Sunday 14 October 2012

The spring clean continues - or, a relatively fun project for a rainy day.

It really is that time of year - it's such a cliche, but I seriously cannot stop going through my life and throwing things out. Mostly objects and clothes, but hey, there's probably some bad habits that I could get rid of as well...ba-doom ching.

My most recent spring clean venture was more like two projects in one. I was standing in front of my wardrobe the other day, trying to decide what to wear to work, and having one of those classic and ridiculous "I have nothing to wear! Nothing!" moments. I was laughing at myself at the same time of course, as it is patently untrue.

So I decided to do something about it. I would enlist the help of my old friend "Nudey Judy" and hold a little self-styling session, cleaning my wardrobe out at the same time. The idea was to take photos of all my workplace-appropriate ensemble options and store them on my laptop, to prevent the aforementioned "what the hell am I going to wear" moments from reoccurring. Also, this is the kind of thing I find quite fun. What can I say?

Meet Nudey Judy! I can't take credit for the name sadly, she belongs to Georgia.


What you'll need:

1. An empty afternoon
2. Some tunes. (I decided Taylor Swift was the most appropriate music to listen to for this project. I know, right? Incredibly surprising. You're shocked, I can tell.) 
3. A spirit of ruthlessness and absolute honesty.
4. I highly recommend getting your hands on some kind of mannequin or dressmakers dummy if possible. 
5. Pegs - it helps to make the clothes fit the dummy as well as possible, so they don't fall off mid-photo.

I started with dresses, then moved onto blouses and skirts, and I think my system worked out pretty well. I'd dress Nudey Judy in a blouse and then put together as many ensembles as I could think of with that blouse. I'm not going to lie, by the time I'd been styling for a couple of  hours I was pretty over it and I got less and less creative towards the end. Here's a couple of examples of my afternoon's work...





The photos are kind of crappy, but that wasn't really the point. All in all I feel like it was a worthwhile endeavour.  I got rid of a whole pile of clothes that I know I'm never going to wear, but I'd been hanging on to them for too long because I'd forgotten they didn't quite fit, or were uncomfortable, or just don't suit me. Clothes that I had been conveniently ignoring that I don't like wearing, and kidding myself I'd drag out of the back of the wardrobe someday. The great thing is, it's made me far more aware of what clothes I own that I DO like wearing, and that can be worn to work. According to my wardrobe I have a penchant for clothing that is slightly 1940s-ish or makes me look like an art teacher circa 1974. But a cool art teacher, I hope. I'm also pretty crap at accessorising. I'm lazy - mostly I just can't be bothered, and doing this little project made me actually think and put energy into dressing for work more creatively. Well, a little bit anyway.






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