Capsule Wardrobe

Have you heard of a capsule wardrobe? It's an idea that's all over Pinterest if you've looked recently! Basically the idea is, you only have about 30 items of clothing total, but they are all able to mix and match with each other to create hundreds of different looks.

A lot of the capsule wardrobes I had seen before looked something like this:

Very cute and classic, a lot of black and white and basic pieces. That is awesome for keeping things versatile and able to mix and match, but I knew I would never own a wardrobe like this. It's just not my style. Almost everything I own has a print or a bright color, and that's just what I gravitate toward in the store.

My friend Amy and I are ALWAYS chatting about clothes, and she happened to mention this idea for a colorful capsule wardrobe she had seen over at Studio DIY. Oh ok, I thought...maybe this is something I can do! This is a VERY bright and happy way to do it!

So this got my wheels turning. I decided to pick a color scheme (like they did at Studio DIY). It's just starting to be fall weather out, and the trend for fall seems to be jewel tones. Plus I find jewel tones to be most flattering on me anyway. Here's an example of jewel tones:

I wanted to keep my color palette broad enough for me to not feel bored, but small enough for me to still be able to interchange pieces. I also knew I needed to add more mixable separates in my closet, not just full length dresses.

So I did some organizing of my closet. I sold a bunch of things that didn't go with the flow, kept the things that did, and bought a few new pieces with the money I made from selling old clothes. I probably have 30-40 items now (dresses,shirts, skirts,shoes,scarves,etc) that all can flow together. I wanted to show you guys those items, but I quickly realized, if I showed all the outfits I could make with my whole closet, it would take me FOREVER. Seriously.


So instead of showing you my entire wardrobe, I decided to take 13 separate pieces and turn them into as many outfits as I could. Even with only 13 pieces, at one point I thought "this is taking so long!! The possibilities are endless!" When was the last time your closet felt like it was full of endless possibilities?



A few notes:

-I didn't use any shoes in this post. For two reasons: It was hard to get shoes in the shot with the DIY tripod I used (a recycled toilet paper roll). And also because just changing outfits this many times took quite awhile. Putting on and taking off shoes and boots would've taken me even longer.

-I used 4 shirts, 2 dresses, 1 jacket, 3 skirts, 2 scarves, and 1 pair of jeans to make these ensembles. I accidentally repeated 1 outfit because I'm not a very organized person. Sorry, I didn't notice it until I'd spliced all the pictures together. And there's just no going back now!!

-You may be able to see an Arthur doll on top of my closet in the background. Don't worry about it.

 So here is just the beginning of what you can do with 13 pieces of clothing in your fall wardrobe!

 

I'm convinced that if I had kept going (and had been writing things down so as not to repeat outfits) I could've assembled a full month's worth of outfits, where I would not repeat an entire outfit once. And like I told you, I have about twice as much clothing as what you're seeing here. Imagine how many outfits I could make with all of that!

I hope you feel inspired to start your own capsule wardrobe! All of this stuff was pretty inexpensive, and I'd be happy to tell you where I got things if you're interested! But if you do make a capsule wardrobe, chances are it will look completely different from mine.... and that's the idea!