Day 12 – Decluttering Scarves, Belts & Accessories

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Originally published January 12, 2016 and updated January 2018 and 2024.

It’s Day 12 of the 31 Days of 10-minute Decluttering Tips Challenge.  Today we’ll be going through scarves, belts and accessories to find what we want to keep and which items we can purge. Our goal is to clear clutter we don’t need from our lives and home so that we can better enjoy life (and make more room in our closets and drawers). 

It’s easy to accumulate clothing accessories. You tell yourself that they really don’t take up that much room or you never know when they’ll come back into style or they’d go perfectly with a certain outfit if… Plus, because accessories seem insignificant, we just never seem to get around to purging them and organizing them. Well, today’s the day. Let’s jump into purging our scarves, belts and accessories. 

Grab the 6 purging bags you created earlier and the free Purging Clutter Checklist.  Figure out where the best spot is to go through your accessories. Would it be easier to bring them to your kitchen table or would it be easier to sort through them in your bedroom where the accessories are probably located?

Decluttering Tips for Scarves, Belts and Accessories

Take Everything Out- Lay the items you take out on a table, bed or the floor. You may have accessories scattered in several different drawers and boxes in your closet or even through out the house. Be thorough and pull out all of your accessories. Keep in mind we’re doing this in 10 minutes. It may make sense for you to concentrate on one category of accessories today. You can come back to the other items another time you have 10 minutes. 

Group Like Items Together – Quickly group like items together. I tend to sort by color (in Roy G. Biv order, of course), but choose to sort your items in a way that makes sense to you. Instead of sorting by color, maybe summer scarves and winter scarves make sense to you, maybe square versus rectangular scarves make sense. Use whatever categories work for you, but break the mass down into smaller categories so that you can make decisions easier.

Evaluate – Look at each group you’ve created. Are there any items that are torn or broken? Are there any items that no longer fit? Are there items that no longer match your fashion style or life style? When I left the office workforce to become a stay-at-home mom, I no longer needed so many formal scarves and belts, so those were obvious items that could be purged. If you have jewelry items that are sentimental, pack those away as a keepsake. Purging clothing accessories are one area where I’m fine with you keeping items (within reason) that you love but are not currently in style. If you still love the item, pack it away because it will come back in style at some point. I have lapel pins from the 50’s and my grandmother that I wore in the 80’s as a teen. I also have costume jewelry necklaces and belts that my mother wore in the 60’s and 70’s that I wore in the 80’s and 90’s and still wear on occasion. But only keep out-of-style items if you really love them. There are plenty of out-of-style items that are simply out-of-style and those need to go. 

Purge – Remove items you don’t need to keep and place them in one of your 6 purging bags. You may need to find a place to pack away keepsake items or make the commitment to pass special items along to family members. If you are going to do this, make a commitment to accomplish it in the next week. Don’t let it linger, or it will become clutter rather than a keepsake. 

Put Everything Away – Put the items you’ve decided to keep back away.

More Clothing Accessory Ideas

Clothing Accessory Organizing Products

If you only made it through one category of your clothing accessories, make the time to work your way through the other categories. You’ll feel much lighter once you’ve purged all those unneeded items.  Join me tomorrow for Day Thirteen in the 31 Days of 10-Minute Purging Tips challenge. Let’s purge some more so you can enjoy life more.

Find all my decluttering tips, printables and challenges in the table below. You can scroll though the table and look for ideas or search for specific ideas with the magnifying glass in the upper right-hand corner (on desktop). Click on the topic and then click through the specific article.