A Data-Driven Approach to Deciding if It is Time to Update My Minimalist Closet

I used SQL to create tables and analyze my capsule closet to decide if I want to update my wardrobe with new items.

Project Summary

Project Links

Business Problem & Key Questions

Despite my friends and family saying I am a minimalist, I still am striving to practice better. One way I practice is with my wardrobe, so I created a 'capsule wardrobe.'

Before repurposing, donating items, or adding to my wardrobe, I have a few considerations:

• I want the average of items to be at least 2.5 years.

• I like to keep my current items for at least 3 years.

• I consider getting rid of the oldest items first (if there is no attachment/sentiment related to the item)

To decide if I should add new items, I need to answer the following questions :

1. On average, how long have I had the items in my capsule wardrobe?

2. What items have I owned for 3 years or more?

3. Which are the oldest items that I still frequently use?

Data Preparation

To get the information needed to run my analyses, I hand-wrote a list of items. Luckily, it was laundry day and I recently finished relocating so it was relatively easy to catalog.

This list included the following information for each item:

• name

• description

• category

• purpose

• number of years owned

• location

I then converted the list into a table using SQL

Below are 5 random rows from the created table:

To enhance readability and enable more analyses (if wanted), then created a few lookup tables. Two of them are below:

1. Category Table

   

2. Purpose Table

After creating these new tables, I updated the original table with the new information using the foreign keys. I did these in separate steps for demonstrative purposes.

Update with CategoryLookup:

Update with Purpose Lookup:

Here is a snippet of the updated table:

Approach

After engineering the tables to ensure they had all the information needed, the analysis was straightforward. Below are the queries I ran to answer the key questions:

1. Find the average # of years I’ve owned all the items in my wardrobe.

2. What items have I owned for 3 years or more?

3. What are the oldest items in my capsule wardrobe?

Results & Key Takeaways

I plan on going shopping soon!

I’ve owned 10 out of the 20 items in my capsule closet for over three years.

I can look for items like shirts, outerwear, and accessories since I've had items in the category for more than 2.5 years! I have held my shirts and outwear for a long enough time. I can add a few shirts and maybe a new hoodie to my wardrobe.

The oldest items are my Batman chucks and my white pocketed t-shirt. I’ve owned both items for 5 years. The white t-shirt can transition to a hair-drying towel; I do not plan on getting rid of my Batman chucks (EVER!).