Creating wardrobe clusters - clusters 1 and 2

This is the post that I promised you yesterday. The best place to start reading about this concept is on Janice's blog: The Vivienne Files. I love her idea of enjoying some wine while you clear out your wardrobe, but if you're a red wine drinker like me it could end up in tears, with red wine spilt on your favourite dress. Better to wait until you've finished and reward yourself with a celebratory drink!

Janice also posted about her helpful Wardrobe Cluster form, which she has kindly offered to email to anyone else who would like to use it. Click on the above link to Janice's blog for details on how to contact her.

Please note that there is a final column for outerwear, however I have hidden it here as the font would have been so small that I - for one - wouldn't have been able to read it! Janice didn't have any problems with her form so make sure you take a look at her example too. In case you are curious, my outerwear consisted of an indigo down jacket, a black and white wool coat and a navy trench-coat, all of which can be worn with every cluster listed below.

I started with one of my favourite items of clothing: dark navy jeans anyone? I then pulled out of my wardrobe some of the tops that I like to wear with these jeans and finally I selected some accessories to complete the outfits. If I was going away for a casual weekend I could begin by packing the garments in Cluster 1, throw in a scarf and couple of pieces of jewellery from the next two columns and then choose a pair of shoes and a bag from the final column.

Cluster 2 is a bit smarter than Cluster 1 and would be ideal for a city break, with the addition of a skirt or a dress for dining out. I have plenty of tops that I can wear with my charcoal trousers, so this Cluster also works well. I don't have a huge wardrobe so you will notice a bit of repetition with the accessories, but I still have lots of options.

Hopefully by now you will have spotted the cunning plan behind this method of sorting out your wardrobe. If you select a skirt or pair of trousers and can't find any other items to form a cluster with it, you will have identified a wardrobe orphan and will know why you never wear that piece of clothing! With luck you will also discover that many of your favourite pieces are ideal as garments to form the basis of different clusters and you may even find several new outfits without the need to hit the January sales.

The Vivienne Files Cluster Collector
	garments	soft accessories	jewellery	leather goods
Cluster 1	Dark navy jeans	Blue fantasy scarf set	Gold link choker	Navy loafers
	Green and navy striped top	Shades of blue wool scarf	Turquoise necklace	Green laced shoes
	Red and navy striped top		Green ring
	Navy and white striped top	Rose River cotton tote		Grey and navy satchel
	Green cashmere cardigan			Green satchel
	garments	soft accessories	jewellery	leather goods
Cluster 2	Charcoal straight trousers	Blue fantasy scarf set	Gold necklace	Navy loafers
	Purple long sleeved top	Pink wool scarf	Silver link necklace	Grey short boots
	Blue long sleeved top		Blue bead necklace
	Fuchsia short-sleeved top		Silver ring	Grey and navy satchel
	Lobelia long sleeved top			Green satchel
	Silver grey cascade cardigan	Rose River cotton tote
	garments	soft accessories	jewellery	leather goods
Cluster 3	Black jeans	Blue fantasy scarf set	Gold link collar	Green laced shoes
	Green long sleeved top	Black wool scarf	Silver flower pendant	Black low heeled shoes
	Raspberry short-sleeved top	Picasso print scarf	Black and silver choker
	Pink long sleeved top		Gold bracelet	Grey and navy satchel
	Black cardigan	Rose River cotton tote		Green satchel
	garments	soft accessories	jewellery	leather goods
Cluster 4	Grey pencil skirt	Blue fantasy scarf set	Silver tear necklace	Black shoe boots
	Red jumper	Black and white zebra scarf	Pearl double strand necklace	Black low heeled shoes
	Purple, black and grey top	Grey animal print wool scarf	Red watch
	Navy peplum top			Grey and navy satchel
	Grey cardigan	Rose River cotton tote		Green satchel

These photos show you some of the items in my Cluster 1:

Below you can see some items from my Cluster 2:

The scarf shown has made four appearances as it's so versatile. It's actually two scarves - one in shades of blue and the other in green and purple - and they can be worn together or separately. Talking about versatility, I could easily have swapped some of the tops in cluster 1 with some of the ones in cluster 2. 

Now it's your turn: select four of your favourite items of clothing and create four clusters around them. Keep these in a separate part of your wardrobe so you know you can grab anything from a particular cluster and have an outfit that looks good on you and that you enjoy wearing. I only wish that I'd known about this idea in my many years of working full-time with three growing children: it would have prevented a lot of early morning stress!