Fall 2023 Footwear Review: Have I Got Shoes For You

It’s time for my semi-annual footwear review and inventory update and have I got shoes for you! No, really, I’ve got a lot of shoes so brace yourself for the updated stats and details.

Space for my vast footwear collection is limited and not really well laid out for my storage needs.  The entirety of it includes some not so easy to access locations, mainly high shelves that require a stepladder to reach as well as some back-of-the-closet ones. Also, the space is located in two different closets as well as in a shelving unit in our bedroom.

Due to this configuration and having faced similar inadequacies in previous homes, I make it a habit to “rotate” my footwear twice a year as the warm days of Summer give way to Fall and when Spring emerges after the dark of Winter. In doing so, I place the footwear that I’m most likely to want to wear in the upcoming months in the most accessible and visible locations. The out-of-season items are relegated to the high shelves and the other less easy-to-reach areas in my closets. I provided a more detailed description and photos of my current storage setup in this April 2022 post, Last Week, This Week: The Ol’ Closet Switcheroo.

As I’ve already alluded to, the quantity of my footwear may also play a part in my closet space limitation problem. Last Fall, I did a significant purge (see Fall 2022 Footwear Review: What’s Out, What’s In), but I still had quite the collection, and the overall count hasn’t changed much since. The first time I’d ever done an actual count of my footwear was during my Fall 2021 rotation.

I’m quite methodical in my process. After pulling out all of my footwear from their respective locations, I  sort them by the 12 categories I use for tracking and I tally up the counts. Those counts are then compared and reconciled to the ones from the previous closet switcheroo. I make note of new items since the previous tally was done as well. In the past, there were times when it all totaled up okay, and sometimes there were differences that I couldn’t account for. And then this past Spring, I had an epiphany.

You can call it a new level of left-brain crazy but I went and created a footwear inventory spreadsheet in Excel. Why I hadn’t thought of it before is a puzzlement considering all of the spreadsheets, charts, and graphs for numerous purposes that I’ve created in my life. My footwear inventory spreadsheet has a fairly simple format with just six columns; brand, category, color, description, date bought, and cost. Having it made doing this past update so much easier and go so much faster.

The 12 categories are shown in the summary table below; the style descriptions are just a few words that help to distinguish them from others. As for the date bought, I have receipts for about 75% saved in their respective boxes. For those that I no longer have the receipt, I was able to look up some in my purchase history at a few stores. For the rest, I used a placeholder with the date of January 1 in the year I am fairly certain that they were bought.

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As seen in the table above, my current tally is 93 which is not too far off from the last count of 90. And, this is after accounting for 7 outgoing pairs and 10 new acquisitions. From my inventory spreadsheet, I can report that over 1/3 of my shoes are fully or predominately black and about 1/6 are a white/beige neutral. Additionally, over 1/3 (36 to be exact) of my footwear are boots of some kind.

The primary reasons behind the selection of the 7 outgoing pairs of shoes were not comfortable/didn’t wear and in unrepairable condition. What a huge shock I got when I opened the boxes of my then 2 “careerish pumps” to find both pairs nearly covered in a white fuzz. I’ve come to learn that this white fuzz is actually a type of mold that is not all that uncommon, especially in damper climates. I’d hoped to clean them up using some instructions I’d found online but it wasn’t just a spot or two, the shoes were fully covered.

Into the trash bin they went. Those shoes had been the last of the footwear I would regularly wear to work so I was a little sad to part with them but it seemed to be the wise course of action. All my other shoes got a thorough inspection and thankfully, no others had been affected/infected. I had a dozen or so small desiccant packets saved from other packaging that I distributed into some of the shoe boxes and I’ve recently ordered a bunch more via Amazon.

Not the end of the mold story, though. Two days ago it was a little chilly in our home so I grabbed one of the chunky cardigans that are stored on a shelf above where those shoes had been. It had an odd, musty aroma that seemed familiar and then it occurred to me that it was the same smell as the shoes. Nearly all of my other sweaters on that shelf and the ones above had the same aroma to some degree (and it wasn’t BO) so they all got washed with vinegar added to the rinse cycle. I’m happy to report that all come through the decontamination just fine and there are no causalities on that front. Those shelves have also been cleaned and large moisture-absorbing desiccant bags are now hanging in both of my closets.

A few of the 10 new acquisitions made their maiden appearance in posts published in the past few months. Those posts include Back In Style: The Denim Skirt, Maxi-Mizing Style: Magnificent 8 Collaboration, Au Naturel: A Style I Adopted Many Years Ago Is Now Trending, and The Summer Of My Discontent. A couple others have been worn just not yet seen on the blog and I’ll be getting around to the rest in short order.

As for the details on my current outfit, you might recognize the top (at least what you can see of it) as it is one of the items in this month’s Style Remix: Varsity Rules collection. The black/white floral skirt is the wildcard item for the collection that hadn’t yet been shown. My distressed denim jacket was a DIY project I did about 5 years ago on a $5 thrift store find and my cross-body purse was also a secondhand purchase made several years ago. I bought my boots about 4 years ago and have only worn them a few times. This is a shortcoming that I will be rectifying in the coming months.

Unlike previous ones, this latest footwear review hasn’t really led me to any greater insights into the changes that are occurring in my style. However, I do see that I’m moving forward as it’s evolving. How have your wardrobe choices evolved and what changes have you made to your closet lately? Have there been any shocking discoveries?

Stay well and let’s keep in touch! Subscribe, tweet, follow, friend, pin … all options are available. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

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Note: This is an unsponsored post; however, some or all of the links to clothing items are associated with an affiliate program where I earned a few cents for each click.

Photo credit: MMPerez