wardrobe challenge: six items or less

Last month, I opted to undertake a 'Six Items or Less' challenge. This was part of my minimalism pledge and I feel it was quite a success. I will explain why as this post goes on.

So to recap, here were my six items (well, five in the picture):

Five of the six items. The last item is a coat - originally, I had chosen an Aquascutum mac but because of the adverse weather, I changed that item to a Whistles wool coat. This meant I still stuck to the 'six items or less' rule :)

The hardest part of this challenge is being creative with the daily outfits. Six items can only mean that the combinations of outfits are less than if there were ten items, for example (mathematics can explain this quite easily). This meant that one had to be dedicated and also learn and develop the art of perseverance. Nothing in life is easy (everyone says this, and I'm pretty sure we can agree that this is true) which is exactly why this is called a 'challenge'.

Also, another problem is that you can get bored easily with such a limited number of garments. However, using the creative side of your brain can help you even if you're more of a scientific person (like I am). Even within science, creativity and the ability to think in different ways can be beneficial but enough of that and back to the topic in hand.

With this challenge a success, I have found it has helped with my new urge to be minimalistic. It has reinforced the need for me to downsize my wardrobe and sell some items on eBay this summer. And it has also taught me that I can live on fewer items too. I'm quite bad in that I love all of my clothes but I don't wear nearly half (at a guestimate).

How my wardrobe looked in my old house... and I hope it won't look after a good declutter; as a direct result of this challenge!

As a result, I believe that this challenge will help me declutter. The positives I have taken from this challenge are:

- that although it is good to have a lot of choice, a smaller number of items equates to less time wasted choosing outfits each morning and;

- that the 80/20 principle might actually be true and maybe I should apply it to my wardrobe! Something that can be related to being a minimalist too, I guess.

I have to admit that this challenge was hard. Laundry had to be done more often and I only chose one cardigan so that made my outfits a bit more boring than I would have liked. On the other hand, the positives I have taken from it has only spurred me on to get rid of more items. A massive sale is next on my list and with me being on a 'no clothes shopping' ban this year, my wardrobe size will surely have reduced dramatically in size in a few months' time.

If you have a similar problem to me - too many clothes, etc - then this challenge would be ideal for you. My advice would be to do it in the summer so that a coat doesn't take up one of the items and possibly expand it to ten items if you think six is too few, and then maybe go down to six the next month.

How do you think you'd fare if you had to do this challenge? Or have you done one already? If so, how did you find it?

wardrobe challenge: a success!

My wardrobe challenge was a success as I did not break any of the rules I set myself (I altered the rules slightly from the actual challenge but still kept the number of pieces at a minium).

But before I talk about the wardrobe challenge, I must first apologise for a lack of blogging in the past week. I had a deadline on Friday the 18th for three (yes, three) pieces of coursework and was busy doing that as unfortunately, in the two weeks previous to that, I had been busy with applying for internships, preparing for assessment tests along with good old netball.

As proof, this was my week before it started:

And my week after it had ended:

Next, this was the past week - also a busy one!

Onto the outfits now! For those not interested in fashion or what I wore, you can stop reading now. The rest of the post is image heavy! Don't say I didn't warn you.

This was the Monday. The Dahlia playsuit and French Connection boots.

And a close up of the print and the buttons on the top half - love it!

Next, Tuesday's outfit: Whistles blazer, Sparkle and Fade top, Whistles skirt and Topshop boots.

Close up of the necklace I chose to accessorize this outfit with. The necklace is from FCUK about two seasons ago now.

And Wednesday's outfit: Topshop blouse, ASOS cardigan, Benetton skirt and Aldo shoes.

Unfortunately, I have no pictures for Thursday and Friday. Thursday because I had to change my outfit accordingly for an assessment test at some posh offices in London. I stuck to my list of items for the wardrobe challenge though! And for Friday, I took the train home from college so I didn't have time to snap an outfit as I literally crawled into bed as soon as I got home. It had been a bad week in terms of sleep!

Finally, I must apologise for my image editing skills! They leave a lot to be desired and I'm fairly rusty too, clearly! Anyway, more blogging to come as no more deadlines for another month or so!

wardrobe challenge: the pieces

So here are my pieces for the Wardrobe Challenge (see here for the first time I mentioned it). As it's only for seven days, I've only included shoes in my 'five accessories' section.

