Paul Smith says:

Making a shirt is complicated. It takes a specialised factory months to develop even our simplest shirt pattern, requiring specialised press irons and sewing machines. Of course you can make your own shirt and there are countless patterns but, to be honest, for so much work they never look particularly good.

However, vintage shirts are cheap and easy to find, buy or inherit: they often still pop up in charity shops, too. The fabric quality tends to be excellent and the stitch size is small and nice. We spend hours each season looking into the construction details and techniques of old shirts – you can learn a lot from them. The one downside about cheap vintage shirts is that they are cheap for a reason! They never fit properly, as shirt fit has changed a lot, and men wear slimmer, shorter shirts now, with smaller sharper collars.

So here is a step-by-step guide to customising an old shirt:

Hello people

Friday 20th March brought us the first day of Spring, and what a day it was, it started out as a bright cheery day and not only stayed for the day but for entire weekend. 

If you’ve been following my “year to an organised life” programme you’ve had it pretty easy so far.   That was intentional, it’s no good scaring you all off with huge lists of to dos and equipment to purchase.

By now you’ll be aware of the value of routine and you’ll  be doing an hour of housework every evening so that way your laundry gets washed and ironed, your bathroom and kitchen are cleaned,  your vacuuming is done and your dusting is kept under control, you’ll no longer have the morning panic as you’ll be into the routine of preparing your work bag, sandwiches and what to wear the day before and before going to bed you’ll be returning any cups/supper dishes to the kitchen and straightening the living room and plumping the cushions.

All in all  you’ve spent the last three months establishing some good routines, and routine and preparation are two of the key factors to living an organised life.

Now that spring has well and truly sprung my mind turns to spring cleaning.  The light is getting better and the home dust and grim is more visible, that gorgeous sunshine is showing you just how dirty your windows are and everything could generally do with a post winter tidy up. 

We spent January putting Christmas away and establishing routies, we did an audit of our homes and what we wanted to do to improve them and we made a good start on our kitchens.

February finished off the kitchens and culled our clothes.  Wardrobes were sorted, shoes were paired up and organised

In early March bedroom drawers were emptied and re-folded.  Some of you even invested in a NoWireHangers approved FlipFold for your tops, sheets, towels and sweaters.

This week were all going to be working on our windows.  Lets let that gorgeous sunshine into our lives.  I tend to do my windows every eight weeks, that’s only once every other month, although in honesty I pretty much skip it during the really dark winter months.

I have two different routines for windows, one is very quick but very wet and sloshy so best kept for the exterior side of the glass, the other routine required a tad more elbow grease and takes longer but makes less of a mess so I keep that for the inside, you don’t want to be sloshing buckets of water around in the inside of the house do you.

Lets start by flinging open our windows and giving the house a good blow through.  Pull your curtans back/blinds up as far as they will go, or even take them down and drop them off at the dry cleaners if you’d like.

Taking a bowl of nice hot soapy water with a dot of disinfectant added go to gay abandon on the interior of your window frames and sills with a nice abrasive cloth, a nice rough tea-towel works for me, a washing-up brush or old toothbrush is wonderful for getting into the runners and giving everything a good general scrub up.  Dry everything off with a dry towel or microfibre cloth.

For the exterior of the windows you’re going to need a bucket of hot soapy water (don’t go mad with the detergent), a cloth, a squeegie and if you’re not on ground level; a ladder and someone to hold the bottom.

Starting with the top windows work your wet cloth in a circular motion all over the glass, getting right into the corners, and around the frames.  Swapping quickly to the squeegee remove the water and soap in a swift downward motion.  If you’re a bit more squeegee savvy you can do it as the professionals do in one continuous swoop from left to right to left to right to left to right making a rainbow arc with your squeegee right down until you’ve reached the bottom of the glass.  If you find this difficult three of four neighbouring downward strokes will suffice.  Be sure to overlap your strokes slightly as you don’t want to leave any water and soap residue behind.  Repeat for all of the top windows then come down the ladder and repeat for the lower levels.

Change your water and repeat the process at the back of the house.

For the interior you’re going to need an empty spray bottle (you can buy these from Ikea, a garden centre, or even recycle an empty kitchen cleaner bottle), some white vinegar, two cloths (preferably one of them being a microfibre cloth) and optionally some tea-tree oil.

Mix two parts water to one part vinegar in the spray bottle, add 4/5 drops of tea-tree oil, add the trigger lid and shake well.

