Out with the old, in with the new: How to organize your child’s SS19 wardrobe

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A change in the seasons is a perfect, and necessary, opportunity to organize your child’s wardrobe. Children tend to have a vast amount of clothing for all seasons as they outgrow it all so quickly. It is important to declutter in order to create space for new items which will see them through spring and summer. As children do grow so fast, it is more than likely that their winter clothes from this year will not fit them next year; consider keeping investment pieces that could be passed onto siblings but otherwise donate the remaining items to a charity shop. There are various cleaning and organizing strategies out there; the method of the moment is the Kon Mari method – invented by Netflix sensation Marie Kondo. The Kon Mari method focuses on Joy and is organised by subcategories rather than by location. It is great to use this, or another method, as it provides structure for your tidying which prevents you getting distracted or overwhelmed. The Kon Mari method suggests starting your spring clean with clothing.

Declutter

The first step to reorganizing in any situation is to declutter. Marie Kondo advises taking every item out of the wardrobe and placing it on the bed. The next step is to sort through the items and decide what sparks joy for you; make sure to get your child involved as much as possible as it is their wardrobe after all, and it can help teach them valuable organisation skills. If the clothing doesn’t spark joy, don’t keep it. Make sure you separate the items into piles of keep, donate and store. With children’s clothes, you will likely have a vast amount of clothing that does not fit them anymore so only store the items you know they will wear again, or that younger siblings will wear.

Store

Store winter clothing, or clothing to be given to younger siblings, away for the summer to avoid unnecessary clutter. The best and most space effective way to store clothing is to vacuum pack it, you’ll be surprised how much more space this frees up. The best place to store their winter clothing is in a loft or under the bed. This is when it comes in handy to have a bed with integrated storage such as one of the many Children’s beds for sale from Room to Grow do. Cabin beds and trundle beds come with an array of storage options perfect for storing away the winter wardrobe. Make sure to label the vacuum bags, clearly showing who they belong to, what items are in there and even what sizes. This way you won’t have to open and dig through them all when looking for something specific.

Donate

The clothes that no longer fit or no longer bring joy should be donated to charity or to friends. If you know someone in need of winter clothes for next year, you could donate to them or ask local charity shops if they are in need of additional clothing. Try to only discard of items that are damaged as there are various options for donating clothes to those who need them.

Clean

Whilst you have everything out of the wardrobe it is the perfect chance to give it a thorough clean. You may be surprised to find there are a number of things in the wardrobe that were lost or forgotten about. Clean everything out and wipe down the walls and surfaces for a fresh start. It isn’t very often you get chance to clean the inside of the wardrobe, so this is a great opportunity to do so.

Fold

The next step is to fold all of the clothing you are keeping and any new items that you have bought. Marie Kondo recommends folding in a way so that items can be stored vertically; making it so each garment can be easily seen. This method is useful in helping you avoid unnecessary scrambling to find specific items when you are in a rush.

Organize

For hanging items, Marie recommends having the heaviest items, those long in length, dark in colour or thick in fabric, at the left-hand side of your wardrobe. The graduation of dark to light is appealing to both the eyes and mind. Marie also recommends using small boxes such as shoeboxes as dividers for drawers to make the sections more manageable. You could choose to organize by colour or style, this is a personal choice, but it is best to do whatever works for you and your child.

After decluttering and reorganizing you should feel lighter and refreshed, it will make yours and your child’s life much easier and take any stress out of getting dressed each morning as everything will be easily visible and reachable.