What a wardrobe inventory is and why you want one

One of my favorite  personal style tools is a wardrobe inventory. But since wardrobe inventories aren’t often talked about, it might be helpful to dig into what a wardrobe inventory is. 

Simply put, a wardrobe inventory is an inventory of your wardrobe. 

But just like a capsule wardrobe is more than just “a small wardrobe” a wardrobe inventory is more than just “a list of your clothes.” 

It is a personal style tool for getting a bird’s eye view of your closet. It helps you look at your wardrobe as a whole rather than focusing on specific outfits or pieces of clothing. To mix metaphors, it gives you a look at the forest instead of focusing on the trees.

Seeing the bigger picture.

Why would you want a wardrobe inventory?

Building a wardrobe you love and that you always feel confident in is about looking at the whole picture. If you have a couple outfits you feel amazing in plus a bunch of clutter you never wear, you’re getting a skewed sense of your options, and will probably end up with nothing to wear syndrome. 

By necessity, when we’re getting dressed each morning we’re only thinking about a small handful of options – we can’t wear our whole closet to work every day. 

But creating your dream wardrobe requires zooming out.

The process of inventorying your closet gives you time and space to sift through the clothes you own and clearly distinguish your much beloved clothes from your “shoulds”, “if-onlys” and other faux-options. 

Making your inventory work for you.

One of the keys to making any tool work for you, but especially something as flexible as an inventory and as personal as your personal style, is customizing it to fit your wants and needs. 

It would be easy to tell you to copy my inventory column for column. But that would be disingenuous. You’re too unique for that. Your wardrobe isn’t an exact replica of mind, and what I emphasize may not be what you want to emphasize in yours. 

Most wardrobe inventories don’t have a self-made wardrobe challenge to track and may not care about keeping track of mends or alterations. But you will have elements of your inventory that are unique to you. 

That’s why The Wardrobe Inventory Workbook walks you through my favorite inventory building process. It doesn’t give you my inventory to copy. 

The wardrobe inventory process

The process I use for inventorying your closet is four straightforward steps to creating clarity in your closet. 

1. Decide what areas you want to use your inventory to tackle. 
2. Nail down how you want to build your inventory to work best for you. (What format to use, what to include, what to exclude, etc.)
3. Inventory your current clothes using the decisions and guidance you found in Steps 1 and 2. 
4. Keep your inventory up to date. (Don’t worry, I included some tips for that.) 

If you’re ready to zoom out and bring some clarity to your closet, the time might be right to build your own wardrobe inventory. Pick up The Wardrobe Inventory Workbook right here, and I’ll walk you through the whole process. 

Or keep reading: 

• How to inventory your closet: building my simple wardrobe inventory
• Complete your closet inventory in no time: 3 techniques