1) ASOS Men's cardigan (my sister's, but we traded some items from each of our wardrobes!)
2) Grey Benetton skirt. I've had this skirt for almost four years now and I've worn it so many times!
3) Sparkle and Fade at Urban Outfitters pleated front top (sister's)
4) Topshop oatmeal sweatshirt (sister's)
5) H&M oatmeal cardigan (years old!)
6) Topshop blouse (years old!)
7) Whistles silk skirt (Christmas present)
8) Primark jeans (I don't wear jeans often enough to justify splashing out more than a tenner on a pair of jeans! They are also years old!)
9) Dahlia playsuit (Christmas present)
10) Whistles camel wool coat (Birthday present)

And now, the five accessories which are shoes.

1) Chestnut Ugg Australia boots (over a year old)
2) Aldo flat leather pumps (gift)
3) Topshop leather boots (years old)
4) Topshop vintage style leather boots (years old)
5) French Connection UK leather boots (gift - and a bargain, reduced to 31.50 from 180GBP!)

Stay tuned to see how I will arrange these items of clothing into an outfit! (Also, socks, tights, underwear and the like don't count. I also haven't included my netball match day and training kit as that would just be stupid as I don't wear those items of clothing outside of netball anyway! And also, my Longchamp bag isn't included as that's the only bag I use nowadays anyway.) The challenge starts tomorrow so, on your marks, get set...go!

a busy two weeks for my filofax!

First and foremost, I must apologise for a lack of posting recently. I've been so busy with everything! Last weekend was my first weekend where I had absolutely nothing to do and I made the most of it. It was my friend's birthday on the Sunday so Friday and Saturday was taken up by preparing surprises for him. Monday was back to normal - netball match that night, then a normal week of lectures as the new module started, and the same this week - except I have Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday off with practicals all day on Thursday and Friday. This means that I have had to plan what to do in these few days; mainly to ensure that I don't waste all this time off.

Consequently, it means that I get to spend a lot of time with my Filofax! I plan what I am going to do that day with the aid of tick-boxes and with a 'to-do list' sheet in the middle of the week. The list is transferred to the next week if it is not filled, and so on, so as not to waste expensive refill paper (cotton cream as well!).

And now, on a completely unrelated note, I'd just thought I'd let you all know that I'm going to do a wardrobe challenge for the week beginning the 14th of Feb. It is mainly inspired by this post at Make Do Style. The aim of it is to choose ten items of clothing and five accessories to take me through the week. It is similar to the Six Items or Less Challenge I did last year, but I'm hoping this one will be less boring and repetitive as ten items and five accessories would make for much more interesting outfits! This challenge would also require me to use my Filofax - and I have already decided to write down what I will wear each day in my diary. I may also take pictures if I get the time! Once I've decided on these items, I will take pictures of each of these items and maybe post them on here if I remember. However, I am really quite a busy at the moment (aren't we all, new year and all that) but I will try my best to blog at least once a week (and I promise you, more pictures in the next post).

my own six items or less challenge

So, on the 11th of August, I undertook my own six items or less challenge. I didn't follow the dates that the official wordpress blog used and just did it to my own agenda as I know that if I tried to do it in September, I don't have the time to 'remember' that I am on this challenge!

Well, basically, I managed to succeed! I picked six items from my wardrobe:

• A Traffic People dress (for the young adult in me)
• A pair of mink coloured tapered trousers from Topshop
• A Topshop striped breton style capped sleeve tee shirt
• A Uniqlo mink coloured A line skirt
• A sheer cream silk blouse
• A pair of jeans from H&M

I kinda cheated a little in that I didn't count a camisole which I wore under the silk blouse - but I had to for decency's sake. If I hadn't worn the camisole under the blouse, I would have been arrested for indecent exposure!

I found that instead of resorting to my usual 'throw on a random dress' attitude (that's how many dresses I have...), I found myself reinventing ways I could wear the six items I had chosen. For example, the sole dress I chose could have been tucked into the skirt; the silk blouse could be tucked into the tapered trousers or it could have been worn as is with the jeans... There were different options for me to choose from, and these different options were enough for me to not have to recycle the same outfit over and over!

All in all, this challenge has been good for my wardrobe and for my own creativity. Usually, I open my wardrobe and say 'Argh, I have nothing to wear' but now, knowing that I managed to live a month with only six items, I know that the phrase no longer stands. This challenge has also allowed me to consider what clothes I really love and need to keep, instead of 'oh I should keep this, just in case'. In case of what? Most of these in case scenarios rarely, if ever, arise so now I have a good idea of what to go and list on eBay!