A graphic of and open wardrobe with neat shelves in the middle, drawers and a mirror to the left and drawers and a window to the right
Episode 232 – How to organise your underwear drawer

It's time to delve into those underwear drawers. It is something we use every day, but it's often overlooked. So today we are going to try and fix that by talking about decluttering, organising and storing your underwear.
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Transcript of this podcast episode
Ingrid: It's time to delve into those underwear drawers, and it's something that we use every day, but it's often overlooked. So in today's episode, we're gonna talk about decluttering, organizing, and storing your underwear.

Voiceover: You are listening to the Declutter Hub podcast, bringing you tried and tested no nonsense tips and advice from the lead in experts in decluttering and organizing your home. Now here are your hosts, Ingrid Johnson and Leslie Spellman.

Hello and welcome listeners. I'm Ingrid. And I'm Leslie. If you're new to the Declutter Hub podcast, you are so welcome. What you'll find is that we try and find a fun factor in the serious business of decluttering, and if you've been here for a while, you know exactly what we mean. So thank you so much for listening.

If you'd like to get involved in conversations relating to this podcast, it all takes place in our Facebook group. So come and join our lovely, warm, supportive community. To find the Facebook group, go to Declutter Hub dot com slash group to find out more, or you can search for the Declutter Hub community on Facebook.

Ingrid: Now, Lesley, in today's episode, we're talking about underwear, but I think we need to first clarify what we think underwear is because you and I have completely different ideas about what underwear is. We found out when we were like, Getting ready to talk about this subject.

Lesley: Well, I suppose this was all about your underwear drawer, really. And I think that my, where my head was going was what's in my underwear drawers and in my underwear drawers as well as like pants, knickers, whatever you wanna call them, depending on where you are around the world, underpants, some people call them. I also have socks and tights kind of in my underwear drawer as well. So I would vaguely think the underwear might have socks and tights in it, but I know you were a little bit anti, very kind of no socks and tights are not underwear and we have to be fair done loads of podcasts on socks before. So I might just mention tights, but I won't mention socks.

Ingrid: It was just so funny because you, we started off and you were like, well, we need to talk about socks. And I'm like, whoa, whoa. Why? Why do we talk about socks? Socks is not underwear. And you were like, yes, they are. And I'm like, no, they're not. I think maybe because in my house they're in different drawers.

Same, same bedside table, two drawers. So they're very close together. But I dunno, I've never seen socks as a type of underwear.

Lesley: You are very rigid language. You are very rigid. It's underwear. Underwear is things that you wear under normal garments, right? So under, you know, bra goes under, socks go under, tights go under normal things.

Ingrid: I know, I know it. It's just, I just love it that we kind of have different ideas about similar things. But anyway, we've decided, ca can I conclude this, Lesley.

Lesley: Well, you say that you've decided, you say that we've decided and we haven't cause we are gonna talk about socks later on. And so we haven't decided. So we're gonna actually talk about socks and tights and so you decided, but I've overruled it. And so now we are gonna talk about socks and tights.

Ingrid: Okay. Right. Okay. Socks and tights and underwear. But now I think we need to do some terminology here, right? Because we, a lot of people here in the UK call underwear or under pants, knickers. I know some in other places they call them panties or underpants or, I mean, there's, there's different terminology.

And of course we know you lovely listeners. You're all over the world. So we wanna kind of clarify this before we get started because you might go, what are knickers? I don't know what knickers are. And bras, we, we kind of use the word terminology bras all the time. Is that kind of a worldwide thing.

thing 

Lesley: I think so. I think so. But let's not, let's, let's not exclude the men here, Ingrid. We have got people wearing things older than bras and, uh, nickers and indeed men, may also be wearing those too. But in general, we have boxers.

Ingrid: Slips, slips?

Lesley: What's a slip?

Ingrid: It's, is, it's not like a, is that like a, a, a tied underwear for men? Is that called a slip?

Lesley: I dunno. I dunno. But I think men will call it, we would call men's pants the equivalent underpants or boxer shorts. , but then there are Y fronts and all those different types of things, so they all come. I think it's fair to say that men's underwear is generally a little bit more straightforward and less of it than women's underwear, right?

