Lucky seven?

I wear this dress a lot, but I wear
the cardi so much more!

How many times do you wear your clothes before you give them away , sell or bin them? Every time I look at my clothing spreadsheet – started because I felt I was in a rut and wanted to see if I really was wearing the same things all the time, and continued now out of habit and because I might find it interesting to look back at in another decade or two – I wonder if it's not a bit odd. And it is a bit odd, but it has done the job I intended it to do, namely helped me analyse my wardrobe and get more wear out of things that would otherwise go neglected. Because of that, and because I love charity shopping, I was quite interested to see this report by Barnardos that says British women wear garments an average of seven times before getting rid of them.

I doubt anyone who owns a wedding dress is planning to wear it more than once themself, and outfits for formal events like weddings or posh dances don't get many outings, so that would skew the statistics. On the other hand, very few people will own a 'reliable basic', be that jeans, trousers or a favourite coat, without wearing it loads, which should swing things back the other way. So although the figure Barnardos quotes is an average, it did seem awfully low to me. Back I went to my spreadsheet. Surely one pair of trousers or a well-loved cardigan can balance out several party frocks?

Now, I don't own masses of clothes (sometimes I think I own far fewer than most bloggers I talk to), but looking at my spreadsheet I could see that I do own plenty of things that still don't get that many outings. Even things I worry my workmates will think I never take off aren't in much danger of getting worn out. And this is after a year and a half of tracking what I wear and trying to base buying decisions on that; I've been consciously trying to buy things I'm more likely to get lots of wear out of. Anyone given to random acts of shopping will make far more 'mistakes'. I do think my personal average wearings will be much higher than seven, given how long I hang onto things, but it's probably not unreasonable for a lot of people.

Still, seven as an average does make me a little uncomfortable. It seems so wasteful. I'd hate for anyone to keep clothes that they dislike and make them feel bad, and I know all too well how keeping too many clothes that don't fit can wreak havoc on your body image, but perhaps it does suggest that a lot of us either aren't completely sure what we like or what fits, or are prone to shopping for reasons other than need. Thank goodness for charity shops, I guess: they stop all those things ending up in landfill, and mean that even if women wear a garment an average of seven times before getting rid of it, those garments get a lot more than seven wears in the end thanks to multiple owners!

I bought this dress because I wanted a cotton day dress I could
wear regularly. Get used to it, you're going to see a lot of it!

Another thing in the article that struck me was the fact that for some women social media seems to push them to replace clothes more quickly, as being pictured in the same thing twice is a bit of a no-no. I find that odd. It takes more than one thing to make an outfit, so surely the point is to mix your clothes and accessories creatively? I like seeing bloggers repeating outfits, personally: people's unique style is one of the things that draws me to their blogs, so why would I want to see them discarding the very things that help make them stand out? (Curtise showed off one of her favourites very recently – who wouldn't want to see that floral maxi again, eh?)

What do you think of the statistics? Have you ever worked out how often you wear particular things, and did the results surprise you?