Cleaning and Decluttering: Project 333

We’re starting from scratch with this year of downshifting. While we’ve made lots of changes in our lives the past few years, our quest to simplify, minimize, do more for ourselves, and spend more time doing things we love started with acknowledging that we knew very little.

So starting our downshift has inevitably meant a lot of reading and asking questions and seeking advice. We’ve been pulling information and projects from all over the place, and putting them to the test in real life – in our work, in our homes, and in our lives. And during that search for downshifting solutions, I came across Project 333.

If you’ve been following along for our first few posts, you’ll know that we kicked off January by seriously minimizing the amount of things we own throughout the house – donating, selling, recycling, or, when necessary, trashing. Our original plan was to box everything away and put them back on the shelves only as we needed them, with a plan of ridding our house of everything that went unused for six months.

The Downshift - Stuff

Once we started looking at all our stuff, we started feeling really good about letting go, making decisions up front. We only put the box system in place in a few places. But we were wrong in thinking we’d made enough decisions of things to cut. Since that initial purge, I’ve continued to find things that can go. The hardest place to make these decisions has been the closet.

Enter Project 333. The basic premise is to whittle your closet down to just 33 items per season – “to create a small collection of clothing for a set amount of time (usually 3 months)”. These 33 items includes clothing, accessories, jewelry, outerwear and shoes, but doesn’t include underwear, wedding rings, or workout clothing (if you use them only for working out).

Downshift

There are many influential, successful, and highly efficient people who swear by a minimalist closet. Barack Obama, Vera Wang, Mark Zuckerberg and Hillary Clinton are just a few who have stated their support for wearing the same thing – or close to the same thing – every day.  

Project 333 is a comprehensive online guide to embracing a minimalist wardrobe. It has lots of example and guides to help inspire and get you started, and a few approaches for an initial purge.  The approach I went with was an inventory approach.

1. Identify the things you love and wear often
2. Make a second pile of things you want to keep for some reason (sentimental attachments, price, etc)
3. Make a third pile of items that don’t fit you or which don’t suit your style
4. Make a final pile of items that are torn or have stains which will not come out

When I purged my closet the first time, I donated a medium sized bag and packed up a large suitcase stuffed with even more items that were maybe to go. And despite all those hard decisions, after taking inventory I found I still had more than 100 items in my closet.

I didn’t get down to 33, but I DID get down to 38 (not including my drawer of running gear and lazy leggings, which are kept in a different area of my room).

Downshift Movement

As per the website’s suggestion, pile 4 went in the trash and pile three was donated. I stored the things I love but which won’t be useful until the summer in a box, then boxed all of pile 2 -the questionable items I want to keep but don’t love (and rarely wear) in a separate box and stored it. I’ll re-evaluate pile 2 and maybe re-add some of those items when building my spring, summer, or fall capsules, but the hope is that the space will help me better evaluate what I own and let go of the things I no longer use.

I also kept a few things that serve more as happy reminders than functional wardrobe, like my oversized fascinator from a family wedding in London this summer, and my first running medal.

Downshift Movement - Minimizing

The Downshift

The point of Project 333 is to build a small capsule wardrobe (of 33 items) that will serve you for three months with the intent of giving you more time (and sanity).  The point is not to only keep 33 things and dump the rest. But since we ARE hoping to reduce the overall amount of stuff in our lives on a more permanent basis, I’m hoping that this particular practice will be a good stepping stone in minimizing my life. Find more minimal wardrobe inspiration on their website: http://theproject333.com/

If you’d like to follow along for our year of downshifting, minimizing, and simplifying, you can sign up for our eNewsletter. We’ll send you a round-up of our new and upcoming projects once a month starting in February: http://eepurl.com/5Vzbj

About the author

Gillian Wesley

Since getting together six years ago, we have given away our television, begun weekly DIY nights, experimented with urban homesteading, challenged ourselves to drive less (100 days car-free in 2013), and have learned more about food security. We have experimented with a range of budgeting strategies, all of which involve consuming less stuff. We buy food with reducing packaging in mind. We got a dog. We have been doing these things for a variety of reasons: financial, social, environmental, to achieve a better work-life balance. It has resulted in us enjoying an increasingly simple and satisfying lifestyle. We’ve been influenced by a lot of people we’ve encountered and things we’ve read about along the way, notably the Transition Movement, the Antigonish Movement, and, more recently, traditional Acadien living. And we’ve learned that we are by no means alone. There are many, many people who are taking steps to downshift their lives. Sign up for our eNewsletter, and we’ll send you a round-up of our new and upcoming projects once a month.