I don't mean less in volume, I mean less different types of it. This is complex, right?

Ingrid: We're we're going into my heads going in the direction I don't want it to go to on the serious podcast, Lesley.

Lesley: Exactly. So basically we're saying there are different terminologies. So what we are talking about is things that sit underneath your clothes in bras, knickers, boxer shorts, potentially socks and tights if we agree on that. So that is what we are talking about today, and we are talking about sorting out your underwear drawer.

So what we wanted to do was talk a little bit about emotions because that's what we're all about here. We wanna talk about the kinds of things that make you clinging onto things unnecessarily in your underwear drawers. And then after the break, we're gonna talk a little bit about storage, decluttering an organisation.

So that's the way it's gonna run. So let's get started. Who knew there were emotions relating to underwear, Ingrid? Of course there are. There are emotions relating to every type of thing that we have in our house.

Ingrid: Well, and you know, and that's, I think that's already very interesting, Lesley, because you would just think it's, oh, it's just a bit of underwear. But it isn't, is it, it, there's a lot more to it than people might think at first sight. Like, oh, well just rummage through your underwear drawer, throw some stuff out.

That's kind of a bit, um, um, how do you call that raffle than a little bit, you know, falling apart. But there, there's a bit more to it than that

Lesley: There is, so I'm just gonna just share with the listeners what happened before we came on air. And so we have a little thing, so we have like notes that we kind of follow. We don't have a script, of course, like how can this ever be scripted, honestly. And so we don't have a script, but we do have some notes to kind of remember what structure we're going in and, and we have some little reminders in there.

So things like take a photograph, which we then may or may not put on our social media in our Facebook group and our Instagram and stuff. And so I said, well, it'll be really cool rather than it just being a picture of me in Ingrid on Zoom, it would be really cool if we kind of started to add in what we were talking about.

And so I did try and get Ingrid to go and get a pair of knickers that she could hold up above her head and show on social media what we were talking about in this week's podcast. But she did not play ball, which is in the first time ever that Ingrid. Ingrid is quite gullible generally. And generally we'll do what I say with a little bit of guidance and coaxing.

But today the knickers were not coming out.

Ingrid: I was like, this is a step too far.

Lesley: I think it might be a step too far to be fair.

Ingrid: I mean, I mean I, because I think also, cause my underwear is not very interesting, you know, I'm good. I'm very like the same. It's black, it's white, it's all a bit the same. You know, there's nothing really spicy going on here in the underwear department, so I'm like, I'm not showing my big old white knickers to everybody on social media. That's not good.

Lesley: But that takes us straight into the first thing that we wanted to talk about, which is. Is your underwear. The underwear that you've got in your underwear drawer at the moment kind of fit for purpose on lots of different levels? But let's just say, and we, we have people of all different ages here, but let's just say this, I think is true.

Generally big generalization. The underwear that we wore in our teens and twenties is perhaps not the same as the underwear that we might wear in our fifties, sixties, and seventies, right? I'm not, I don't wanna generalise cause I know that lots of people were like wrong. I absolutely wear the same types of thing.

But many people, our experience of working with lots of different clients means that they don't quite look the same. Those knickers don't look the same when you were 20, as they do when you're seventy. Am I right, Ingrid?

Ingrid: Yes, I think, I think we can do that a little bit. I think we should change that. I think we should start an underwear revolution, but that's a whole other podcast, Lesley, because I'm like, why am I so boring? Maybe I've fallen into a rut a little bit and go, well, they're really comfy. I like them. Let me buy the same one over and over again.

They fit nicely, but maybe I should spice it up a little bit Les. 

Lesley: Yes. Maybe this podcast is gonna be start of an exciting new English. Jan will be happy. Let's just say that. But anyway, so what we wanted to talk about is, The first thing we need to look at is we need a little bit of realism here, . Okay, so we can't really have our drawers chocka block with things that perhaps we go, oh, maybe one day I'll go back to that red laced frilly thong that I had when I was 22. Cause I really want to, and so we really need to look at that and go, okay, how many of those do we need? Right? We're not saying give up completely, cuz that would be a bit sad. Ingrid, in fact, is gonna go out and buy new this week. And so she's changing it the other way around.