Again working from the top downwards to prevent dribbles spritz your window with your solution and working in circles with one of your clothes agitate the dirt away.  Once that entire pane is clean then buff dry with the other cloth (preferably a microfibre one) and them move onto the next pane.  The vineger helps to cut through the grease and drys to a smear free finish.

The tea-tree oil not only helps to kill the bacteria that cause the black spots you get in the framework from condensation, but also masks the slightly vinegary smell (which in itself clears very quickly).

Another tip is to dry in a side to side motion, that way if later you see a smear you can tell if it’s on the interior or exterior side of the glass.  Up and down strokes on the outside and side to side strokes on the inside make the smear easier to distinguish.

Diarise to repeat this process every eight weeks.

Richard

Allocate different drawers for different purposes, I have one for jeans & shorts, one for sweaters, one for T-shirts & polos, a half one for pants & swimwear and a half one for socks.

For the lady followers, a great way to store matching underwear sets is to pass the loop of the bra through the pants and then fasten – that way when you grab one from the drawer in a rush its partner is attached.

I like to keep socks bundled in pairs and keep belts wound tight (starting at the buckle end) and fastened with elastic bands, these go in a box in the jeans & shorts drawer. I personally only wear canvas belts – leather belts should really be hung out straight.

Ties are laid out and folded into three and placed in rows in a shallow box again in my jeans & shorts drawer.

Remember – try not to think of it as a big challenge. Work through it one drawer at time, you can sort out one drawer in an eveniing can’t you and before you know it, one week later your entire chest of drawers is done.

Don’t forget your daily routines, you know, bathroom, vacuuming, ironing, and are you all plumping your sofa and taking any cups to the kitchen before bed and prepping your work clothes for the next day? This simple process really does save the morning rush.

Have fun

• The good
• The bad
• The ugly

• Good is things you love and wear regularly, or things you love but don’t actually wear that often but should
• Bad is things you never wear as they’re generally horrid, they’re too small/big for you, they’re someone else’s or doesn’t suit you
• Ugly is things that you don’t wear for a particular reason but would if it was fixed, as in the zip is bust, it needs taking up/in/out or it needs dry cleaning.

The BAD just needs bagging up and getting out of the house, by some means, either to a charity shop, throwing away, giving to a friend or perhaps selling on eBay (other auction sites are available). The sooner it’s out of the house the better. If you’re offering it to a friend call them to tell them about it and ask if they’d like it. Then arrange to either drop it round this week or ask them to come and collect it. Explain to them that you want it out of the house and set a deadline with them for it to be gone by and if it’s not you’ll be donating it to a charity shop. It’s all very well and good saying I’m going to give this coat to Dave but if three months later you’ve still got it in the back of your wardrobe what are the chances of him actually getting it.

Then tackle the UGLY. If you were to get it fixed, that stain removed, have it dry cleaned are you likely to wear it? If so then bag it up and take it to the necessary cleaners/menders or if you’re handy with a needle and thread as I am fix that zip or take up that hem (but not today).

The GOOD on the whole you’re keeping. Try every thing on (this is where a friend comes in handy) and then check it for stains, smells, loose buttons, loose hems etc. If it’s perfect and you like it (and will wear it) then it wins wardrobe space. Continue through the pile like this until you’ve assessed every piece.

Give your wardrobe a vacuum/wipe out and put everything that you’re keeping back in. Try to zone it in a way that works for you. My work and social clothes tend to overlap so that doesn’t work for me but I do have sections for trousers, shirts and suits. You find a way that works for you. Personally I like all my hangers to be the same style. I think there’s something lovely about the collars and shoulders of all of your shirts lining up but that’s just me being fanatical about such things.

I also like multi level trouser hangers. They’re a bit like a mini-ladder on which you can hang half a dozen pairs of trousers at once. I tend to keep shoes in the boxes they were bought in and stack these up in the bottom of the wardrobe but if you don’t have these they can be be purchased quite cheaply online. I can add a link later if you’d like.

Right – well that’s about it. Please – I can’t express enough at this point – NO WIRE HANGERS EVER. Have fun and I’ll be back in a week.

Any questions post them below. Richard

OK – so you’ve had nearly a fortnight now to get to the bottom of your kitchen drawers and the back of your kitchen cupboards to clear out the clutter and mix-match bits and pieces. By now your chipped cups and lidless Tupperware (other brands are available) should all have been disposed of and everything that remains in your kitchen should be useful, beautiful, or sentimental (or even a mixture of the three).

