE, and ~=Walmart, and Facebook at least offers secondhand. I don’t have a solution for this portion that doesn’t support these entities, but I’d love to hear yours in the comments, if you have any.

Next, envision where you want to store things. For some people that means preparing a closet or a part of a closet in their house, and for others that means renting a storage unit somewhere convenient to their home. In my old apartment I was using parts of each closet for longer term storage, and now this past year I’ve begun using an outside storage unit because our headcount at home has doubled and I’m storing way more stuff.

If you’re using closets or parts of closets, clear out and clean the space you’ll use before you start the work–trust me, you’ll be way happier later. If you are using a storage unit for the first time, acquire the unit now during the prep stage. I now use Manhattan Mini Storage, but I used to use Clutter. I found Clutter to be too expensive for what I needed it for, and I felt a constant sense of dread over never really and truly knowing where my stuff was.

Next, in the case you have been storing your stuff somewhere other than your home, schedule time to pick your things up, or schedule someone to do it for you.

And last, give the clothing you currently have in your closet a good clean, especially if it’s about to get packed away. It’s a good time to hand wash or dry clean sweaters, which might be making their way to a vinyl bag for a while. If you have things at the cleaners, or the tailor, or just sitting in the dryer barrel, gather everything back home and make sure nothing is getting left out of this process.

Up next: The Wardrobe Edit

til then,

Anja