How to Build a Versatile Minimalist Wardrobe

Whether you’re dressing up for a big event or a day at work, we bet you find yourself dreading what to wear. Despite having an overflowing wardrobe, you may find yourself thinking I’ve nothing to wear.

Well, we’ve put together this guide so that you can bid farewell to such helpless situations. In this blog post, we’ll guide you on how to build a super versatile and minimalist wardrobe so you can dress for any occasion within minutes!

Step 1: Consider the Range of Your Activities

Your wardrobe should be based more on what you need than what you want. And to determine your needs, it’s important to consider the range of activities you engage in every day. Study your schedule and list down the:

Places you frequently visit
Duration of your visits to each place
Your purpose for the visits

It’s important to be as specific about your activities as possible. Doing so will help you plan a wardrobe that works for everything. Also, no activity should be considered “minor” and left out.

When you have the list of places you visit, you’ll be able to determine which of the following four attire types you need the most:

Casual
Partywear
Semi-formal
Formal

Knowing the purpose of your visit and the time you spend at each place will help you determine the right colors, fabrics, shoes, and accessories to wear. With the help of this data, you can work out the perfect outfit formulas for yourself (more on this later).

Let’s consider an example to understand how you can use the data you collect. Say you’re a college student. As a student, you might be balancing academics, part-time work, sports, and social events.

The places you visit frequently may include university, office, gym, and parties. Your university and office will occupy most of your day, and you’ll require semi-formal clothes for these places. On the other hand, gym and social events will occupy an hour or two each day. You’ll want to buy casual, comfortable, and cool clothes for these places.

In this case, it’s a good idea to buy more formal/semi-formal clothes than casual wear. You might want to check out Maple for an example of a diverse collection of clothes.

Step 2: Sort Out Your Current Wardrobe

Now that you have an idea of your needs, it’s time to evaluate your current wardrobe. And in this step, you’re going to declutter and say a lot of goodbyes. So it’s going to be a bit heavy on your heart.

Nonetheless, browse through all that you own and separate worn-out clothes. These may include faded, torn, overused, stained, and ripped clothes. At this point, it’s important not to get carried away by any memories attached to your clothes or creative wardrobe recycling ideas that may pop up in your mind. Remember, a minimalist wardrobe demands intensive decluttering.

From the remaining stuff, consider your clothes, shoes, and accessories one by one and ask yourself if you can wear them at this very point in time. You may base your decisions on:

Your current styling preferences
Your everyday needs (according to step 1 above)
Potential uses in the upcoming days

If your answer is no for a particular item, separate it out as well. Do not hold back stuff simply because it still fits. Or because it may come in handy in a super rare situation. Once you’re done with this analysis, get rid of all the clothes and accessories you separated out.

Step 3: Settle for a Color Palette

Here comes the exciting part of setting up a minimalist and versatile wardrobe, i.e., visualizing a new you.

Consider the remaining pile of your clothes and the shades you genuinely like. Based on these two factors, pick 8-9 colors that fall in harmony with one another. Out of these colors, three should be your primary colors, 3-4 should be accent colors, and at least 1-2 should be neutral shades. You can read more about picking the right color palette for your wardrobe here.

Tip: Neutral colors are the key to versatility. Focus more on your neutral shades in step 4!

Deciding a color palette will bring a new personality to your wardrobe and cut down your shopping and dressing struggles by half.

Step 4: Shop for Outfit Formulas

It’s time to get to the real work. First, decide the total number of pieces you want in your minimalist wardrobe. Ideally, a capsule wardrobe comprises 30-50 clothing items. But there are no hard and fast rules — it depends on your needs and budget.

Now, consider outfit formulas that suit your taste and needs. Some universally chic outfit formulas are:

Leather Jacket + T-shirt + Jeans + Boots
Long Skirt + Fitted Shirt + High Heels
Sweatshirt + Blazer + Jeans + Sandals or Shoes
Wide-legged pants + T-shirt + Heels
T-shirt + Jeans + Jacket + Sneakers

Here are two helpful guides for brainstorming and coming up with your own custom outfit formulas:

Your outfit formulas should be based on your needs, taste, comfort, and looks. Focus on creating formulas that work for more than three scenarios at least. In this way, you can make the most of your minimalist wardrobe and enjoy a truly versatile collection.