Now it time to do some lovely elbow grease cleaning. 

How you tackle this is up to you. You may want to allocate one day to get the whole lot done, you may prefer to divide the number of cupboards and drawers between the days (or working days) of the week and focus on a couple of them at time. 

Don’t take out more than you can clean and put back within an hour. It’s no use emptying the contents of all of the cupboards and drawers all over the kitchen floor, so you’ve then no room to move and if you get a phone call, last minute visitor or have to pop out, you’re all over the place with clutter.

Empty one cupboard, one shelf at a time, give the cupboard a wipe out with a hot cloth and some cream cleaner, then a fresh wipe and replace all the bits and pieces, editing out once more anything that can be disposed of.

Then move on to the next shelf and repeat. Continue this process all around the kitchen.

I’d personally start on the bottom shelf of the bottom right unit, then the next shelf up, then the top shelf, moving around the room right to left and then then starting again with the top cupboards.

The actual tops of the cupboards would be last, emptied off, wiped down and then all of the bits and pieces placed back on top, once they too have been cleaned off and then I’d finish with the drawers.

I personally don’t really like packets in cupboards, I think lentils, beans, pasta, rice etc look so much better when they are in jars than in packets with screwed down wrappers secured with clips or tape.

Jars can be economically purchased from Ikea like this > http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/catalog/products/40065867 < or even something like large coffee jars make good substitutes. 

I also prefer to keep food cans in rows of like products. All beans, tinned tomatoes, chickpeas etc in a row. This means when you go to make a grocery list you can see at a glance that you’re two tins of red kidney beans and a tin of soup down in your pantry.

I know it might look a bit “Sleeping with the Enemy” but isn’t just because it looks nice, it does save time and stop you buying things you’ve already got plenty of and ending up replacing things you’ve already plenty of.

Finally give the exterior of the kitchens a wipe down with a hot soapy cloth, then the worktops and give the floor a sweep and mop.

Now get to it and if you’ve any questions give me a yell.

No Wire Hangers

Richard

• What do you like about your kitchen?
• What do you dislike?
• Do you have things from past generations that don’t give you any value other than family devotion?
• If you are sharing your home – do you have a lot of duplicate items?
• Are you using chipped plates and cracked cups/glasses?
• Is the lighting adequate?
• How much of every day is spent looking for things?
• Do you have adequate storage for the things you need in the kitchen?
• Are there things in your kitchen that don’t belong there?
• Are you making use of all of the storage areas in your kitchen (top shelves/under sink area etc)?
• Do you have clear worktop space to prepare meals or is that taken over with paperwork, unused gadgets, work things?
• Are the things in your kitchen the right size for your family? For example: do you have a two slice toaster but live with your partner and three children? Are there two of you in the house but you have 26 odd cups (some chipped)? Is the rubbish bin overflowing because it is too small?

As you look around your kitchen, if you see other points I haven’t mentioned please write them down too, perhaps you have an incoming damp patch you really meant to get fixed or the bulb under the extractor fan still hasn’t been replaced. Does the washing machine door leak?

Now you’re not just standing there saying “my kitchen is a mess” you’ve got specific points to work on.

Although much clutter can accumulate over time, a kitchen can fall into disarray from the very start. You move into your new home and you bundle things into cupboards and drawers in an effort to quickly get unpacked and settled. In many cases a friend or relative is doing this for you or even someone you’ve hired to help with the move. You get used to this hap-hazzard arrangement and it sticks.

Now basically, now you’ve listed what you dislike you simply go about changing it.

Throw away those stained tea-towels and chipped cups. Look under the sink – if you’ve three started bottles of cream cleaner or bleach can you decant them all into one? (same product, don’t mix chemicals or you could end up with no end of explosions).

Do all of your plastic storage pots have lids? Do you in fact use them? Did you buy them five years ago for carrying home made soup to work in and are yet to make any? If they’re just taking space them ditch them.

Don’t forget what’s in your drawers too. Consider throwing away Aunt Florence’s ancient potato peeler. If she were alive today would she have a new one? Would she also wonder what on earth was wrong with you for keeping such a rusty antique?

If you have little gadgets that you can’t identify then toss them too – if you can’t remember the last time you used your melon baller or bean slice then get rid of it.

Did you use the pasta maker once 9 years ago when you had Italian exchange students and are yet to do it again as it was such a palaver? Get shot of that too.

