I’ve always been a clothes horse. Some women love skincare in a big way and will blow £100 on the latest cream. Or scented candles. Or flowers. For me, it’s clothes. I buy three items of clothing a month – some new and some on Vinted. I’ve tried to stop multiple times – too many times to count – but I am definitely a clothes-buying addict.
I’m not alone. We’re all on a manic clothes-buying train and we can’t get off. A recent survey by British Wool revealed that Brits are throwing away 192 garments per person every year, a 65 per cent increase since 2023. 46 per cent also claimed they’d rather buy fewer, higher-quality pieces than larger quantities of fast fashion, but in reality this isn’t happening.
Many of us know that we need to do better. I have two daughters aged 13 and seven, and my 13-year-old, Rae, is passionate about clothes too. She’s just entering that phase where clothes become pivotal in terms of building her identity.
We needed to get things under control, or at least a bit more under control than they were. Apart from the sheer horror of realising that you are creating an ecological disaster (we use Vinted often but I worry about all the energy it takes to ship things back and forth), there’s also the fact that every drawer in the house is bulging. It’s hard to get a cardigan out as there’s another cardigan wrapped around it like a toxic knitted boa constrictor. We have a small house, and I’m regularly overwhelmed.
So eventually, in a fit of overstimulation, I tried decluttering our clothes. I spoke to Jenn Jordan, a professional organiser, who helps clients not only declutter but also refrain from buying things they don’t need. “You need to be aware of what you already have,” she said. “So, if you know that you have 12 pairs of jeans, and six pairs of black trousers, then you can stop buying them. Keep reminding yourself.”
I checked Rae’s drawers and discovered 20 hoodies. And maybe one or two pairs of decent trousers. How had this happened? My younger daughter Greta was in a similar position; she had 60 tops and three pairs of trousers that fit properly and weren’t either gigantic or tiny.
Jordan said to think about the times when you tend to buy clothes that you don’t need: “Are you tired? Stressed? Is it scrolling in the middle of the night? If so, leave the stuff in the basket, and you might not feel like buying them in the morning.” This is true for me, as I tend to scroll online at night, sometimes waking in the morning to discover that I’ve ordered something I don’t remember buying. Financially, this is a disaster, and it doesn’t help you be more strategic about your clothes consumption.
But what about the decluttering itself? How do you avoid overwhelm? Jordan’s advice was to handle it one category at a time, i.e. root through your skirts, then shirts, then jeans. This would be easy as my girls only seemed to have tops. One morning, we started “Le Grand Declutter”. I’m making it sound like a fun, family thing, but I was doing it whilst Greta played with one of the cats, and Rae hung off the side of her bed texting a friend.
I immediately felt stressed. For a start, in one cupboard there were hundreds of tiny pairs of pants (some so small that I realised they were from when the girls were potty training). What to do with these? Make them into cat pants perhaps? I created two bags, one for the local charity shop (good-quality stuff), and one to go into the clothes recycling place at the dump. Then when it came to socks, there were many sans partners. Could I make sock puppets? Or sew them all together to make a nice wholesome blanket?
Jordan advised that whilst you’re decluttering (I did ours over a period of five days), you think about what’s going into the charity bag and make a mental note. “So, when you have a dress in your hand, and are about to buy it, you can think about what you just took to the charity shop.” This helps with breaking the cycle of buying more things you won’t wear.
In my wardrobe, I discovered a worrying fetish for brightly coloured jumpsuits. Was I yearning to be a car mechanic? Or a 80s kids TV presenter? I’d been buying these as they were easy when the kids were little, but now they were too big and no longer my style. There were also lots of blouses, but I kept all of them as I love a blouse, and will probably be buried in one. An investment for the future!
Then, I tackled the jumpers that I’d shoved under the bed, and the cats liked to sleep on. Many were ruined by moths. After I’d cried about a Bella Freud I’d bought years ago on eBay, I made a pile and put the moth-eaten ones to be darned.
Another key learning was not to declutter when you’re feeling stressed. Or had three coffees. Jordan echoed this. “Slow down. Make sure items are really good. ‘This will do’ is not an option. You are worth things you love.”
The decluttering of my wardrobe revealed I also had many tops and hardly any bottoms (a family trait it seems). We all needed new pants in the right sizes. I made a mental note. Then, just when I’d finished five days of decluttering, and had four bags for charity, a friend knocked. She had two bags full of her daughter’s old hoodies. Could I tell her to take them away? “Thanks that’s very kind,” I said, making another mental note never to open the door again.
But I have since cleared these final bags of unwanted overconsumption. I now look forward to opening my wardrobe, and have put more old clothes on Vinted, selling six items in one day, and generating a grand total of £100. I’m more aware of the gaps, and of what we all need. It helps the girls get dressed more easily and there’s less tension in the morning.
I’ve discovered items I’ve not worn for years, and am giving them another whirl. Fashion is cyclical and I’m hoping that I can wear more of my existing wardrobe and cut back on buying more.
I recently found a quote online that felt apt: “The important thing in life is not what you get, but what you throw out”, said Saul Leiter, American painter and photographer. The key, therefore, is not to buy more clothes, but to focus on what you already have. Unless you have no pants, then you must buy them of course.