I am asked this a lot – how many undies should I own? How many dresses do I keep? How many T shirts can I have?
The answer is, it depends. You only have one body, but there are factors like washing cycle, seasons and variations on use that come into play.
Some people wear jeans and a T shirt every day as part of their life uniform, and others prefer a more feminine or corporate look for the office. Personally I don’t go near T shirts for more than half the year because Melbourne winters don’t really warrant them.
How many T shirts? Washing
Do you do a daily load of washing and then tumble dry immediately, meaning a super-fast turnaround?
Or do you haul everything to the laundromat twice a month and hang it all on drying racks inside?
Most of us are somewhere in between. If your maximum laundry turnaround is one week and you wear a T shirt every day, you’ll need seven T shirts plus one so that you won’t be naked on laundry day. Easy!
How many T shirts? Extras
But for a frequent wearer eight T shirts is a bit miserly. Don’t forget one for painting, one for washing the dog, one for dying your hair and two for gardening. Actually these can all be the same T shirt. So nine then.
And that doesn’t count active wear, which is a separate category.
How many T shirts? Audit
However most of us don’t wear a T shirt every day. It depends on your lifestyle and preferences. If you feel like going down a deep rabbit hole of assessing your entire clothing stash, have a think about whether your wardrobe reflects your life.
Like anything, if you haven’t worn it in six months or a year, it’s probably superfluous. Except of course, those sacred band T shirts which you only wear to see that band. Even with that in mind, it may be time to re-evaluate your tees and discard the duds.
How many T shirts? Organise
Like anything, keep them all in one spot so you can find what you want. Organise by season and/or colour for ease of retrieval.
How many T shirts? Upcycle
T shirts actually make pretty good rags. The fine fabric is ideal for polishing glass and cleaning detailed equipment like your bicycle and inside the car – anything really!
There are several ways you can make a T shirt into a tote bag, more info here. Unfortunately if you’re anything like me you have way too many tote bags though. So this may just waste time and shift your T shirt clutter into a different cupboard.
T shirts can be super sentimental. A quilt made from all your faves that you no longer wear, is a great keepsake idea. Beware that this may fall into the aspirational clutter category though.
How many T shirts? Refuse
Truth is, most of us do have too many T shirts and sometimes freebies are to blame. You do a fun run, a team-building exercise for work, a volunteer gig manning a stall. The resultant T shirt might seem like a good idea at the time, but Australians send an average 23kgs of textiles to landfill per person, each year. It’s OK to say no. Alongside Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle, there is a fourth ‘R’: refuse.
When we start saying no to all the freebie merchandise we don’t really want, we vote for the wardrobe we want to use, and the environment we want to protect. More clothes decluttering hacks here.
If you want a concise guide to a curated wardrobe, check this out. If you need hands-on assistance organising your T shirts and clothes, reach out and get in touch.
