Capsule Wardrobe - Killer Concept or Complete Closet Crap?

When I first sort of discovered 'fashion blogging' I was still pregnant with Baby Ninja and looking forward to re-working my personal style as a young(ish) mom and fashion forward individual. I remember stumbling across, Kendi Everyday and her 30 x 30 Remix Challenge (take 30 items in your closet, make 30 outfits) on a late night Pinterest binge. That's actually how I first discovered Andrea at For The Love Of. But back then, she was Four Flights Of Fancy, anyhow, I liked how Andrea took on the challenge and made it work in her everyday mom life. As a working mom with one on the way, I could totally appreciate that. Getting dressed had begun to seem like a chore and I knew with a newborn I needed to streamline as much as possible. I also knew I wasn't going to have much to work with being between sizes and her posts gave me great ideas for stretching my postpartum wardrobe. Although I never actually tackled my own 30 x 30 remix I enjoyed seeing how the ladies worked their wardrobe and finding out all the behind the scenes scoop. Living in Georgia for years and having to pack clothes away for each season thanks to small closet space got me in the right head space to not miss certain articles for awhile but I still shopped my heart out for what I thought was "lacking". The concept of capsule dressing is quite appealing in theory as I like the idea of knowing what I’m working with clothes wise for any given season. Sometimes having so many options can be paralyzing.
But let me back up a minute. Not sure what a capsule wardrobe is really? Whoorl, does a great job of breaking it down here. After reading an article on Caroline (aka UnFancy) I was intrigued by this latest capsule concept. Basically, you pare down your clothes to a set number of pieces (37 as per Caroline) , wear only those items for 3 months (also known as a season to those outside of So Cal) and don't shop for those 3 months until it's time to start planning for the next capsule. Keep in mind those 37 pieces don't necessarily include underwear, jewelry, workout gear, jammies and accessories. (The "rules" vary depending on where you look.) Ideally, at the end of the 3 months you're only buying items you may NEED for the next season and then creating yet another capsule using the previous seasons pieces mixed in with anything new you may have purchased for the current season. Make sense? The idea is that at the end of the year you only have a collection of things that you truly love and will wear often and less 'fluff' to distract you.

image via Project 333
While I'm impressed she can shoot all the outfits in one day, my only issue with UnFancy is that you don't really see how she wears her capsule throughout the season in real life situations. I mean, I want to know if by week 4 you're tired of wearing the same boots or yellow cardigan over and over. Or worse, you stain a key item? And what happens if something unexpected comes up that requires a fancier option than the 37 pieces? Am I just supposed to automatically work in an LBD for reasons such as this? I have questions.

image via Whoorl

I’m a busy WAHM and taking forever to get dressed isn’t really a luxury I have anymore so limiting my closet to X number of pieces per season seems like it would work wonders at saving me time and headache. But what about when I want to spice things up? And shopping for each season just ahead of the next? Is that too extreme? I’m thinking I might attempt to tackle a 30 day Capsule challenge , sort of a remix capsule combined and we’ll see how it goes. I know one of my biggest issues is going to be shoes. The #westcoastwinterstruggle is real and you never really know from day to day what footwear will be the most appropriate so dressing "seasonally" is a bit trickier out here and I've been known to rock everything from Uggs to Birks on the same day. I do think it will be fun to see what I actually wear on a consistent basis and I'm feeling the need to pare down as it is so this will be a great reason to do a good closet purge.
I'm thinking I'll start my challenge in February as that will give me time to look at my calendar, plan what type of things I'll need to pick as well as clear out some of the closet clutter.

So I'm interested in finding out what you think! How do you feel about the concept of a capsule wardrobe? Does it make things super simple or you think you'd feel constricted by the number of items you can choose?