But in general, we need to be realistic. We can't fill our drawers with things that are not fitting our current lifestyle. And who's to say that your life doesn't change? Right? And so this might change. Oh, you know, if. I mean, you know, do we wear underwear for ourselves or do we wear underwear for a partner?

This is a good question. This is maybe a bit deeper than a decluttering podcast, is it?

Ingrid: I think definitely both. I mean, I had one of my clients who had really, um, uh, problem with arthritis in her hands, and so she found dressing herself and buying stuff for herself and especially shoes, was a really big bug bear, so she kind of ed it, overdid it on the underwear because she was like, that's something I know that always fits me, that I like, that I enjoy. I got loads of them and she had lots of choice, but I think if you wear, let's maybe, maybe the question is, Lesley. I think if underwear is nicely fitting, it's really important that we do it for ourselves and not for somebody else.

Lesley: Yeah, definitely. So it's finding that balance, isn't it, of course, but whether it's for yourself or whether it's for somebody else, and obviously it's a combination of the two, it's really important that we are realistic about what we have in there and whether it fits our current lifestyle.

Bottom line is we can go out if our lifestyle changes, all of a sudden, if we drop tonnes of weight, if we suddenly going through a relationship where we wanna spice things up a little bit, we can go out there and buy new for the most part, right? Everybody here who has clutter in general buys. Yeah. Have come from a place of buying, so that is a possibility.

So first things first. Realistic about what your current lifestyle looks like in the underwear departments, and make sure that your underwear drawers reflect that it's a bit kind of like deep. I think it's quite deep. Yeah.

Ingrid: Yeah, I know. We, as per usual we go off on a tangent, but I think it's really good and important to talk about this because in the end, when you declutter and organise, it's all that's making yourself feel good about yourself and your home, and it all works together. I think if you feel better in yourself by wearing good underwear, that that fits in within you.

It's nicer to get dressed, so then you probably figure out better than maybe the tops that you wear, the trousers that you wear fit nicer because you're wearing the right underwear over it. You know what I mean? I think it's all combined.

Lesley: Yeah, definitely, definitely. And of course we have that thing. We talk quite a lot about things that we keep in our wardrobes that actually make us more down than if they weren't there. And so if you open your drawer and all, you've got is this beautiful underwear that you'd love to wear, but you can't, for whatever reason that is, or you don't want to, then it's just gonna make you a little bit more down, isn't it?

You know? So perhaps it's better to kind of ditch it all and start from fresh. So we've, you've already alluded to practicalities in the fit of something. So we need to make sure as well as something looking the right thing aesthetically, it needs to fit well. And so we've all got those things. I've got the, my weight's fluctuating quite a bit at the moment and I've got bras that by the end of the day, they're in the morning, by the end of the day, I can feel that they're really tight on me.

You know what I mean? And you know, I need to kind of ditch. But then we've got this thing added into the mix, this kind of aspirational type thing where we're like, oh, well I don't really, it's actually okay. It hurts me a little bit, but if I just drop five or six pounds, then actually it will fit me. And so we keep loads of stuff for that reason, don't we?

So fit is a big one. You know, sometimes it is the right size, but it's the wrong shape almost, isn't it? You know what I mean? So everyone's got a shape of underwear that works well and we really talk about pants, actually bras. Then for women, I, I can't really comment on, uh, boxer shorts. Other than that, people, men will want boxer shorts and stuff that fit well and are not awkward for sure, and don't ride up. It's the same principle is it not? I presume.

Ingrid: Yeah. Yeah.

Lesley: Do you know what I mean. And so it's the same for everybody, but we only have experience of wearing knickers and pants and not on a boxer shorts. But I think, you know, we've got to make sure that it's the right fit. So I know what type of brief then let's call it is right for me because of the way my body is. Yeah.

