While we all swear by our ritual of spring cleaning, there’s something to be said about Marie Kondo-ing your home prior to the winter too. The fall and winter seasons are famous for encouraging cozy nights indoors spent with family and friends or working on new collections in celebration of news seasons to come. Therefore, creating a little more space to enjoy the long nights and crisp days, comes highly recommended.

As you empty your wardrobe of its contents and heap it all on to your bed, you’re guaranteed to find a few mis-buys, fashion fails from past eras and a few pieces that have seen better days: unfashionably ripped jeans, fading t-shirts and more than one odd sock. While you’re sorting through your clothes, you may as well brave your vanity table or the edge of your bathtub too – two places where years’ worth of beauty and makeup products accumulate quickly. Time to get rid of all those dried up mascara containers and brushes and those gross-looking and foul-smelling powder boxes you no longer use but haven’t parted with!

When our minds are set on clearing space and ridding ourselves of all the things that “no longer bring us joy”, it can be difficult to think of ways to breathe new life into garments and objects we had mentally already scrapped as garbage. The only way we can work towards a sustainable environment, however, is by correcting the way we discard the products we bought into in the first place – whether they are clothes, beauty products or our children’s toys.

If you’re about to embrace the pre-winter clear-out extravaganza, here are five fun effective ways to recycle your clothes, homeware and beauty products.

Put Those Pots, Bottles & Other Containers to Good Use

Let’s be honest – the main reason you’re still hanging on to Boadicea The Victorious’ Blue Sapphire-Pure bottle, is because it looks amazing on your vanity table. Even though you’ve used its scent up years ago, you can’t seem to part with the striking blue bottle and its luxurious gold designs. Well we’ve got good news for you: you don’t have to. Instead, repurpose it as a mini flower vase or a mini candleholder for your altar of pretty things and meditative tools.

It’s not just the perfume bottles that can be reused. Think of all the amazing perfume bottles that come with funky, intricate lids that look like little sculptures. Anna Sui’s La Vie de Bohéme, which features a golden, butterfly screw-top is an excellent example of lids you could reuse as a knob for your cupboard or wardrobe; you could also stick it on a wooden or metal pole and use it as an eye-catching feature in your vegetable patch, or to cover a cork-top with to give that bottle of wine a creative touch when you serve it to guests.

Don’t get rid of all those black Lush pots you’ve been collecting over the years either. You can rinse and return them to your local Lush shop in exchange for a free face mask or reuse them for your own, homemade balms and creams. Never get rid of mascara brushes either – small-animal sanctuaries are always in need of them to care for tiny critters such as rabbits, guinea pigs and rats.

What to Do with Old Bedding and Towels

When it comes to getting rid of old bedding and towels, we find ourselves tempted to get rid of them once and for all – just chuck ‘em in the bin and be done with them. Thing is – we usually end up regretting it because there are always moments when an old blanket or an assortment of raggedy old towels could come in handy. Why use your stain-free and super-soft living-room blanket for picnics when you could use an old bedsheet instead? Why use up all your good towels when you’re defrosting the fridge when you could use a stack that is expressly reserved for that purpose?

More importantly – think of all the people and organizations who are in desperate need of towels and bedding, even if you yourself consider them raggedy and no longer useful. Whether you decide to drop them off at homeless shelters or animal protection centers, you can rest assured that they will be put to good use and will get at least a few people or animals through the winter.

Give Old Clothes & Homeware a New Life

The possibilities for upcycling your old clothes and giving them a new life are endless. Whether you’re looking to add some colours to your boring old winter coat by sewing on designs and embroidery you cut out from an old skirt or t-shirt or are already thinking ahead for next summer by turning long jeans into sexy daisy-dukes: there are so many ways to repurpose old clothes! All you need is the right idea and a bit of creativity. In many cases, you don’t even need to know how to sew – there are plenty of upcycling projects that require little more than a bit of fabric glue and/or the right folding and cutting techniques.

As for the homeware and broken appliances that have been piled up in the far corner of your basement, there are plenty of things you can do to repurpose them rather than throwing them out. Turn that old retro TV of yours into your own little cocktail bar display or a fake aquarium that’ll be sure to become your living-room’s center piece. If you’d rather fill it with greenery, you can just as well turn it into a quirky little planter on your balcony. And what about that bread-bin that has become useless to you since you swore off the gluten? Use it as a lovely little shelf on your wall or a place to store your art and craft supplies. If your mailbox is too small to hold all your fan-mail and monthly magazine subscriptions, an old bread box can easily be converted to offer all the space you need for your mail.