Of course you’ll need to consider some items carefully but don’t let indecision slow down your progress. If you need to make a decision with your partner then make a list of these items and choose an opportune time to discuss them – not in the middle of a blazing row. “… and while we’re at it, what do you want to do with Aunt Lorna’s tea service?...” is not ideal.

If you’re not using all of the shelves of the kitchen or even the top of the cabinets as they’re too high to comfortably reach then consider getting a stepping-stool. You can even get a tiny one that folds flat and sits in the gap between your washing machine and dishwasher.

When storing thing on open shelves or cabinets, only store pretty things, if it’s something ugly empty jars ready for jamming in the summer or food items then consider placing them in a basket. A row of baskets looks far prettier than bulging knotted carrier bags.

Set yourself a target “I’d like to get at three bin liners for the charity shop” before you begin and try desperately to reach it.

Good luck and feel free to ask if you’ve any queries.

So far we’ve not really done a great deal, it’s been a slow gradual start. We’ve taken down some decorations, we’ve had a walk around the house with a clip board and pencil, we’ve made some list, perhaps taken some photos but we’ve not really rolled up our sleeves yet have we.

Well before that starts we need more little administrative task and then we’re off.

It’s all too easy when looking at a cluttered home to not know where to start. Every room is a mess, every cupboard is crammed, every item of laundry needs ironing and you’re already tired from looking at it before starting it. Well the truth is you have started it. When you signed up for this programme you started it so well done so far.

What every well run home needs is a routine, think of your home as you would a little business, because your home is your business. Run it as you might a little hotel, with systems and timetables, allocated days to do allocated jobs and lists of what is required to be in stock at all times.

Yes, during the coming year we’re going to do lots of de-cluttering, lots of heavy duty cleaning, lots or organising but there’s also maintenance. For example in April we’re focussing on the bathroom but this by no means means that you don’t need to clean your bathroom between now and April, and once you’ve done it in April you don’t need to do it again until next April. This will need doing at least once per week if you live alone, more often I’d say if you co-habit.

Later this month we’re focusing on the kitchen but of course you still need to do other chores around the home at the same time whilst focussing on the kitchen.

The first year is the hardest – but bare with me and you’ll be on top of things in no time. Once you have the clutter banished and the systems in place the home is a much simpler place to run.

This week as well as your audit you’re going to be coming up with a timetable for your daily, weekly and monthly maintenance programme. This is where an electronic diary is especially useful but if you don’t have access to one you can register for web-based one such as “Google calendar” or you can simply make a timetable similar to the kind you made at school with two columns: the days of the week down one side and the chore to the other.

If I give you an example of my daily, weekly and monthly chores it may help you to get a better understanding of what I mean. Remember, I like most of you, work full time, so all of my home chores are completed in the morning before going to work or in the evening when I get home before I settle down for the evening.

DAILY:

• 0730: Empty dishwasher (if started the previous evening)
• 0800: Make the bed before leaving for work
• 1800: Prepare dinner and tomorrow’s lunch
• 1900 > 2000: Clear away kitchen and load dishwasher and complete allocated chore depending on which day of the week it is (see below)
• 2300: Before going to bed straighten living room, fluff cushions, return any cups to the dishwasher and activate if full. Plan tomorrow’s outfit for work

WEEKLY:

• Monday: Iron all aired laundry and return to wardrobes, cupboards, drawers as necessary. Vacuum throughout
• Tuesday: Home filing and shredding, write any necessary cheques, sort recycling for tomorrow’s collection
• Wednesday: Clean kitchen, clean bathroom, mop all hard floors
• Thursday: Clear superficial clutter in living room and bedroom. Vacuum throughout
• Friday: An easy one as it’s Friday night (at least one load of laundry) then either fold ready to go on washing line tomorrow or spread out on clothes horse and place in spare bedroom to dry (ready for ironing on Monday)
  and so we repeat…
• Monday: Iron all aired laundry and return to wardrobes, cupboards, drawers as necessary. Vacuum throughout…

I know it seems like a lot but it’s only one hour per evening. I personally don’t watch any soaps, I get my chores done. I don’t know what time Eastenders/Corrie is on 1900/1930ish isn’t it but next time you’re home and you hear the theme music marking its end you’ll know that I’m just finishing for the evening now and I’m now relaxing for the rest of the evening knowing all my chores are done and the rest of the evening is mine to enjoy.