Ingrid: And, and, and, and with bras Lesley, it's the size of the, the, the, your, your body. But it's also the bust size. And it's indeed what kind of tie, because there's balcony ones and there's ones with wider straps and ones for big, more big busted ladies. And it, it, it's actually a bit of a minefield. I think maybe that's why a lot of people kind of put it off because they're like, what I have isn't right, but I'm gonna have to actually go to this measuring lady in the Marks and Spencer and book an appointment and she's gonna tell me, I maybe I'm like three sizes bigger than I thought I was gonna be, but it's, it's a bit of a faf, but I think it's, it's worth it because once you know what size you are, then it makes the shopping much easier.

But it's, it's a bit trial and error, isn't it? I mean, I don't really do balcony bras very well because I'm a bit big busted. So that, that, for me, that doesn't.

Lesley: Yeah, exactly. So I think it's definitely about working out what's right for you at the moment. And I think it's fair to say that when you're younger, you can probably have the opportunity to explore more, but as your body. As you kind of grow into your body, almost perhaps we become a little bit more set in terms of what is gonna work for us.

I think we also wanted to talk a little bit about the quality, about the, the color, right? We wash these things repeatedly. Different people have got different ideas about how you should wash something. How often you should wash something. Do you wash it every time you wear it? I mean, obviously pants you wash every time, but you know bras.

Do you wash them every time or do you leave them a few days? And different people have got different ideas about that and it's going to very much depend on your body and all those kind of things, but washing bras and pants means that they go through an awful lot of laundry. And so the quality of them deteriorates, doesn't it, over time.

But how often have we gone to client, Ingrid, and we've looked through a kind of graying, elastic kind of snapping drawer and tried to coax the client into going, I think it might be. I think it might be time for these to go do you know what I mean? But you just kind of get stuck in your ways, don't you? And you kind of just keep on going and keep on laundering and keep on putting 'em away.

And you never give yourself a clean slate of, of pants. I know a lot of people, and I certainly mean this, is I will like every, I don't know, year, couple of years I'll go and buy a whole new batch and then make a decision to ditch some and it's only then when you look and you're like, oh yeah, there is quite a big difference between that white and that white

Do you know what I mean?

Ingrid: Yeah. And I think also the fabric itself, the elastic from it, you know, it all starts to lose its, its its shape and its elasticity. So I think, but I think it's something that. Because, because underwear can be expensive. It doesn't have to be, but it can be. It really depends on if you wanna go for, for the nicer brands, if you wanna go for something like, okay, I replaced a bit more, I'd buy a bit cheaper, but I replace it more often.

That's also, of course, an option. So there's a lot of things to take into consideration in how you want to do it.

Lesley: Yeah, definitely. And I think the last thing that we wanted to talk about in terms of what's in your underwear drawer that potentially might, um, go out of your underwear drawer, might get decluttered along the way is we tend to find loads of, like, particularly for bras, right? We find lots of access, let's call 'em accessories or add-ons to bras.

So for example, if you've got a strapless bra, um, and it comes, it will come with, not all of them, but some of them come with an extra strap that you can put on if you want to. And so what we see a lot is that we see the accessories for the bra in the drawer after the bra is gone, right? Yeah. . So you've gotta keep an eye on those accessories as well, haven't you, Ingrid?

Ingrid: Yes. Or it can, it can be, oh, it can even be the packaging. It can be uh, uh, some sort of shape holders, you know, all these kind of random little bits and bobs. You think, I don't even know what these ones belong to or like, well, I remember, but that's, that's left my house ages ago. But it's something because it goes into the depths of the drawers kind of at the back, and we don't really look at that a lot so when you're gonna look and, and do this decluttering and organising of your underwear drawer, have a look at all of those little bits and bobs as well, and see if you can, um, declutter some of that stuff.

Lesley: Am I allowed to talk about, um, socks and tights?

Ingrid: Yeah, go for it. Go for it.

