More thoughts on wardrobe orphans

ORPHANS
Wardrobe orphans tend to exist because they are an unusual colour and/or print. If you really love print and texture you can end up with a lot of things which are individually quite nice but very hard to make into outfits. (I'm not going to include special occasion wear with sequins or whatever here as they are a separate problem, I keep my really dressy stuff down one end of the wardrobe and mostly don't include it in these adventures).

NEUTRAL PIECES
The answer for a lot of these more difficult items is to make sure you have some neutral garments which can be used with your more unusual item.
Things in this category for me would be
plain knit tops/plain blouse in white or ivory
plain trousers in black, navy or taupe
plain dark wash jeans
denim jacket
dark gry or taupe cardigan

These items on their own are fairly dull but they can be great with something more unusual.

PRINT
Let's say you have fallen in love with some beautiful print fabric and made a lovely summer skirt. Add a simple top or tee in white, ivory or a colour from the print, plus a jacket in another neutral or a colour.

Use a search phrase like 'Floral Skirt Outfit' to get ideas.

COLOUR
Or let's say you've bought or sewn something in a new colour which you found exciting - for example Pantone greenery

And then realise you have no idea what you would wear it with.
Image search for 'Pantone Greenery Outfits' and see what comes up

For me another rich avenue is to go through my scarves, necklaces, print tops and print yardage and see what I have.
In my case I would find this top

And lots of green necklaces, maybe some scarves and be able to go from there.

I hope this gives you some ideas.