Happy Friday!
It’s spring cleaning season. Whether or not you’ve read The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, Marie Kondo’s phenomenally successful guide to cleaning out superfluous stuff, you are probably familiar with the premise: If an item doesn’t “spark joy,” get rid of it.
That’s fine, but there’s another key to the success of Kondo’s method: Clean by category. Empty your closet, shelves, bins, etc., of all the blouses, books, bowls, or whatever it is you intend to edit and organize, and face them all at once.
Last weekend, I tackled dresses. I emptied my tiny closet of them and was semi-appalled at the mass before me on my bed. Many were too wrinkly to wear, due to squishing, and there were some I’d frankly forgotten about because I couldn’t see them (also, due to squishing).
One by one, I picked up each dress and evaluated its place in my closet, and my life. A strapless floral Laura Ashley frock that was once my mother’s—a veritable joy explosion—was promptly put back in my closet for summer weddings. Other dresses were thanked (a Kondo-ism), and set aside. A spaghetti-strapped Cynthia Rowley gown I’ve worn to countless events over the last 15 years was still in great shape for many more—just not for me.
I only got through dresses, skirts, and jumpsuits, but it was such a satisfying start—and my closet feels so refreshed by that bit of breathing room—that I’m actually looking forward to diving back in for the blouses, jeans, and jackets.
What to do with the discards? Try to approach the bags of clothing produced by such a cleanout as an opportunity, rather than a burden. If you don’t want to deal with reselling your old clothes, just go ahead and donate items that are still wearable, or recycle those that are not. (Racked has a great guide for where to do so in the US.)
Not-quite-designer clothes. If you live in a walking city like New York, you might consider a stoop sale, which can be a fun—and lucrative—way to spend a Saturday. Here in LA, I’ll take a few bags of tired sundresses and such to a local second-hand shop like Buffalo Exchange or Wasteland, where I should get cash or store credit for whatever they’ll take. If you hate the schlepping and fear of rejection that comes with real-life reselling, you might try shipping a bag to ThredUp.
Designer clothes. A pair of barely worn Acne trousers, some mint-condition Rochas wedges… Here it’s a question of whether you’d rather set your own price, or you just want the items off your hands. If you don’t mind taking pictures and creating online listings, try eBay, Vestiaire, Tradesy, or for menswear, Grailed. If you want to outsource that work, try TheRealReal, where the audience is primed for designer shopping, but you’ll have to give up a bit of commission and control.
Don’t forget your friends! That great suede skirt that you just don’t wear? Maybe your best friend, sister, or niece will. Snap a pic and ask if she’s interested. This is the most joy-sparking way, in my opinion, to see clothes get a second life (and lower-maintenance than a full-on clothing swap).
The luxury of clothes worth keeping. The closet clean-out can also bring fresh life to the clothes you hold onto. As Marc Bain recently wrote, in the age of disposable fashion, it’s the things we decide to keep again and again that are the most luxurious. (Marc’s own closet has a one-in-one-out policy, which is a good way to avoid the squishing.)
Marc used the example of jeans made from raw, 100% cotton denim as the ultimate in clothing that improves with age: ”In a year, the raw jeans will likely be better than when you bought them. But cheap, stretchy, pre-distressed pairs will often be best when you first bring them home from the store, and decline from there. When those raw jeans get a hole, you may actually want to patch them up and keep wearing them. When the other jeans start to rip, you’re more likely to toss them and get a new pair.”
Along with the bags for donating and selling, I have a little pile for repairs: a vintage white blouse that needs a new button, a pair of Isabel Marant boots that need to be re-heeled. These pieces are totally repairable, and not easily replaceable. You might say they spark joy.
Pantry porn. “In the year 2018, we’re more interested in where celebrities are storing their toasters than in who they’re sleeping with,” wrote Quartz food reporter Annaliese Griffin who, like much of the internet, found herself affected by a series of photographs of Mandy Moore’s airy, walk-in pantry stocked with labeled bins of snacks, uniform jars of grains, and expensive appliances surrounded by white space.
“The dream of a pantry is all about two things that most of us perpetually wish we had more of—space and time,” wrote Annaliese. “I start to believe that I too can live my best life. All it will require is a few clever IKEA hacks and 20-30 matching containers to store flours, beans, and nuts in.”
In all seriousness, Annaliese does advise reigning in kitchen chaos by categorizing grains, flours, nuts, legumes; baking stuff; and spices/herbs. My visiting mother once alphabetized my spices—yes, alphabetized my spices—and I have to admit it was a game-changer. I haven’t bought a superfluous second jar of coriander seeds since.
Have a great weekend!
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John Mulaney is hosting Saturday Night Live tomorrow. I wasn’t familiar with Mulaney until I saw him live last week at the Comedy Store in LA, but never in my life have I laughed so hard at a human on stage. Mulaney, who has a sort of clean-cut 1950s charm and gave comic genius Cardi B a cardigan for her forthcoming baby on Jimmy Fallon this week, is a six-year veteran of writing for SNL. He also had a short-lived sitcom on Fox, followed by a Netflix standup special and a Broadway show, and just finished a run at Radio City that will be immortalized in another Netflix special in May. Also, David Letterman called him “the future of comedy” at the Kennedy Center last year. So I have a lot of catching up to do—and happily, plenty of material with which to do it, starting with SNL tomorrow night.