Lesley: Tights is a big one. Tights. Socks, not quite so much. I mean, socks, we would rather that you tackle socks in terms of decluttering as you're doing your laundry. So we would rather that you look at those and if you see a hole, which is really easy to see when you're doing your laundry, then it goes straight into your donation station at that point. Tights were a little bit more tricky because sometimes we've gotta put the tights on to see see the ladders in the tights to see the holes in the tights to see that they don't fit properly anymore and things like that. So tights is kind if you, if you are a tight wearer, it's a big job to go through all those tights to try them on.

So you've got two choices really. You can do a project, then a tight trying on project where you really go through and see what's fit for purpose or you really need to get into the habit of making sure that every time you take those tights off, they don't just slope off into the wash and then come back.

Yeah. And so tights is definitely something that you need to, um, keep an eye on. Cause they get pulls in them, they get runs in them, and, um, you definitely need to keep on top of those tights when you're decluttering.

Ingrid: Yeah, and I think also we get tempted sometimes less by like fish net tights or really funky colors

Lesley: don't, I'm worried about you ing. Worried about what you are gonna be after this podcast.

Ingrid: Well I don't have them, but

Lesley: I've seen you in a, in my entire life. I've barely seen you in a dress.

Ingrid: I know, I think I've got about four pairs of tights, Lesley, but I think what I see in client's houses is that we, they, there's green ones and purple ones and Fishnets and, and, and they're like, oh, wow. Because they end up in the bottom of a box somewhere. It's like, I don't even, I can't, that was a former life.

I don't wear those colors anymore. The outfit that that went with is, is long gone. That, those are kind of easier wins then. But yes, if you have a whole stack of tights, just pull your, just gently pull your, put your hand in and just see if there's ladders or not. I mean, that's the first thing I think.

Pull out the colors and things, you know. And then what's left? Go, I'm going to gently pull my hand in. If there's a a ladder, boom, it's gone because that will really help you get ready in the morning. Efficiency.

Lesley: You know, what's the most depressing thing in the world for me? So, me and Leah wear kind of opaque black tights quite a lot. Cause I wear dresses and hers quite often get mixed up with mine. And so in the morning I'm trying to pull tights on and like they'll barely go past my knees, nevermind onto my body. If anyone has seen my daughter she's like the tiniest thing, isn't she? I'm not. I'm like, oh no. I was like this when I was 20. So yeah, that whole mixing up of the tight situation, we not got that quite under control yet with the laundry. So that starts my day off. Just mightily fine. So on that note, we'll go through a break and we'll come back after the break to talk a little bit about organizing your underwear drawer.

Voiceover: Hi. Just a little break from this podcast episode to ask whether you are on a quest to declutter your home. The last thing you need to do is go out there and buy more stuff, right? We completely agree, but there are just a few small things that we truly believe will enhance your decluttering journey. A small number of products that we use regularly believe in and want to highlight to you. Have a look at declutterhub.com/products and find out what our favorite organizing products are.

Ingrid: Hello everyone. Welcome back. Well, that podcast before the break went off on all different kind of tangents. Let's make sure that we now talk to you about organising and storage of your underwear. So, Leslie, let's kick it off.

Lesley: Well, it is tricky to talk about this without talking about something that kind of went crazy in our Reset Your Home Challenge back in January, right Ingrid? So anybody who wasn't part of the challenge, don't worry. Well, you'll get the gist of it anyway, but all of a sudden, Ingrid pops into a conversation, the fact that she rotates her socks when she's putting them away.

This was news to me that she rotates socks because I am like, Why would you do, why would you rotate socks? Like literally do you not just put your socks in the laundry and then put 'em back in the drawer and then put 'em back in the laundry and put 'em back in the drawer? And it doesn't really matter about rotation.

Cause to me that's more about food and things like that. But Oh no. Ingrid very much rotates those socks. So there's me thinking that it's some kind of crazy. Kind of Ingrid-ism, you know, Ingrid thing, but oh no, like at least half the people. No, actually not half the people. Many people came out in support of Ingrid to say that they also rotate their socks so that the socks are worn in an even way, so that the socks at the back don't get left out and feel sad. Ingrid.

Ingrid: #sockrotatorsunite, I say, I mean it, it went into a whole life of its own. We had a couple of days of so much laughter about it. It was just so funny. And then we had an Ingrid camp and a Lesley camp and it was absolutely brilliant. But yeah, I do rotate my underwear as well, in case you were wondering. So underwear rotators unite, I say.

