Questioning minimalist wardrobes and in a fashion rut... again.

Earlier this week I had an epiphany moment.  I am a LAZY creature of comfort and as a result my favourite pieces are falling apart and I need to change this because it does not make me happy.

Get me into a dress which I feel comfortable in, and although it may not be the most flattering of dresses, you will not be able to get me out of it - until it tears!  Yes, that's right, earlier this week I found myself in the ladies loos (rest rooms) at work armed with a roll of packing tape and some scissors fixing my dress which I had worn to death.  This came only weeks after I retired my favourite black silk dress after the tearing under the arms got so bad that I could no longer lift my arms without looking homeless...

One would think that I own only two dresses... and it seems that people do because the moment I wear something different I get asked "Oooh, is that new?" (and it probably is, but then I don't wear it again for ages, since I'm in favour of my dresses).

Recently not a week has gone by that I haven't worn one of the following dresses on at least 2 weekdays (funnily the same dresses which I wore last Winter):

From left to right: Country Road, Adam, Country Road, Country Road.

In the image above, I have included both retired dresses - the Country Road animal print dress dress (any ideas what I could do with the fabric?) and the Country Road black silk dress which incidentally I have managed to replace (thank you eBay).  This replacement will be saved for occasional dressing as the fabric is too delicate to wear on an everyday basis.

I know that it's a good thing that I now literally wear out my clothing (how it should be I think?), but I can't help but feel sad when I do given I have so many other things in my wardrobe which could be rotated around to prevent my favourites from wearing out.

It has made me wonder again how some of the women who follow the "minimalist wardrobe" method of dressing manage it?  Is it possible that they are all Law students with only 9 university contact hours hence most of the time they are just sitting around studying at home or in the library in their James Perse trackie dacks? (For my overseas readers 'trackie dacks' is what we Aussies affectionately call track suit pants).

I don't care how expensive an item is, if you wear it constantly it will fall apart.  Blazers will develop a shine from multiple dry cleanings, cotton breton tops will eventually look manky (especially under the underarms from deodorant) and a delicate silk item will likely develop seam slippage if you wear it normally. That is move around in it typing, carrying files and what not...

I'm sad that my favourites are gone, but the reality is that if you wear things, they wear out.  In actual fact I think that I'm just surprised.  Until recently I never wore anything out.  I would buy a heap of clothing, only wear it once or twice and then forget about it as I bought the next thing.  When I was a younger party animal, you would not catch me dead wearing the same thing in the company of the same friends.  Then Facebook came along and the has-this-been-photographed-on-Facebook test was born before getting dressed to go out.  Haha... those were the days.

My aim for this coming work week is not wear any of the above dresses (granted I can't wear the animal print one anyway as it's torn).  This is my way of injecting some impulse into my life.  Can I do it I wonder?  I might even need to plan my outfits for this week!