Clearing out the stash

Since I moved in to my apartment almost six years ago I have had all my fabrics in a cupboard in my hall. Quite high and with plenty of shelves, but of course through the years it's been filled up with fabrics, pieces here and there and stuff like that, so the last few months it's been bursting. I've had to more or less force the fabrics into the shelves, and to be honest I haven't had any overview of what fabrics I actually have.

Today I was finally fed up with the situation and decided to go through the whole stash and see what I could get rid of, or if simply folding the fabrics neatly would help in getting me more space.

cleared out fabrics

 At first it was hard, but then got into the groove and started to be able to put fabrics in the "get rid of"pile. These are the kinds of fabrics I've decided to get rid of:

• Small scraps. If I can't see myself getting anything useful out of them, then they shouldn't take up space.. For example I had a lot of cotton cut up to be ruffles and flounces, but I haven't added them, and today I wouldn't use those kind of fabrics for ruffles. 
• Ugly fabrics. Through the years I have gotten quite a lot of pieces of fabrics from people, after all I like to sew and then I must love getting more fabric. I have also bought some hideous things, and there was a while when I thought I actually could look good in big patterns. I've found an UFO in the pile that proves that if I had finished that dress in that print I would have looked like an 90-year old elephant.
• Polyester satins. When I started sewing I thought that polyester satins were the thing you could make nice costumes out of, after all that was the only thing available in the local stores. Now I hate working with those kind of fabrics so I'm throwing them out.
• Muslin/bed sheats I've always asked my mother to get her old bedlinens when she's bought new ones, so that I can use them for muslins and trying out patterns. I found so many of them in all of my shelves that I've now decided that I will not allow myself to have more than one shelf with that kind of test fabrics.

newly organised stash

This is my new stash. Previously the shelves were ordered by colour, but now I've instead decided to have them by fabric type.

• Top left. Natural coloured fabrics in natural fibres. Mostly leftovers from my tusken and jawa projects, but I can see use of them for historical projects as well.
• Top right. Special fabrics. Here I have lace fabrics, batting, vinyl, felt and faux leather.

Then from the top down

• Muslin and cheap cottons. These are the fabrics that I will use for testing patterns and draping. I've decided that I'm not allowed to let them grow out of this shelf.
• Satins and shinies. I didn't get rid of all my satins. I kept the heavier duchess satins and those in the most beautiful colours
• Knits and jerseys. I found a lot more jerseys than I remember that I had I normally don't work in jersey, but if I have them easily visible I might get inspired to use them. The big white piece is the material for my new classic princess Leia gown.
• Wools and suiting fabrics. I even found a piece of plaid wool so I might have something for the HSF plaid challenge now.
• Silks and brocades. These are the really beautiful pure silks and brocades that I have gotten through the years. They include quite a lot of fabrics that I've gotten as presents when family members have been in Asia.
• Velvets and chiffon. It's hardly visible but I've put my velvet and chiffon fabrics in the bottom.

Now I'm going to gather the useable pieces so that I can give them to the local second hand store, I don't want to throw them away in the trash, and then I only need to make sure that I can keep the stash ordered even if I get more fabrics. I've tried to keep not fill up the shelves so that there will be space for new aquisitions.