Lesley: Well, my hashtag was keeping socks simple, so I'm also gonna keep underwear simple, which takes us neatly into the first thing that we wanted to talk about, which was all about creating a system that isn't manageable for you. Okay, so the most important thing, let's. Cut out the sock, rotators, unite situation.

The most important thing is that when you open your underwear drawer in the morning, you have things in there that fit you, that you want to wear, that you can see, and that you can get hold of easily. That's rule number one. We need to keep these systems everywhere in our home. Sensible and manageable and what you need to work out is what is sensible and manageable to you.

Okay, so Ingrid's got her way of doing things sock rotators unite. A bit strange, but hey ho. I will let that go. I'm all about keeping socks simple. Same with knickers. As long as I can find my underwear where I expect it to be, then that's good enough for me. And you need to do that. Cause what we find, and this is quite harsh, really, is that we find in the, in the decluttering world, a lot of people focus very much on things that are intended really for people who are very meticulous.

So Ingrid is meticulous okay with the way that she does things. And what we find is that fe people are spending inordinate amount, inordinate amounts of time. Rotating, folding, all of those kind of things when actually we need to get the basics right first. Am I right ing?

Ingrid: Oh yeah, I mean, and I support that message. I mean, it's all about decluttering what you don't use, what you don't need, and only having your drawers, what you can wear, what you feel good in, et cetera, and making sure that things go in the laundry, get washed, get dry, and go back in the drawers. Those are the basics, and you need to do that throughout your house in phases over time, in manageable chunks.

But once. Past that, and you're like, okay, now I'm ready to take the next step. Then you can start to think about containerization, right? And we're gonna talk about that as well, Leslie. And of course, then the next step after that is what I do, and that is indeed rotation of things. And I don't do it only with my food, but also with my towels.

With my socks, and with my underwear. But that is the another step, more indirection of being super organized. But I'm like, please, let's start with, let's have clean underwear. Let's have it in one place and make sure that you don't run out all the time of underwear to wear. You end up buying new and creating more laundry for yourself.

That is I fully support.

Lesley: Yeah, I think it's about focusing in areas that, that are gonna make the most difference to you. And sometimes even though aesthetically, It's very pleasing and satisfying to have a drawer that looks beautiful. Um, sometimes if all the other things are going astray because of that, then that's when we need to sort of bring things back in.

But you do you right, your choice. You wanna rotate, you wanna fold. Absolutely up to you. We're not here to say don't do that, but we're here to say, think about it. Because we've seen it many, many times where people are like, look at my beautiful folder drawer. And then there's chaos everywhere else. And so, but if that's, if that's what makes you take, then that, that's absolutely fine as well.

So we really wanted to talk about creating and manageable system. That's the most important thing. It's important for your underwear to be accessible. Right. And so, you know, we've been talking about drawers. Not everybody has got the benefit of having. Nice drawers. You can split things out, you can put drawer divides in, you know.

But the most important thing is where is, where is your underwear and is it easily accessible? Because this is something that we are gonna be working with regularly, right? There's a big, um, throughput of underwear, right? This is something that's gonna get laundered every single week as opposed to dresses and trousers and things that might only get one every three, or.

You know, so, um, it's very, very different. There's a sort of, um, the regularity with which you will change these draws over. So it needs to be something ideally at the right height so you can work with those draws the right size, the right depth. So really think about the draws and whether it's an accessible, useful space to you.

Ingrid: Yes, because if you've got your underwear somewhere and you've got loads of piles in front of that, , it's, it's, it's a nightmare every day when you've got the most stuff out of the way just to grab some underwear. While this is something that you would do on a daily basis, you want it to be something that you can open and close without even thinking about it and having to move lots of stacks of stuff.

And I think that's what's really important. And you don't want something to have an underwear on the top of a wardrobe somewhere. You want to have it probably on, on waist level or eye level. And not completely on the floor. If you have trouble with your knees and you have to bend over, uh, to get your, uh, underwear out of the lowest drawer in your house every day, that's not helpful.

