"Picture this: You’re getting ready for a night out with your best friends. You have Sabrina Carpenter playing in the background, you’re drinking a glass of your favorite bubbly, and your hair looks like it was professionally blown out. Things are going so well… until it’s time to get dressed. You stand staring into the abyss of your closet, only to sigh in defeat. The dreaded phrase escapes from your mouth, “I have nothing to wear.”
While this phrase is rarely the truth, that doesn’t mean that it can’t feel like reality sometimes. If you’re finding yourself throwing clothes around your room in a panic, trying on outfit after outfit, only to give up and reach for your go-to jeans and black top instead, it’s safe to say you might be making some wardrobe mistakes. The good news? They’re easily fixable.
If you’re having a fashion fiasco day after day, these mistakes might be tricking you into feeling like you have nothing to wear.
1. You’re only buying into microtrends
How easy (and fun) it is to jump in on a microtrend. Mesh flats, denim midi skirts—the trendy pieces we’ve fallen victim to over the past couple of years go on and on. And while these items always seem great at first, after a few months, it’s easy to feel like they’re no longer “in.” And what are we left with? Clothing items that we don’t love, let alone really like.
How to avoid having a closet full of pieces you don’t get a lot of wear out of? Follow this golden rule: If you can’t see yourself wearing it in six months, skip it. By thinking ahead and pausing before impulse purchasing trends, you’ll have a closet full of things you want to wear a whole lot more.
2. You’re buying low-quality items
We’ve all experienced it: You buy a cheaper item, then when you go to wear it, it doesn’t fit right, it’s uncomfortable, or it just looks blah. While you don’t need to invest in every single item you add to your closet, when you’re buying something you see yourself wearing for years (like a leather jacket or good pair of jeans), it’s worth spending a little more time and thought picking out.
Try investing in high-quality pieces, even if that means it takes you twice as long to build your dream wardrobe. This insures that you won’t have to replace your wardrobe staples anytime soon, and the cost per wear will be lower than if you bought a low-quality piece you have to replace after a couple of months. Make a more conscious effort to assess the quality of the clothes you’re considering purchasing before you actually buy them.
3. You don’t have enough basics
There really is something to be said for having a wardrobe that includes staple pieces you can turn to time and time again. Truth be told, you can buy as many trendy items as you want, but if you don’t have a pair of jeans that fit you like a glove or an outer layer you love turning to in transitional weather, you’re going to run out of options… and fast.
An easy fix? Try investing in more staple garments. Think of items you can work into multiple outfits a week, like a good white T-shirt that can be worn with a leather jacket, blazer, or on its own. If you have a solid foundation of base pieces for outfits, you’re good as gold.
4. You’re holding onto clothes you no longer wear
It’s easy to want to hold onto things for sentimental reasons, but when you just aren’t wearing something, it ends up taking up space and making it harder to see the things you do wear.
The next time you do a closet purge, ask yourself if you’ve worn the item you’re considering over the past year. If the answer is no, ask why not. If you have something like a head-to-toe green sequin dress that you’re absolutely obsessed with, but just haven’t had the right occasion to wear, you can keep it. However, if you’re just holding onto it for the sake of holding onto it, maybe it’s time to re-assess.
5. You’re buying things for the future
The absolute biggest shopping mistake you can make? Buying something that doesn’t fit right, but that you hope will in the future. Getting something that’s too big or too tight with plans to fit into it in the future is a road you should never go down.
How can you avoid this? When shopping, gently remind yourself that clothes are supposed to be worn. If you can’t wear it and feel confident in it tomorrow, it isn’t worth getting. Your clothes should make you feel confident in a way that makes you look forward to putting them on—and that means that they need to be in the right size.
Alyssa Grabinski, Contributing Fashion Writer
Alyssa Grabinski has been a contributing fashion writer at The Everygirl since 2021. Aside from The Everygirl, Alyssa’s work has also been featured in POPSUGAR and The Young Folks.