Adventures in Polishland

Happy Wednesday! If you’ve been following my blog this year, you’ll know I decided to really focus on decluttering my nail polish collection. I absolutely love nail polish, and have been very fortunate over my four years of blogging to grow a large collection through purchases and project reviews. That being said, my collection was getting out of hand for me. I can’t even tell you how big it got, but a safe estimate is nearly 700 nail polishes. I decided it was time to really declutter my stash to include only those nail polishes that I absolutely love and will use. This declutter project has been going well, and now it’s time to share an update with all of you on my progress!

First things first, I want to quickly mention the steps I’ve taken thus far to declutter my collection. The very first thing I did was a KonMari style of decluttering with my own spin. I sat down with my entire collection and held each polish in my hands, asking myself if I wanted to keep the polish or declutter it. This helped me get rid of a good group of polishes, and prompted me to do Manicure March, where I tried out polishes I wasn’t sure whether or not to keep. The next step I took was the nail polish comparison stage. You have seen many Dare to Compare posts on the blog over the last few months. That really helped me clear out my stash even more, and this is the place I am at right now.

So, let’s discuss numbers. I did a quick count of the polishes I’ve decluttered this year and the polishes that remain in my collection. I have let go about 200 nail polishes so far, which is amazing! However, I still own about 480 nail polishes. I cannot believe how many polishes I still own. Even though I am a blogger who often reviews nail polish, this number is way too high for me. I know I will be moving again in the near future, and it is not fun to move with polish. I also know that it isn’t possible for me to get true use out of this number. I still need to cut down a great deal.

I also wanted to quickly mention my life changes throughout this decluttering process. I decided in June to switch over to a vegan lifestyle, and unfortunately many of the polishes I own and love are not vegan. At this point I am comfortable with keeping non-vegan polishes in my collection, but I will obviously no longer be purchasing non-vegan polishes, nor will I accept any for review.

Now it’s time to talk about what happens next. You may have noticed that during Manicure March and in all of my Dare to Compare posts I never mentioned my most-owned brand – Zoya. I decided that Zoya will act as my ‘control’ brand in my collection. I am keeping all of the polishes from Zoya because they are great quality and have a vast color palette. I will now be comparing all of my other polishes to the Zoyas in my collection, and might share some of that process on the blog!

All in all, I’m very happy that I’ve buckled down and made real progress decluttering my nail polish collection. I know this might not be extremely relatable, as my collection grew thanks to my years of blogging. Nonetheless, I hope you find this inspirational whether you are trying to cut down your beauty stash or any other part of your life. I know it can be difficult to let go of things that you love, especially when there are memories connected to those things. At the end of the day I know functionality is most important, and I am constantly working towards making my life more organized. Please let me know in the comments if you’ve been decluttering your life, and how your progress has been. We can cheer each other on as we continue the process!