Lesley: Yeah, exactly. So accessibility, visibility is all really key and we talk quite a lot about compromise and this is where compromise comes in. So really evaluate what you have in your bedroom and look at which draws you're allocating to, which types of things, and really give your underwear drawers priority over all the things that you're using much less often.

So we wanted to talk about, we talked about um, containerization, right? And so, uh, I sometimes if you've got a small drawer that's containerization enough language, I think that's what you've got. So you've not got internal containerization cuz you've got smallest drawers in your bedside table that you use for underwear.

And so that's small enough. My drawers are wider, so I've. Wider drawers, so I have to subdivide those drawers. And this is where either draw dividers or containers come in really well. Ingrid, do you wanna talk about the different types of draw dividers and containers that might work?

Ingrid: Yes. So you need to really think about this. If you're gonna go for drawer dividers, then you need to really do some measuring. I mean, whatever container you buy, you're gonna have to do some measuring as well. Um, you can go for fabric containers. Because they're normally, um, Ikea for example, have a range of fabric containers that are really easy with little, little zips.

So you can collapse them out and collapse them, make to make them smaller and they've got 'em in different sizes and you can kind of build up on that. Um, , I would probably not go for, um, wicker as containers in underwear because of course there's lots of times there's it. There's little straps or lace or it's delicate fabric over overall.

So you probably want to have something that is a delicate container as well. So either a plastic or a fabric container, I would say.

Lesley: Yeah, I think it is, it, is it the scrub range for ikea? That's the one that a lot of people use and the the, with the scrub range, which is really, really cost effecti. There's loads of different kind of configurations of that. But I would, if you are a person who's not super meticulous and not folding or rotating, then the bigger container's gonna serve you better than the smaller ones, which only fit a few in.

So really think about the size of the container and what you wanna do with it, because they always look fantastic. But you've gotta think about how you are gonna utilize that. You know, how is that system gonna be manageable to you? And so that's really important. So quite often when I'm doing um, uh, projects with clients, the little tiny containers will be the place where we put.

Um, little maybe buttons or little brow accessories or things like that, you know, that you can just kind of throw in. So just really think about that.

Ingrid: Yeah.

Lesley: The last thing we wanna talk about, indri, Ingrid, was laundry, right? And so this is very reliant on a robust laundry rotation system, isn't it?

Ingrid: Yeah. I think that's where a lot of the problems with clothing start is when the laundry system is kind of rattling and not really, um, the throughput of laundry is not well thought through. So the problem is a lot of people struggle with clothing. and ha have excess amounts of socks and underwear mainly is because somewhere the laundry cycle, there's a hold up.

So either stuff gets left in the laundry basket or the laundry isn't being washed often enough, or there's not enough drying racks to have the throughput of people that you have in your house or. The dryer is broken, and that's why things are falling apart. You know, there's somewhere along the line in the laundry cycle there is a problem or the drawers are too full, so the things can't be put away properly, and you get piles, and then underway gets buried under, under, under other clothing, and then you can't find it.

And then sometimes the panicky reaction is to go, I, I can't find any other. How can I not have underwear? I'm gonna buy more. But the more you buy, actually you're going backwards. And that sounds a bit strange, doesn't it, Leslie? Because we think, ah, well there we don't have enough underwear. We're gonna buy more.

So that will solve our problem. But actually, I think you need to think about your laundry cycle to see where's the hold up? What's my problem here? And once you figure that out and you start to work on that a little bit, that underwear will come from everywhere and suddenly, I can't even believe how much underwear we have.

Lesley: Because I think sometimes, cause I, I keep my underwear to a minimum actually. And sometimes I can tell if, for example, I, I have a weekly reset, but if for whatever reason I haven't done that on a weekend. By the time I'm getting to nine or 10 days, I can see that I'm starting to run out in my underwear drawer, and that prompts me to go and get my underwear from my laundry room and bring it down.

