Clothes
Recently, I answered a fellow human's question What do you generally look for when you need to buy new clothes?
I decided to take pictures of all the items I have in my wardrobe, apart from underwear, socks and one pair of shorts that I'm not wearing these days because they don't fit me anymore due to pregnancy. The shorts that don't fit me are exactly the same colour as the pair of shorts in the picture above. The white top in the picture above came in a pack of two, but I didn't take a picture of the other one: it's identical.
There is nothing else.
My wardrobe is not seasonal: I don't put anything in storage. For example, I continue to wear shorts in winter, but I do it at home. I also continue to wear sweatpants in summer, as it can be rather cold here in the Nordics in summer months too. Even the woollen scarf I wear in summer as well: usually on cold days, when I travel by train or ferry, and when I'm by the sea in the evening.
Every day, I wear a uniform: sweatpants (or shorts in summer), a basic top and my linen shirt. At times, I borrow my partner's clothes such as t-shirts and shorts. I also borrow his hats, but most of the time I just wrap the large woollen scarf (in the picture above) over my head and neck. Usually, my linen shirt dries overnight. Otherwise, I borrow one of my partner's shirts. I used to have another linen shirt that looked almost exactly the same as the one in the picture above. After many years, the shirt wore out and I haven't replaced it yet. I decided to give myself some time, several months, to contemplate before buying a new one.
Both pairs of shoes were gifts: the grey clogs were gifted to me by my ex partner, who is now a good friend of mine. He gave them to me some years ago when I still lived in Sweden. I wear these shoes at home in winter and outside in summer. The hiking boots were gifted to me by my partner a few months ago.
I am over 15 weeks pregnant, and my body is changing. Many of the items of clothing that I live with are loose and comfortable and were bought years before I got pregnant. I wear loose clothing mostly due to my skin condition, to avoid close contact between with my clothes and my skin, but also because I prefer this style, which is something between pajamas and so-called menswear. I hope that many of these items will serve me until the baby is born and afterwards too.
For simplicity, when I talk with my fellow humans about living with less with, I refer to my small collection of clothes an extremely minimalist wardrobe. I have a difficult relationship with the word extreme in this case. To me personally, having a large wardrobe, shopping often (new or second-hand), contemplating every day what I want to wear, taking my clothes somewhere for dry cleaning would feel incredibly overwhelming. My existing relationship with my clothes feels liberating and cosy.