I can’t decide if I’m a maximalist or a minimalist. On one hand I wear the same things on a weekly basis, on the other hand I do indulge in items that just call out to me when I’m shopping. Your girl has gone ham with shopping for fall styles, and now it’s time to organize it all. To get our fashion ish together, I’ve enlisted the help of Jai from The Fat and Skinny on Fashion aka TFAS to share her tips on creating a capsule wardrobe just in time for fall. Please follow her blog and show some love #womenempowerwomen and enjoy the minimalist knowledge below.
Today is the first day of a series of blog posts that will help you clean out your closet, and organize your wardrobe, annnddd hopefully your life. As a fashion stylist, closet cleaner, and professional wardrobe consultant, one of the things that I have to do is help people maximize their wardrobe by teaching my clients how to shop their closets. I also help them minimize their wardrobe by cleaning out the excess, and helping them to build their wardrobe into a cool capsule collection.
A capsule collection is a small group of pieces that you base your wardrobe around each season. It helps to cut back on excess, it makes things easier, and it helps you save money in the end. My girl Tiffany, from Tiffany Marie Tucker is a master at building a capsule collection. She has a ton of examples of her own personal capsule collection on her blog. Annnnddd because I love you all, I created a minimal fall wardrobe checklist for you all to follow and use as your guide. Click the pictures below for your free wardrobe checklist. Also if you sign up for my newsletter, you will get my all season wardrobe checklist-which is slightly different from the fall version below.
A minimal wardrobe containing thirty to forty pieces maximizes creativity and forces you to clearly define your style. It also makes dressing easier, reduces the amount of time spent browsing and shopping while freeing up money to pay off debts and experience more. Below are a few tips to help you create your first capsule wardrobe.
- Don’t Throw Everything Out: What scares people most about capsule wardrobes is getting rid of nearly all the clothing they own, but you don’t have to do this. When first experimenting with a capsule wardrobe pack any excess clothes away. If you like the concept, then start getting rid of things.
- Start Small: A capsule wardrobe is typically thirty to forty pieces (more or less depending on your preference). Many tend to purchase the “perfect” items to fill every single slot. Instead of purchasing new pieces for your first capsule, fill your closet with your own clothes first and leave any available spaces empty. As you work with your new shrunken wardrobe take note of what pieces might make getting dressed even easier. Then fill those empty spaces with a few well-planned, quality purchases.
- Focus on Fit and Quality: The typical mantra of most capsule wardrobe proponents is to buy high quality garments that fit well. These items cost more, but with frequent wear won’t give out in a season or two like their fast fashion counterparts. This leads to fewer new garments purchased in the long run. Unfortunately, most plus size lines subscribe to the fast fashion model of low quality, cheap garments. To subvert this, shop at indie brands like Jibri or NakiMuli and thrift stores.
- Make Changes: Starting and ending the season with the same thirty to forty pieces is ideal but not reality. During the season you may find that some pieces just don’t work as well as you’d hoped or aren’t weather appropriate. Whatever the reason, the purpose of a capsule wardrobe is to make your life easier, not constrict you needlessly. So make changes throughout the season as feel you need to.
For full details on how to create a capsule check out this guide on Tiffanymarietucker.com.
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