There are some chores that need to be done less regularly. For example:

• Every other Sunday I change my bed linen. I take it off on Sunday mornings and wash it, I replace it on Sunday afternoon after the bed has had a good airing and I add the clean linen to the ironing basket for Monday.
• The first Saturday of every month I clean my fridge (so twelve times per year)
• The second Saturday of every other month I clean my oven (so six times per year)
• The first Sunday in March, June, September and December I clean my windows inside and out (so only four times per year)

I don’t have to remember all of these things as they are diarised and I’m not constantly updating my diary either as I have them in auto repeat. Make full use of the repeat functions in your diary. I can help you with this if you get stuck.

So what I need you to do is come up with a simple daily (morning and evening) routine that will work for you and a simple weekly routine so that each evening you spend approximately one hour on domestic chores. Areas you will need to include are: the kitchen – the bathroom – vacuuming/mopping – home paperwork – laundry. Once you’ve done this start it with whichever chore you’ve allocated yourself for Tuesday. For example my recycling is collected on Wednesday mornings so I like to do my home paperwork and sort out my bins and recycling on Tuesdays so I can throw away all of the envelopes and shredded paper straight away.

The more sporadic chores like cleaning windows/ovens/fridges you can leave for now and we’ll return to those later.

Come up with a plan that works for you.

Good luck and remember – NO WIRE HANGERS!

Richard

Working around your house in an orderly fashion visit each room individually (including hallways, stairs and landing areas) and locate your dumping grounds or hot spots. Do you always keep things on top of your microwave that don’t belong there? Is your hall table always covered in a pile of post? Is there a pile of pizza/takeaway menus beside the front door? Do you have a pile of shoes at the foot of the bed? Do you have eleven half started bottles of shampoo/conditioner/body wash on the side of the bath.

Once you’ve found all of your clutter and listed it and it’s location you need to decide whether those items actually have a “home”.

Is the pile of towels on the bottom of the guest bed simply because you’ve not yet put them in the ottoman/airing cupboard, or is there no such home for them? Is there a box of light bulbs on top of the microwave because you replaced one last week and you’re yet to put the remainder from the packet away or do you not have an allocated drawer/cupboard/box for light bulbs, torches, batteries, fuses and such like?

Working around your home you’ll end up with a list. I prefer to divide the paper into four columns, the first is the room, the second names the clutter, the third states why and the fourth states the solution.

EG:

• spare bedroom > big pile of clean towels > dumped in there in hurried panic tidy up when niece came to visit > return to airing cupboard
• kitchen > half box of light bulbs on top of microwave > they have no allocated home > solution to be found (perhaps in the cupboard under the sink)
• bedroom > eleven pairs of shoes in a pile at the foot of the bed > the bottom of the wardrobe is currently full of shoes > can I loose a few pairs to make room for these?
• bathroom > nine started bottles of shampoo/conditioner/wash on the side of the bath > keep starting new > can I decant into a shampoo cocktail then buy NO MORE until these are used?
• hallway > big pile of pizza/Indian restaurant/kebab menus on hall table that I never use > they keep coming through the door > bin them and as they arrive continue to bin them
• hallway > big pile of pizza/Indian restaurant/kebab menus on hall table that I do use > first dumping ground as they arrive through the door > purge any you don’t use then find a home for them – how about hole punching them and keeping in a tiny ring binder next to the recipe books?
• living room > basket of laundry to be ironed > procrastination > get it ironed and put it away or put it away and iron as you wear it.

Continue like this until you have a full list. Once this is done you’ll discover not only the areas in your home that are cluttered but you’ll start thinking about why those items are out, where you’d like them to go and then the hidden areas (cupboards, shelves, units etc) that you need to clear out or purchase in order to allocate those items a home.

If your vacuum is always out on display in the hallway because there’s no room in your under-stairs cupboard, you need to find out what’s in the under-stairs cupboard. I helped a friend recently to clear out theirs and they found tins of sour paint, the wheels off of an old bike, an old TV stand, crates full of old paperwork and about 200 Sainsbury’s carrier bags. Once we’d sorted this out and about 80% of it went to the dump. there was room for not only their vacuum, but also their clothes horse, and mop and bucket that they used to constantly have out on display in their kitchen.

Now – get to it. I’m not saying you have to find all of these things homes instantly, this week, but by knowing what needs a home it’ll inspire you to throw away some of the clutter you are storing in cupboards to make room for what you do need.

That’s your home audit sorted, later this week we’ll be drafting timetables and establishing routines for the general maintenance of your home so you’ll need a diary, access to Outlook, iCal, a telephone/blackberry/PDA calendar or something like Google calendar.

Now get to it and remember - NO WIRE HANGERS.