And so, you know, less is more really, I mean, you ha you need to have enough underwear. D really what you need to think about is what's the maximum amount of time that I go on holiday? Yeah. Basically. So if you've gone a two week holiday, you might change twice in a day. If you go on holiday, you might have one pair during the day and you might switch up when you go out in the evening cuz you probably shower.

So you might need two. So think about those kind of things. How mu, how what's, what's your cycle like? How many you know? And in fact, you might go on holiday and you might. Access to a laundry. Um, so you might not need all those. And so it's really important to think those things through. But actually that's only, it's more the exception than the norm isn't Ingrid.

Cause generally, you know, you probably only need enough for a week or 10 days or something like that, um, in your laundry. You know what I do? If you, if you do have space in your, wherever you do your laundry, try and split up. as you are taking things out of the laundry into, or at some point split it up into the individual people.

Really interesting and really useful to do that. And, and then, you know, you're kind of halfway there, aren't you as well? So laundry's absolutely critical. Honestly, I, if there's one thing that is a problem in every single home that we visit, it is laundry. And so getting the laundry, your laundry cycle under control certainly is one of the biggest things in our membership as well.

In English, you know, we, we say, Get your laundry and we've got a whole course on laundry alone. You know, talking about what's your laundry, what are your laundry baskets like, what's your cycle, what's your dirty cycle, your clean cycle, your rotation cycle. And it all sounds ridiculous cuz we just do it, don't we?

But do we do it well? This is the question, do we do it well in a way that's gonna serve us and make sure that we have things in our wardrobe that we're gonna wear? Because if we don't, that's when we go out and buy more. And it just adds to the problem. So something as simple as laundry is probably one of the biggest clutter problems in homes right around the world.

Ingrid: yeah, absolutely, absolutely. Seed all the time.

Lesley: So have we exhausted? No, we have not exhausted. We could literally talk for another four hours on underwear, couldn't we alone? Um, but I think we've given some great hints and tips there. We've talked a lot about the emotions relating to different types of underwear and really homing it, homing in on that realism.

Are we being aspirational? Are we looking at the quality? Are we making sure that everything that we have, Is fit for purpose. And then of course, some useful ideas about creating a manageable system, creating some storage. Maybe we've got to compromise where maybe we've got to look again at the way that our drawers are configured in our, um, in our bedrooms and take it from there.

So hopefully that's been useful today.

Ingrid: know. I'm like, show us your underwear, drawers. Maybe people, people out out there are feeling brave and are like, yes, I am gonna show Ingrid and Leslie a picture of my underwear drawer. So do share with us on, on our Facebook group. Everybody else gonna wonder what. What's happening? Why am I suddenly seeing pictures of underwear?

But yeah, if you're feeling brave or if you want to show us your containers, we would love to know, let us know. Now next week, Lesley, let's talk about that. We have a guest. Jacqueline from APDO is coming to tell us all about spring clearing week. So more about that next week. Thanks everyone for listening. 

Voiceover: Thanks so much for listening to the Declutter Hub podcast. Don't forget to subscribe to us in your podcast player so you don't miss an episode, and we'll see you next week.
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Recent Posts
Episode 392 – The clutter advice I’d give my 30-year-old self

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Episode 388 – Start as you mean to go on – plan 2026 for decluttering success

Episode 387 – Our 2025 year in review – the big Declutter Hub round-up

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Liz Charpleix says:

16 March 2023 at 10:27 AM

Socks are underwear. You wear them under (inside) your shoes.
Pantyhose are underwear. You wear them under your dress and under (inside) your shoes (albeit over your knickers).
Regardless of whether they live in the same drawer as your underpants and bras or not.
End of 🙂

Reply
1. Ingrid Jansen says:
  
  19 March 2023 at 3:11 PM
  
  Hi Liz,
  
  Message received 😉
  
  Ingrid x
  
  Reply
Episode 232 – How to organise your underwear drawer

Episode 392 – The clutter advice I’d give my 30-year-old self

Episode 389 – Overcoming mobility challenges when decluttering with member Rory

Episode 388 – Start as you mean to go on – plan 2026 for decluttering success

Episode 387 – Our 2025 year in review – the big Declutter Hub round-up

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