I have been recently fascinated with the idea of cutting down the amount of possessions that I have and one of the simplest ways to do this seemed to be the idea of having a 'capsule wardrobe', which is about maximising the number of outfits one gets from a minimal number of items. It seemed like an easier, cheaper and more space-saving way of solving the age-old "I have nothing to wear" refrain in my head...for about five seconds.
The trouble is, a capsule wardrobe simply does not work for my lifestyle. After doing my microbiology job in London, I got even more paranoid about bringing my transient carriage of hospital bacteria (inevitable when one works with patients) back into my home environment and particularly squicked by the amount of pseudomonas around. What this means practically is that I like to shed clothes and shower as soon as I get home, and I am not usually keen on letting any item of clothing back into my wardrobe or drawers until it's been through the washing machine. Often I will only wear clothes for one, maybe two days before washing - when you have been wearing the same clothes for 14 hours + and haven't exactly been sitting in a nice cool air-conditioned room the entire time they can get pretty gross. Couple this with 12-day stretches where the last thing you feel like doing or have the time to do is laundry every two days...and you really need 2 weeks' worth of underwear, socks, and work outfits, plus on your days off you don't really want to wear 'work clothes' if you can help it...and I'm pretty sure that as comfortable as my onesie is, it's not really appropriate outside clothes.
So really, what I'm trying to do is justify the large amount of clothing that I have, even if it does mean that everywhere I live needs at least a double wardrobe to accommodate the stuff that I have.
